Summer is come a-knockin’!

Already you can see the gleaming faces of sun worshippers and beach scenes exhibited on TikTok and Instagram.

With the pandemic on the decline, fingers crossed (we’ve been burned too many times), the Filipino nation braces for a summer of face-to-face fun in the sun.

If you’re planning to change your profile pic and want to feature a sporty new you, read on because we may have something to help you get fit…fast.

Yes, there’s still time.

5 Ways To That Perfect Summer Bod

1) Water Matters

It’s not just quenching thirst, water just might be your best bud when it comes to losing weight.

Water increases metabolism.

Water fuels the body and powers practically every metabolic process, from digestion to excretion.

Another example is thermogenesis—our body’s way of producing heat. In a study published by the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, researchers found that drinking two cups of water (at around 22 °C) increases metabolism by 30% on average.

The body works to raise the water temperature to 37°C (the body’s normal temperature), and that involves the expenditure of energy. So calories are burned even when an individual is at rest.

Water promotes satiation.

You might be hitting two birds with this one because water itself has zero calories.

A study reported that subjects lost weight, reduced their body mass index and body composition scores simply by drinking two cups of water half an hour before eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Note, they did not change their diets, but simply drank two cups of water.

In another research, pre-meal drinking of H₂O resulted in 22% less consumption by the research subjects. The water stretches the stomach and sends “fullness” signals to the brain, decreasing appetite and lowering the intake of calories.

So instead of skimping on the liquid, you might want to grab a glass as often as you can.

Water helps you get the most out of your exercise.

Staying hydrated optimizes your workouts by decreasing fatigue, allowing you to burn more calories and get more work done. Post-workout, water is also required to recover quicker and build those muscles faster.

So it’s best to be sufficiently hydrated before, during, and after your workout.

Speaking of which...

2) HIIT IT

Looking for an exercise regimen that’s both fast and effective?

For those strapped for time, HIIT or High-Intensity Interval Training is a quick way of getting fit, not requiring one to be a gym rat to get those muscles toned.

A typical HIIT regimen requires less than 30-minutes of shorts bursts of activity followed by varied recovery times.

For example, you could do squat jumps for 60 seconds—performing the routine as fast as you can, and as many as you can. After a minute, you take a breather for around 30-60 seconds. Repeat this cycle a few times.  

The main idea here is to “floor it” during your exertions. Whatever exercise you’ve chosen, and there’s a lot—shadow boxing, sprinting, swimming, Tabata, etc.—you need to go all out in those 60 seconds of activity.

Of course, if you’ve never done any form of legit exercise since P.E. days, it’s probably good to start with shorter bursts—like 5 or 10 seconds. (HIIT as a fat-burning protocol should be adjusted to your fitness level and conditioning.)

When researchers compared the calorie burn for aerobics, resistance training, and HIIT, they found that the HIIT burned 25-30% more calories than more paced forms of exercise.

Not only is HIIT shorter than regular exercise, but it is also much more efficient in getting rid of calories. Studies have shown that HIIT continues to burn calories hours after the exercise, again outpacing other regimens.

HIIT has been proven effective in losing fat, building muscles, and strengthening the heart.

So get on that stationary bike and...pedal as fast as you can!

3) Your Body Is Like A Bank  

Food is a big part of things. But we’re not going to talk here about what food to eat or what diet you should get into. We’ve already discussed the different diets a couple of months back and if you want in on what differentiates the Keto diet from the Mediterranean and the Paleo diets, then read this post.

Don’t kid yourself and believe that you can lose weight sitting down and filling your plate with unhealthy food and calorie bombs. If you want to lose weight, you’re going to have to restrict your calories.

There will be no preaching about the importance of eating healthy food here because you already know that.

But think of your body as a bank.

Calories are the “money” you put in. Every time you eat, you’re “depositing” calories in the bank, storing them up in your body.

Metabolism and your daily activities have the opposite effect. They burn calories. Think of them as “withdrawing” money from your body bank.

If you want to lose weight, you must restrict the calories coming into the body, while at the same time increasing the calories burned.

This is an oversimplification, yes. (For one thing, all calories are not made equal.) But it is a helpful metaphor for understanding why you’re getting fat or why you’re losing weight. It has something to do with the amount of “deposits” and “withdrawals” from your body bank.

One last thing about “crash diets.” A study compared 14 different diet regimens and found that after a year, most of their desirable effects have disappeared. In short, people put on the pounds back. Without a change in lifestyle and mindset, quick results also quickly fade.

For long-lasting results, you have to stick to your guns—which is a better way of doing things.

Instead of dieting for beach season and looking great for a couple of weeks, wouldn’t it be better to be fit and healthy for the rest of the year?

4) Happy chemicals, please.

You don’t want to be fit...and cranky.

You want to be glowing and happy.

It’s more attractive and that’s bound to leak out of your Instagram posts.

If you want to be fit fast, you cannot be stressing your way to it. The “stress hormone,” cortisol, is known to increase appetite and, for all your heroic determination, you might end up gaining weight instead.

Also, notice that when you’re stressed, the first things you reach for are sugary foods? Sugar gives you a quick source of energy to deal with any stressful situation (fight or flight). Unfortunately, excess sugar is often stored in the body as abdominal fat, which, you already know from experience, is hard to burn.

And that’s not even the whole story. A 2015 study has shown that cortisol can slow down metabolism. Researchers discovered that women who experienced a stressful situation 24 hours prior burned 104 fewer calories than women who didn’t report any stressful event. Projected to a year, this means 11 extra pounds for stressed individuals.

So do yourself a favor and minimize the stresses, whether they are people, situations or environments, from your life.  

Engage in self-care acts like getting a relaxing massage, curling up with a good book, or clocking a good run. Meet friends and laugh the afternoon away. It’ll do your body loads of good.

5) Dress Right

Sometimes, looking good is even simpler than feeling good. Sometimes it’s simply getting the clothes cut in the right way.

People come in different shapes, sizes, and colors, so there’s more to the S-M-L sizes that companies box people into.

Maybe you don’t even have to make changes to your body. You just need to get the right-fitting clothes to give yourself a little flair.

Remember the last time your friends told you, “Oh you look so good in that...”?

So maybe you get more outfits like that.

If clothes say something about you, then they should say something flattering about you. If you can get clothes that fit right, that minimizes certain places, and highlights those assets, then you might already be ready for beach season.

All you need is sunblock and out you go!

In this post, we’ve talked about summer, but we at BloodWorks Lab are here to serve you all months and seasons of the year. As your health and well-being advocates, we are your one-stop-shop for all your blood test needs—offering the full range of screenings, as well as immunological neurological tests.

We are also proud to be the first laboratory in the Philippines to offer the Anti Acetylcholine Receptor (lgG) Antibody Test and the Anti N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptor (Anti NMDA Receptor) Antibody Test.

Come give us a visit. Our branches are in Alabang, Katipunan, and Cebu.