Body fat reduction

Reductions in body fat can enhance sports performance by improving running economy, speed, endurance, heat tolerance as well as power and coordination.

If you’re aiming to reduce body fat, then the most effective dietary approach is to save on the fat calories and watch your intake of alcohol calories. Also check that you are not eating protein in excess of your requirement for training.

Athletes and sportspeople, who have diets that are too high in protein, often find it difficult to eat the recommended amount of carbohydrate for training, without gaining body fat. If you can reduce your intake of fat calories, and keep to the optimal intake of protein, this will then allow you consume sufficient amounts of carbohydrates to meet the energy demands of hard training.

Performance Food has put together a personal action plan for reducing body fat with self assessment tools and fact sheets that you can download. This comprehensive guide includes the following resources:-

• Performance Food fat reduction planner
  Download your personal food diary to help you assess your current fat intake and identify areas for change
• Performance Food fat calculator
  Helps your calculate how much fat is in your daily diet and set sensible goals for reducing your fat intake to save calories
• Food swaps to save fat
  Our collection of high quality fact sheets illustrate at a glance how to make food choices to reduce your dietary fat intake
• Alcohol – How many calories?
  Find out how many calories your alcoholic drinks are adding to your diet!

The Performance Food guide to body fat reduction is free for members

Forget fad diets and say goodbye to yo-yo dieting- Our action plan can help you to reduce body fat safely and protect against loss of lean mass.

Performance Food resources

For great ideas on food swaps to reduce fat intake order the Performance Food booklet and fact sheets. Our easy to use star-rating guide will enable you to identify food swaps to save fat at a glance

• Food Facts for athletes and sportspeople
• Performance Food fact sheets:-

Food fact sheet 1: Carbohydrate ready reckoner	Food fact sheet 2: How do your snack choices rate?	Food fact sheet 3: How do your cake and biscuit choices rate?
Food fact sheet 4: How do your pizza choices rate?	Food fact sheet 5: How do your salad dressings and ready prepared salads rate?	Food fact sheet 6: How do your sauces rate?
Food fact sheet 7: How do your sandwich choices rate? (ready made & home-made)

What about essential fats?

When keeping to a low fat diet it is important to ensure that the requirements for intake of essential fats are met.

Performance food describes the types and amounts of essential fatty acids necessary for health, and gives examples of the food sources where these can be obtained.

Essential fats

There are only two fatty acids, which are considered essential for health, as the body cannot make them.

Linoleic acid (cis – n6 polyunsaturated fatty acid)
Linolenic acid (cis – n3 polyunsaturated fatty acid)

The UK Department of Health Dietary Reference Values recommend that 1% of dietary energy as linoleic acid, and 0.2% of dietary energy is obtained from linolenic acid.

In America, the National Research Council recommends a total intake of 3-6gms of the essential fatty acids each day, and states that this level of intake should easily be obtained from a diet containing 5-10% of dietary calories as fat.

Are supplements necessary?

Performance food suggestions for achieving the recommended intake of essential fatty acids show that supplements should not normally be necessary. A small handful of walnuts provides around double the intake required by most people.

Food sources of essential fatty acids

Further guidelines:

• Body fat reduction
  • Performance Food fat reduction planner
  • Performance Food fat calculator
  • Food swaps to save fat
  • Alcohol - how many calories
• Essential fats