Welcome To Fat Burners Digest! 

We Cut Through The Fat So You Don’t Have To

 

We made this site to bring you in-depth, reliable information on fat burning supplements, weight loss diet plans, and workouts that build muscle while burning body fat.

Whether you’re transitioning from a long bulking phase, or just looking to shed a few lingering pounds before summer, we can help.

 

 

Our dedicated review team takes a close look at the newest fat burning supplements on the market, examining their formulas to find out if they’re the right products for you.

We also regularly chew the fat on issues surrounding weight loss, utilizing the latest scientific studies and decades of combined experience in the gym to help you achieve the your fitness goals.

 

On this website you’ll find:

• In-depth fat burning supplement reviews

• Advice on staying lean and muscular all-year-round

• Our personal recommendations on the best fat burning supplements

• Advice on how to drop body fat rapidly while keeping your gains

 

With our help, and with hard work, you can soon be in the best shape of your life. 

 

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What Do Fat Burners Do? 

 

Key Points

 

• Fat burners can help you lose body fat without losing muscle mass

• Professional athletes who need to drop a weight class can benefit a great deal from using fat burners as eating a deficit can negatively impact training

• Fat burners can help you break through a plateau and get rid of lingering, stubborn body fat

• Fat burners can’t help you build muscle, but they can make your physique more muscular

 

Fat burners can’t help you build muscle. Lifting weights and a lot of food are how you build muscle. 

And if you want to build muscle, you need to accept that you’re also going to put on some fat. 

But what happens when we reach the point when we are done building muscle, and we want to start being able to appreciate our new, hard earned muscular physiques? 

There’s an age-old saying in bodybuilding: “abs are built in the kitchen, not the gym.” 

That’s a bit of an oversimplification of things, but it does speak a very real truth – you can get as big as you want, but unless your body fat is under control, you’ll never have the chiseled, vascular arms and 6-pack abs you’ve always wanted. 

So, when we think we’ve built enough muscle, we need to strip off the fat so we can appreciate it in all its glory. 

This invariably entails eating less food, and expending more calories, be it by doing more cardio, longer gym sessions, or some other means. 

Eating less calories than we burn is a sure-fire way of losing body fat. Unfortunately, eating fewer calories than we need in a day is also a sure-fire way of losing muscle mass. 

That’s where fat burners come in. 

 

 

Fat burners can give you the extra boost you need to shed excess body fat while still maintaining a fair amount of muscle mass. 

Not only do they make you burn through more calories while at rest, but they also help you still train effectively while eating a caloric deficit. 

Not only that, but the fact that they remove hunger cravings allows you to stick to a diet that is going to favour muscle mass over fat retention. 

 

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 Different Types of Fat Burners – What Do They Do?

Contrary to what some gym rats think, not all fat burners are alike. 

Far from it, in fact. There are several different types of fat burners, and each type works in a very distinct way. 

Some supplements utilise two or more of these fat burning mechanisms, and these are usually more effective supplements. 

But anyone looking for a potent and reliable supplement to help them shred-up for summer should really learn the different techniques that supplements use for burning your body fat.

 

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Thermogenic Fat Burners

Thermogenic fat burners basically work by increasing body temperature to promote lipolysis, which is the breakdown of stored body fat for use as energy. 

Your body temperature is kept in check by various mechanisms. To work, these mechanisms require energy. 

By raising your body temperature, thermogenic fat burners increase the amount of energy required by the body to keep itself cool, thereby increasing your basal metabolic rate.

This means that you will be expending more energy at rest just to keep your body temperature within normal limits, and so you will be burning through your body fat stores at a faster rate. 

Benefits: Very effective at increasing caloric requirements; seems to target fat specifically.

Negatives: Being warm all the time can be a little annoying sometimes.

 

 

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Appetite Suppressors

Caving in to hunger and food cravings is by far and away the most common reason for someone failing to reach their weight loss targets. 

We’re just animals at the end of the day, and hunger is a very primal feeling. Sometimes, it’s just too much to handle, and before you know it you’re half way through a muffin that you just didn’t need. 

Despite what many people think, hungry does not mean that you need food.

 

 

People in the Western world eat such huge meals with such frequency, that our body is tuned to expect meals even when we have no need for the extra energy. 

Appetite suppressants work by simply making you feel full. If you feel full all the time, you won’t have the overwhelming urge to eat when you aren’t scheduled to eat.

The last hour before you tuck into your healthy and nutritious lunch wont be anywhere near as grueling, and you wont give in to the temptation of the donuts that your colleagues insist on bringing into the office. 

Simple but effective. 

Benefits: Overcomes the hardest part of dieting – the food cravings and hunger pains! 

Negatives: Can make it difficult to gauge how much you need to eat if you aren’t great at planning.  

 

 

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Carb/Starch Blockers

From the name, you might be able to guess how this particular type of weight loss supplement works.

Carb/starch blockers are typically amylase inhibitors. This means they prevent the enzyme amylase from forming. 

Why does that help us burn fat?

Starch cannot be absorbed unless it is first broken down. If it isn’t broken down, then it simply passes through the body unabsorbed, along with all the calories it contains. The enzyme responsible for breaking down starch is amylase. Take away amylase, and all the starch you consume will simply pass through the body undigested. 

People use these supplements as an easy way to immediately cut calories out of their diets without having to actually kick any of their favourite foods. 

The problem? If you’re interested in burning fat while building or even just maintaining solid muscle mass, then a starch blocker can actually be counter-productive. 

You can’t build muscle efficiently without carbs.To replenish glycogen stores and properly rebuild muscle after hammering it in the gym, we need carbohydrates. Without carbs, you’ll also have a lot less energy for your workouts, which means you won’t be doing the work you need to do to elicit growth in the first place. 

If, for example, you’ve decided to practice carb backloading to help keep yourself lean while increasing muscularity, then carbs like pasta and potatoes are your best friends. They will certainly be better for you than sticking to things like white refined sugar. 

Benefits: Prevents calories dense carbs from being absorbed properly. 

Negatives: Even when cutting, you should be eating a balanced diet. Carbs are really important for building and maintaining muscle mass! 

 

 

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Fat Blockers

Like carb/starch blockers, fat blockers interfere with the digestion and absorption of fat in the body, preventing it from being taken up and used by the body, and thereby reducing your total caloric intake without reducing your actual food intake. 

As starch blockers inhibit the formation of amylase, fat blockers inhibit the formation of lipase; the enzyme responsible for breaking down fat so it can be absorbed by the intestines. 

Fat blockers are by no means 100% effective. Lipase inhibitors will only prevent a portion of the fat you consume from being absorbed. But this portion is still sizable (as much as 25% is blocked by some lipase inhibitors according to WebMD). 

Benefits: Fats are the most calorie dense food by a fairly big margin. Inhibiting their uptake is an efficient way of lowering overall calorie consumption. 

Negatives: As with carb blockers, fats are absolutely necessary if you want to be a healthy, functioning human being. Preventing them from being absorbed is just downright dangerous in my opinion. 

 

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Which Supplement Is Right For Me?

The answer to that question very much depends on your goals. 

That said, there are a number of products that should benefit anyone looking to lower their body fat %, whatever your sex, age, or reason. 

Whether you’re a bodybuilder in need of some help dropping weight after a long winter bulk, an amateur boxer looking to make weight for your first fight, or a fitness enthusiast who feels they need to lower their body fat to break through their plateaus and achieve their goals, general purpose fat burners can be a huge help.

 

Of course, if you’re not willing to work hard in the gym, on the track, or in the ring, then no supplement is right for you! 

 

Fat burners amplify lipolysis, and help you burn through excess fat during the day. They do not get you in shape, they do not increase muscle mass, and they do not replace the need for serious exercise. 

Fat burners can make a serious cut much easier than it would be without the supplements, but they can’t do the cut for you. If it was that easy, everyone would have a 6-pack, a chiseled chest and a defined back. 

But what kind of fat burner should I look for? 

Well, if you’re like us and predominantly concerned with cutting fat while retaining muscle, you should completely avoid fat blockers and carb blockers. 

 

Fat and carb blockers are unhealthy for anyone, regardless of goals, but they’re disastrous to anyone interested in keeping hold of serious muscle mass.  

 

We have always found that the best products are those that combine caffeine (for workout motivation and energy), thermogenesis, and appetite suppression. 

Check out our Fat Burner Guide for help. 

 

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Should I Change My Workout For Fat Loss?

The internet is absolutely rife with people telling you that their special workout routine is the best possible way to lose fat. 

Self-styled ‘workout gurus’ make an awful lot of money from convincing people that they have quick and easy ways of getting ripped and lean. 

Their living depends on them making up ever-more imaginative workouts, both to make them stand out form the previous guy, and to make the process sound far too complex for you to manage it on your own. 

 

 

At some point, you’ll be asked to part with money. What you’ll get in return is nutrition advice that is basically just common sense mixed in with some buzzwords, and a workout plan that is far too time consuming, far too difficult to follow, and nowhere near effective enough. 

I understand why people do this. You’ve got to make a living, right? 

That said, I think it’s wrong to make a living by giving people fitness advice that is at best purposefully sub-optimal, and at worst downright counter-productive. 

So, we’re going to do our best to provide some genuinely useful advice, for absolutely nothing. 

The most important thing that you need to get into your head is this:

 

There is no such thing as a “cutting” workout and a “bulking” workout!

 

Too many people think that they need to do a certain workout for gaining mass, and a certain workout for losing weight. The truth of the matter is, the same workout will help you both gain and lose weight – the only thing that makes the difference is food! 

For example, take a classic 5 x 5 full body workout. 

If I went to the gym and did 5 x 5 on Squats, Bench Press, and Barbell Rows, I tried to put the weight up whenever I could, and I consistently ate more food than I needed for maintenance, then I’d grow. I would inevitably gain muscle mass. 

If I did the same workout but ate less overall calories than I needed to maintain my current weight, then I’d lose mass. If I’m still eating good, balanced meals, my diet is well thought-out, and I’m still stressing my muscles, then I’ll lose more fat than muscle mass. 

This applies to almost every bodybuilding style workout imaginable. 

Of course, if you’re dieting, then you’re going to stop making progress on your lifts. It’s almost impossible to lose body fat without losing some muscle mass, and it’s even harder to gain muscle mass while eating a caloric deficit. That is true for almost all natural trainees, barring the few of you with God-like genetics. 

This is why a lot of powerlifting progression programs are unsuitable for cutting. You won’t hit the numbers prescribed, and you’ll probably hurt yourself trying to do so. 

But most of you are focused on bodybuilding, and as far as bodybuilding workouts go, every setup can work for both cutting and bulking. The difference comes down to the timeless formula of calories in vs calories out. 

 

Are some workouts easier when dieting?

To put it simply, yes. 

That may sound contradictory, given what I have said so far, but it isn’t. 

While there is no real difference between a cutting workout and a bulking workout, different people will find different workouts preferable when dieting or when eating like a king. 

For example, some people just can’t handle lots of volume when they’re dieting. They can’t do supersets, and they get absolutely exhausted doing sets of 15 with very little rest periods. 

On a caloric deficit, these people are probably better off dropping reps, and hitting the majority of their work in the 3-5 range, and hitting the same body parts more regularly.

In other words, what they lose in volume they can make up for in intensity and frequency. 

Other people require the exact opposite. Personally, my bench press drops off massively when I lose weight. It’s crazy how closely correlated my bodyweight and bench press are. 

So, when cutting, I need to drop weight and up the reps and the amount of exercises on chest day. 

But, and this is a big but, that isn’t the case for all exercises. My deadlift and squat aren’t so heavily affected by my bodyweight, so my routine doesn’t change a great deal for them whether I’m on a cut or not. 

 

What’s the take home message here?

 

There is no “cutting” workout. All you can do is figure out what works best for you while dieting. 

What works best for you will simply be whatever lets you get enough work done to stimulate your muscles without overworking yourself. For the vast majority of people, that will look no different to their “bulking” routine. 

The ‘gurus’ who preach “higher reps for cutting” and “lower reps for building mass” are doing nothing but muddying the waters. Both high reps and low reps build muscle when you’re eating enough food, and both help you lose fat while eating a deficit. 

How lean you are is not a function of how many isolation sets you do. It is determined by your body fat to muscle mass ratio and nothing more. 

 

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Where Do I Start? 

Want to start getting lean but not sure where to begin? 

Take a look at our some of our supplement reviews to get started. 

We have also documented our favourite diets and workouts for getting ripped and lean. Have a browse through the site and start making some positive changes!