Well it is that time of year again, you are a little pale and the spare tire is a little bit bigger than it was in the fall and now you want to lose some weight and look better in those skin showing summer clothes. What you need is a plan and a bit of a change in schedule.

Here is a simple list of things that you can do starting today to make sure that you are buff and ready as the summer and summer activities come in a couple of months.

Eat Smarter

The key to a healthy diet plan is to eat smarter than before. Over the winter you may have been eating a little badly, keeping on track but cheating. Now is the time to start eating in a very structured and focused way.

No matter how you have been eating you must now start eating every couple or three hours. Really this just means toad snacks, good for you snacks. Let’s say that you eat breakfast at 8, lunch at 12, dinner at 6. Now all you have to do is add snacks (really just smaller meals) at 10 am, 3 pm and 8 pm. Now you must be wondering, what you should be eating.

The next important thing is to be sure to eat smaller meals and small snacks. The idea of eating so often is that your body will be better able to use the food that you are eating and a side effect of this is that it will raise your metabolism.

Raise the protein, drop the carbohydrates

What you eat is the next thing that is important. You should get a good idea of what is a carb based food and what is a protein based food and we all know what is fatty and these high fat foods should be avoided when you are trying to lose weight.

I said that you need to eat small meals but most importantly you need to make sure that you have lots of protein and less carbohydrates than you are used to. This may be initially harder than you expect but in the end this adjustment will pay great dividends in having a healthy diet plan for summer.

Stay hydrated when you exercise

When you are working out you will want to of course drink water and sports drinks so that you can keep not only your liquids up but the magic of sports drinks like Gatorade is that they bring back the electrolytes that you are losing by sweating. Getting dehydrated will drop your energy and in the end will stop your body from functioning normally.

These steps to a healthy diet plan will make a big difference this spring and summer to make you healthier and more fit.

Thanks for visiting. To get started why not subscribe to the 21 day fitness plan at the top of this page. Look in the red box, it is right there.. Thanks Bill

A couple of days ago my son was not eating his dinner and my daughter piped in

“Jaiden eat the chicken, it has protein, it will give you energy”

I cringed a little but this myth has gotten legs over the years. If you are tired and need energy nothing can beat a big steak.

In fact this idea is not at all true. Carbohydrates are the choice of energy sources in the body the fact is that the simpler the carb the more likely your body is to break it down and use it. The way that I look at energy sources your body will use the following in order; glycogen stores in your muscles, sugar, starch, and then equally protein and fat.

Many people on a diet will try to cut down on all of their carbs and will try to lose weight. This works initially because the body uses up all of the easy to get carbs and then will then move on to eating away at fat and protein. After a while you will get tired as your body will be really craving some kind of simple carbs for energy and it is a struggle for your body to use protein and fat as quick energy sources. This problem is even more of a problem when you exercise as there are no easy ways to get energy for your workouts.

So now you see why I am always writing about how important it is to get protein in your diet, not for the energy but more to counteract your body eating away at the protein in your muscles as well as the fat on your body when trying to lose weight. Your goal should be to look healthy not to look starved and muscleless.

So yes your body can use protein for energy buy mostly as a last resort. The problem is that when losing weight your body will use the protein in your muscles for energy as well as the fat in your body. But it will not use that steak right away.

Well I have to preface this post with a warning that what I am about to write about is a high fat high calories snack that anyone trying lose weight will want to always avoid.

Okay, Peanuts and raisins. This is a great snack for people that have trouble gaining weight and people that are tying to bulk up. I know that most people are not too interested in bulking up, instead they will want to lose weight. I remember back a few years working out a lot with weights and having friends that could not gain muscle trying anything to get the calories needed. Read the rest of this entry »

Are you hungry because you’re fat, or are you fat because you’re hungry? This is no chicken-or-the-egg question. To some degree, at least, you are hungry because you’re fat. You have more body area and that means greater surface to radiate heat and call for calories.

That being the case, foods which satisfy your hunger fastest will help you to cut down comfortably on your calories. Nutritionists call the hunger-satisfying properties of foods “satiety value.” Satisfying foods are those that remain longest in the stomach and small intestine, demanding the most vigorous attention from the digestive machinery.

Meat is the most satisfying of all foods, containing extractives that stimulate the stomach to highest activity. Milk ranks next to meat in satiety value; whole milk is more satisfying than skim milk. Fish is slightly less satisfying than meat because usually it contains less fat. Read the rest of this entry »

People hate dieting because it deprives them of their favorite foods (read fatty and junk foods). When you start dieting, you will inevitably have tough times during the first few days when you reel under the pressure of hunger. Just think about it - you used to eat every now and then and now that you are dieting, you got to restrict your food intake. Obviously your body is quite surprised at the change of food habits but hey, there are ways you can make sure you can diet for a long time without troubling your body! In this article I will give you five tips to lose weight effectively!

1. Remove Sugary Foods from your kitchen. Do a search in your kitchen as well as the refrigerator and make sure there is no food left there that has high sugar content. Sugar or sucrose easily converts into carbohydrates once it enters into body. And as a matter of fact, unused carbohydrates are easily turned into fat by the body. You therefore, as a rule, should avoid sugar and sugar-rich foods. Read the rest of this entry »

One interesting line I heard once has stuck with me for years when it comes to carbohydrates,

“If it is white, don’t eat it”

Well that may be true for a few reasons that I wanted to cover today. When we eat carbs they tend to come in all colors, fruit has all sorts of colors, vegetables have all sorts of colors and bread, rice and potatoes some in one color often and that is white.

So why should we avoid all of those white carbohydrates? There are two ways that colored carbs are better than white carbs but I don;t think that we really ever hear why…so I will tell you now Read the rest of this entry »

Another article on the South Beach Diet?

I am a bit of a fan of the South Beach Diet, well as much as I can anyway. I still believe that good common sense should beat out good marketing. The South Beach diet is one of the most popular on the planet right now and it is hard to open up people magazine or entertainment weekly without a reference to south Beach somewhere.

The South Beach Diet is essentially an eating plan that holds the principle that one must eat the right carbohydrates and right fats in order to have a healthy life full of vitality and a great looking body. Consequently, what you eat; and indeed what foods are good and what are bad for you, is a paramount principle in the South Beach Diet.

In the South Beach Diet plan, you must eat the right carbohydrates and the right fats. South Beach Diet plan is very trendy, with a lot of people following it these days. Although a lot of people consider the South Beach Diet as a popular diet, many are still not aware about the foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet.

The first thing you need to know are the principles of the South Beach Diet, so that you can then fully understand the foods that are good and bad for you. The South Beach Diet is specifically divided into three different phases. Each phase has its own distinction and limitation. However, knowing the foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet requires a great focus on the phase one of the diet. Why? The foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet are largely stated in Phase one.

The first phase of the South Beach Diet is considered to be the most challenging and strict phase of the diet, because there are so many foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet� first phase. The main foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet particularly in the first phase are beef rib steaks, honey-baked ham, breast of veal, all yogurts, ice cream, milk including whole, low-fat, soy, and full fat cheeses, beets, carrots, corn, yams, fruits and fruit juices, all alcohol.

It is also essential to remember that aside from those foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet, there are also some sorts that are included in the foods to generally avoid in the South Beach Diet and these include all starchy foods such as bread, cereal, oatmeal, matzo, rice, pasta, pastries and baked goods among other similar foods.

What then are the foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet?

So the foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet are really carbohydrates. It is recommended to avoid carbohydrates on the South Beach Diet for so many reasons. The main theory behind this reasoning is that once weight decreases, the followers of the diet begin to metabolize carbohydrates properly and the longing for carbohydrates will consequently disappear.

In the South Beach Diet it is also recommended that the dieter must to eat three balanced meals a day, and to eat enough so that the dieter does not feel hungry all the time. It is estimated that on average, the expected weight loss which a dieter can achieve during the phase one of the diet is eight to thirteen pounds.

On the second phase of the South Beach diet, basically the foods that were barred during the first phase are now allowed in this second phase. It is recommended that the dieters remain on phase two and continue losing weight until they have reached their weight goal. As far as how long it actually takes to lose the weight, that really depends on how much the dieter wants to lose.

The third and last phase of the South Beach diet is one where one continues maintaining good eating habits for the rest of the dieter�s life. By this stage, the dieter would have adopted the South Beach diet plan as their natural eating habit for life.

By simply following the South Beach Diet, you can achieve your best body weight. You can be healthy for life and also have a great looking body. By knowing the foods to avoid on the South Beach Diet, you can achieve any weight and fitness goals you may have.

People are getting ready for summer, losing weight and getting toned up. Losing weight is a huge challenge, and in most cases, it helps to follow some diet plan while trying to lose weight.

Today, the South Beach diet plan is widely followed by many dieters. However, quite unlike other popular diets, the South Beach diet is neither a low-carb diet nor a low-fat diet. Basically, the South Beach diet plan teaches dieters to eat the right carbohydrates and the right fats. By avoiding “bad” foods, then one can be healthy and fit.

What is the South Beach Diet?

It is however noteworthy that despite its popularity, the South Beach diet plan is not normally fully understood.
So, what is the South Beach diet plan? What is all about it � what are its principles?

The South Beach diet plan was in fact developed by Dr. Arthur Agatston after the truth that some of his patients were having little success by using the said to be conventional low carb, high fat diet plans like the Atkins diet.

Dr. Arthur Agatston, being then a cardiologist, decided to formulate a diet that will lead to a healthy heart � and the South Beach diet plan was created.

Based on the testimony of Dr. Agatston, since the introduction of the South Beach diet plan, many people who followed the South Beach diet plan actually lost an average of 13.6 pounds almost double the 7.5 pounds lost by those who use the strict “Step II” of the American Heart Association (AHA) diet.

In addition, it was also found that with the use of the South Beach diet plan many people showed to have greater decreases in their waist-to-hip ration and triglycerides, and their good to bad cholesterol ratio even improved more.

The South Beach diet plan is not considered as a low carbohydrate diet. This is because the idea behind the South Beach diet plan is to lose weight in a way that is healthy and sustainable for those who follow it.

A lot of people are now realizing the importance of being healthy and fit; thus dieting has become very popular as people seek to maintain healthy bodies. While the dieters are increasingly looking for the way to lose weight, there has also been many diet plans that have been developed. Some of these diets have been more effective and popular than others.

The South Beach Diet is the latest in the series of the diet fads. As a lot of people who hear about the excitement about this diet, they ask: What is the South Beach Diet? What is involved in the South Beach Plan?

As the search for the best diet program continues, the number of diets to select from in today�s society also increases. Now there the low-fat diets, low-carbohydrate diets, reduced-calorie diets, and low protein diets, and the list goes on. A South Beach Diet plan is the most recent contender. The South Beach Diet plan has amazingly taken the whole continent of America by storm and is set to have an impact world wide.

Why should you do South Beach diet?

With all the various diets to choose from, how is a dieter going know which one is the best diet? Knowing the basic facts of the diet is the starting point. So, what actually is the South Beach Diet plan?

The South Beach diet is very different from any other forms of diet plans. Why? It is mainly for the fact that the South Beach diet system does not rely on the low carbohydrates or low fat like other main diets.

Instead, the main purpose of the South Beach diet system is to discipline people, especially the dieters to rely on the right carbohydrates and fat. The South Beach Diet plan is also designed to teach the people on how to avoid the food items that are �worst� for their bodies.

The South Beach Diet plan is in fact a diet program that is generally set for a healthy body. The most significant principle of the plan is that teaches you to rely on the right kinds of carbohydrates and the right types of fats to maintain health and facilitate weight loss. These particular groups are considered as the �good� carbs and fats. By eating the �good� food items and avoiding the �bad� ones, then you can lose weight and keep healthy.

The South Beach Diet plan is further contrasted from one of the hottest diet plan that also swept the continent of America and worldwide � the Atkins Diet. Unlike the Atkins Diet plan, the South Beach system does not entail removing a particular food group. Whereas the Atkins Diet relies primarily on the no carbs and limitless proteins and fats, this diet plan seems to be rooted around a balanced and healthy eating regime. You get to eat what is �good� for you and avoid what is �bad�.

Carbohydrates in the South Beach Diet

Within the principles of the South Beach Diet, the good carbohydrates such as whole grains, fruit and vegetables, are highly recommended, as are unsaturated fats. In the South Beach Diet plan, proper form of exercise and healthy eating plans are not a critical necessity. For this reason, some people have expressed concern with the South Beach Diet Plan, since it is a proven fact that exercise helps speed up the process of losing weight.

Numerous studies have shown that the South Beach Diet plan can aid to reduce cholesterol as well as to minimize the risk of cardiovascular problems. Satisfying the hunger is a big part for the South Beach Diet plan, as it requires both determination and willpower.

Basically, the South Beach Diet teaches you how to eat healthily, to include good carbs and fats in your meals. This ensures that your heart is cared for and generally makes you fitter for life, thus increasing your vitality and quality of your life.

In the South Beach diet plan, unlike the low carbohydrate, diets have to choose between the good and bad carb foods; rather that avoid all the carb foods. As such, the dieter is required to eat more fruits and even entire grain bread when it is contrasted to other low carb diets. The South Beach diet is therefore more manageable and dieters are able to stick with it, and incorporate it as their new way of eating and living.

The South Beach diet involves stopping your cravings, eating foods that are good for you and maintaining the diet and way of eating for life. Those who have followed the South Beach diet plan plan comment that the diet more like a way of life rather than a diet. Successful dieters go to live the rest of their lives following the South Beach diet plan principles.

There are a lot of success stories from dieters who have followed this diet. These are a great source of inspiration for others who are planning on losing weight and have a healthy life. With summer coming up, get onto a diet today and look and feel great!