Monday 15 July 2013

Metabolic Profile: Burner Breakdown & What Your Plate Should Look Like


Hi Bootcampers! If you haven’t already head on over and take the quiz to find out what type of burner you are! We included the password in your weekly email!

Eating for your metabolism is a quick way to boost your energy, fight hunger and cravings and lose fat. Most of us don’t even realize that we should be eating a certain way in order to optimize our bodies.  We think that feeling sluggish, exhausted, bloated, constipated etc, etc. is normal, and we combat these feelings with coffee, or Pepto-Bismol rather than addressing the real issues of why are bodies are reacting the way that they are.  In an ideal environment your body would be full or energy, regular, and not puffy all of the time. Well one of the things that the Metabolic profile does is allow you to discover the way in which your body burns food and HOW this should impact the way and the things that you are eating. 

There are 3 types of burners, Sugar Burners, Muscle Burners and Mixed Burners and everyone will fit into one of these three categories.  Let’s take a peek into what each of these profiles really means:

The Sugar Burner

Sugar burners tend to be overweight, often obese from a young age, and easily develop metabolic resistance. It is very difficult for them to lose fat; the traditional low-calorie diet and aerobic-exercise regimen actually worsens the problem. Sugar burners have a primary defect in insulin metabolism and tend to either overproduce and/or be resistant to the action of this powerful fat-storing hormone.
Sugar burners store fat all over their bodies, not just in one spot. They often look puffy and somewhat waterlogged. Their diets are high in carbohydrates - often up to 70 percent - from pasta, bread and potatoes. Sugar burners crave sweets, coffee and chocolate, which may make them feel good for a short 10 to 30 minutes spurt, but quickly leave them feeling lethargic and tired. Sugar burners tend to eat constantly. Headaches often occur during exercise. They can have difficulty falling asleep at night and find it just as hard to get out of bed in the morning. Finally, sugar burners tend to be procrastinators, frequently suffer from fatigue and depression and are at increased risk for diabetes, heart disease and other illnesses.

If you’re a sugar burner, you’re body has become very inefficient at burning fat for energy and relies almost exclusively on sugar. Your predominant hormone balance turns off fat-burning enzymes while enhancing sugar-burning and fat-storing enzymes. Hormonally, you likely have elevated cortisol and insulin hormones to the point of hormone resistance (making you a very inefficient use of fat and forcing your body to burn sugar instead). Also, your body is probably not getting the signal the hunger hormone leptin is sending. You feel hungry all the time and have frequent food cravings (foods rich in sugar and fat). You may have diabetes or hypothyroidism in your family.

The good news: you probably have plenty muscle on your body. Good because muscle tissue is a prime mover of hormonal metabolism. Exercising and eating appropriately will trigger your hormonal fat-burning machinery. The body burns what you feed it. Switch your nutritional choices to PROTEIN, FIBER and the right FATS and the body will shift from using sugar to burning fat.

Every single time you eat according to your ‘proper plate’, you’ll set into motion a hormonal software program that will elevate fat burning in the body.

The Mixed Burner

Mixed burners use sugar and fat as their sources of fuel, and their lifestyle choices largely determine whether they burn sugar or fat. If they stay up too late, they are tired. If they work too hard, they get sick. If they overindulge in food and drink, they gain weight. Most of the people who come to us are mixed burners and their metabolic tendencies are influenced by their chosen lifestyles. High-carbohydrate diets, sedentary lifestyles, and especially stress push these individuals into a sugar-burning state that causes them to gain fat. Menopause and andropause (a loss of male hormones such as testosterone as men age) can also trigger the fat-storing, muscle-burning state. When it comes to food, they can skip meals without feeling hungry, yet often have cravings. The low-calorie diets that worked for them at a younger age lose their effectiveness over time. Calorie-counting diets and aerobic-based exercises programs are effective for a few weeks, but once they stop, they weight they lost returns as quickly as it came off and they regain more fat and lose muscle each time.

As a mixed sugar and fat burner, you have an advantage over sugar and muscle burners. By changing what you eat, your hormonal signals trigger a fat-burning mode. You naturally have a well-regulated metabolism, are probably not too thin nor overweight and have a good amount of muscle on your body.

To push your metabolism into a higher state of fat burning, you’ll need to regulate your metabolic fire with sugar/ starch foods that are burned slowly (low-GI) while providing plenty of protein to maintain your muscle mass. Enjoy steel cut oats, brown rice and baked potatoes with their skins. AVOID bread, pasta and sweets.

The Muscle Burner

Muscle burners are the envy of their friends. They tend to be thin, even though it seems as if they can eat anything they want. Despite their thin appearance, they have little, if any, muscle tone and loose, sagging skin. We call these people ‘skinny-fat’ because they have a low muscle-to-fat ratio. They burn sugar from muscle tissue due to an over- secretion of the stress hormones cortisol, adrenaline, and noradrenaline. This gives them energy and can often make them high-strung and anxious.

Muscle burners are generally driven, type-A people who are always on the go. They prefer repetitive exercise like running or riding the elliptical trainer, which helps rid them of some nervous energy. They have difficult staying asleep at night and will sometimes wake repeatedly or sleep very lightly. Muscle burners crave sweets. They may have a few cocktails or wine at end of the day to calm themselves down. These lifestyle choices can wreak havoc on their bodies. They tend to have weak digestive systems and frequently suffer from irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), ulcers and gastro-esophagel reflux disease. Muscle burners often suffer from anxiety, attention disorders, mood swings, colds and flus, and wild high and low swings in blood sugar.

Muscle burners are often high-string, type-A people who seem to run on ‘nervous energy’. They release a larger amount of stress hormones (cortisol and adrenaline). They tend to be think in their youth but often develop that ‘skinny-fat’ look that appears to be thin though their bodies are flabby, with an unfavourable muscle-to-fat ratio. Any pronounced fat storage is concentrated around their belly. They often skip breakfast.

Muscle burners can often go for long periods (3-6 hours) without eating and may suffer from anxiety. Diabetes, loose connective tissue, osteoporosis, arthritis, sarcopenia and fibromyalgia are often consequences for muscle burners who yo-yo diet and don’t eat properly.

Muscle burners need to balance out the biochemical overdrive created by the adrenal hormones adrenaline, nor-adrenalin and cortisol. High amounts of these hormones break down muscle tissue to supply the body with sugar. It’s crucial to eat a balanced diet of protein and fat for a steady supply of energy (hence, why breakfast is so important). Once the nutritional hormonal inputs are corrected, the body will begin to spare its muscle stores and burn fat more readily, leading to an overall toned body and more consistent energy.

For a more in-depth and specific look into what you should be eating check out the resources page for each of these burner types on our resources page.  In the meantime – here is a quick snapshot of what each of the Burner’s plates should look like to maximize fat loss, increase energy and fight your hunger and cravings!



Have a great week!


Source for all information and images:




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