Want to give your weight loss a boost? Try this deadly combination: Exercise and green tea.
A new study from Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences shows that mice put on an exercise and green tea regimen reduced their body fat by 36.6 percent in just 16 weeks–as well as reduce their blood glucose and lessen insulin resistance, two factors that can lead to diabetes.
While researchers note that mice studies don’t always correlate to the same effects as humans, both humans and mice share the same physiology, making it likely that the same benefits are possible.
“What is significant about this research is that we report for the first time that voluntary exercise in combination with green tea extract reduced symptoms of metabolic syndrome and diet-induced obesity in high-fat-fed mice more significantly than either treatment alone,” says Joshua Lambert, lead researcher and a Penn State associate professor of food science. “The changes in body weight and body fat may result from increased fat metabolism and decreased fat synthesis. Green tea seems to modulate genes related to energy metabolism.”
The research, which was published in the health journal Molecular Nutrition Food Research, is the first of its kind to find that both exercise and green tea are needed to make significant changes in body weight, when in previous years researchers believed that either factor was good enough. As it turns out, that wasn’t the case: Although exercise or green tea alone resulted in some changes in fat distribution, it did not cause as many significant changes than when it was combined.
Now Lambert suggests this could possibly serve as a future treatment for those battling diabetes, obesity, or a combination of the two–and better yet, it’s drug-free.
“The mice that exercised and had decaffeinated green tea extract had a more significant change in body weight, and they had better outcomes as far as lower blood glucose and lower plasma insulin levels,” says Lambert. “It looks like a combination of exercise and decaffeinated green tea enhances the body’s ability to use energy that is taken in.”
What Lambert Discovered
Gathering a group of laboratory mice, Lambert split the mice into groups to put them on different weight loss regimens, including regular exercise and green tea consumption. At the beginning of the study, the mice were described as “high-fat”–so they had a lot of weight to lose.
Lambert then had the mice follow each prospective diet for a total 16 weeks to see how it affected their weight, and found that all regimens were somewhat effective.
However, those who consumed green tea and exercised regularly reaped the biggest benefits–losing up to 36.6 percent of their fat on average and reducing insulin resistance, a precursor to diabetes, by a whopping 65 percent.
“It looks promising for people, but somebody will have to do this experiment with people to definitively show that green tea and exercise together have a beneficial effect in humans,” says Lambert. “Our rationale for looking at voluntary exercise as opposed to forced exercise is that people who are interested in reducing body weight and dealing with diabetes and that sort of thing do have a high level of motivation.”
So what does this mean for you? Simple: If you want to lose more weight, you need to combine exercise with weight loss aids, such as green tea. While both of these tricks won’t replace a bad diet, it can enhance the weight loss you’re already striving for–and make the process that much easier.
Readers: Have you tried green tea for weight loss before?
Source:
Exercise and Green Tea Signficantly Reduces Body Fat – Teatronaturale.com
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