METABOLIC ASSESSMENTS FROM IMFIT: TRAIN LIKE A PRO
The IMFIT metabolic assessment is not a test. There is no pass or fail standard, no studying or preparation you can do beforehand. The assessment gives you a snapshot of where you and your body are today, in terms of how your body burns fuel when it is at rest and when it is exercising.
A metabolic assessment measures several things:
- The amount of calories your body needs to function, including everything from regulating your body’s hormones to thinking the thoughts that run through your mind
- The amount of calories you need to consume each day to achieve your fitness goal, whether that’s weight loss goal or greater athletic performance
- The point, known as your aerobic base heart rate, is the highest intensity at which your body still uses fat as it's dominant fuel
- The highest sustainable intensity of exercise, known as your threshold, that your body can sustain and still burn fat efficiently
- The rate at which your body absorbs oxygen, which your body requires to burn fat.
- Your VO2 Max- the maximum capacity of your body to transport and utilize oxygen during incremental exercise
All that information comes from measuring your heart rate and from evaluating the mix of oxygen and carbon dioxide in your breath. Those measurements are taken at various levels of activity, from a point of complete rest to a point just shy of your highest normal physical activity level.
Here’s what happens when you come in for your assessment:
You receive a personal assessment pack that is yours to keep. It includes a comfortable, somewhat stretchy, mask and the airflow sensors and accessories that are used during the assessment. Everything is packaged in a nylon drawstring bag, which makes it easy to store your mask so you’ll have it for follow-up assessments.
There are two kinds of assessments. The first measures your resting metabolic rate (RMR). The mask is positioned over your nose and mouth, and then you get to kick back in a comfy chair for about 10 minutes. Hang out, breathe, try to stay awake. That’s all there is to it. (Your assessment will be most accurate if you’ve fasted overnight and are well rested. Mornings are a great time for this assessment.)
The second kind of assessment measures your metabolic rate during exercise. You’ll put the mask back on, and for 10 to 15 minutes, you’ll walk or jog on a treadmill or ride your bicycle on a computrainer at increasing levels of intensity. This is where you’ll learn how many calories your body burns while exercising; whether those calories come mainly from fat, carbohydrates, or a combination of both; and at what intensity level you burn calories most efficiently.
And that’s the science-based secret to creating a personalized, fitness plan.
Why this works
The information gained from a metabolic assessment is powerful because it comes from technologies that have been proven effective for decades. The type of metabolic assessment offered by IMFIT is used by physicians, who rely on it for the health of their patients, and by Olympians, who rely on it to achieve world-class athletic performance
What makes an IMFIT metabolic assessment the gold standard? It measures both the oxygen levels and the carbon dioxide levels in your breath, where other techniques measure oxygen only or just airflow. Other metabolic systems merely estimate—rather than precisely measure—the carbon dioxide levels in the breath. And with an estimate, you leave a large part of your training program to chance. (In fact, it’s a lot like relying on the preset programs on the treadmill at the gym. You may see some progress for awhile, but in the long run, you’ll miss out on achieving a lot of your personal potential because you get stuck in a rut or plateau in your performance).
With an accurate measure of both oxygen and carbon dioxide, you get a clear picture of your body’s complete fuel composition. That is, you know exactly when you’re burning the energy-dense fat fuel as opposed to when you’re burning the less-efficient carbohydrate fuel. You know the precise heart rate you need to work up to, and how long you should exercise at that intensity. You know you’re burning fat, not just time. No guesswork required
Benefits
There are many benefits to having a personalized metabolic assessment: You get a training program that is based specifically on the data that is YOU. Your resting metabolic rate. Your required calories. Your calories burned. Your fuel composition. Your base heart rate. Your threshold heart rate. Your fat-burning efficiency. That’s what makes the IMFIT metabolic assessment your sure path to success.
Your results determine how long you need to exercise, how intensely you need to exercise, how often and for how long. Your results reveal your fitness level right now, and they suggest what level of fitness you may achieve in the future. With your personalized metabolic assessment results in hand, IMFIT can map out an exercise plan that makes the most of your time and your effort.
Your metabolic assessment looks inside your body to find out what’s going on with your fitness efforts. In fact, it’s similar to the inside look you get from x-rays or blood work at the doctor’s office—although there are no tiny gowns or needles involved here! A metabolic assessment delivers results instantly.
Like a doctor interpreting lab results and writing a prescription, IMFIT will help you understand the information revealed by your metabolic assessment. IMFIT will talk with you about your resting metabolic rate and your caloric needs. You’ll learn about your base heart rate (known as your aerobic base) and your threshold heart rate (known as your anaerobic threshold). And based on that info, you’ll discover how and when your body burns fat instead of carbohydrates.
The result is a more meaningful fitness plan.
RESTING METABOLIC RATE:
Your resting metabolic rate (RMR) is one of the easiest measurements to come by during an assessment. It’s also one of the most important. Your RMR is the number that comes from sitting in that comfy chair, breathing, and taking it easy. What it reveals is the number of calories your body requires to stay alive.
What’s the big deal about knowing how many calories your body burns as it goes through its daily work of sleeping, eating, breathing, and so on? Consider this: Let’s say your RMR is 1300 calories. That means that combined with your lifestyle (job, etc.) you need 1690 calories just to maintain your body. If you eat 1500 calories, and you burn 500 during a workout, you’ve got 690 calories available for your body to do its thing—and that’s 610 fewer than your RMR. While that deficit may sound like the key to losing weight, it’s actually a short, straight route to killing your metabolism.
When your caloric balance drops below your RMR, your body goes into starvation mode, slowly burning calorie-hungry muscle mass while clinging to calorie-dense fat tissue. You may lose some weight at first, but in the not-too-long run, you’ll have trained your body to burn calories very, very slowly. Achieving your healthy weight will get tougher and tougher to do.
The key to losing weight safely, effectively, and quickly is to eat enough nutrient-rich foods to stay above your RMR, but below your total daily caloric needs.
Your RMR also identifies what fuel your body’s engine is tuned to burn. For instance, if your body burns a lot of sugar while you’re at ease, that’s certainly the fuel your body will turn to when it’s doing the harder work of working out. By putting your metabolic assessment results to work, you can train your body to burn more fat, more often—both at work and at rest.
ACTIVE METABOLIC ASSESSMENT:
If you’ve been exercising without any inside information about your metabolism, there’s a good chance you’ve been pushing yourself harder than you need to.
When you start to feel the burn, your body is sliding into that inefficient territory where it predominantly burns sugar instead of those preferred energy-dense fat calories. When that happens, you not only spend more time trying to lose the fat, but you also risk injury (such as muscle tears or ligament strain) as your body tires out.
With your metabolic assessment results in hand, IMFIT can determine your correct workout intensity. Whether you want to lose weight or boost performance, whether you are new to working out or you want to take your training to the next level, IMFIT can prescribe a routine that makes the most of your current fitness abilities.
What’s the point of logging all that time in your gym shoes if you don’t know why you’re lacing them up in the first place? Sure, there’s the general motivator of taking care of your body. But if you’re going to spend the time working out, make the most of it. A metabolic assessment makes the invisible inner workings of your body visible in a single, handy fitness report.
It can be tough to track your cardiovascular fitness from one day to the next. A metabolic assessment makes it easier to chart your progress because it delivers clearly defined cardio markers. Your subjective “Hey, I felt pretty good on that run today!” becomes an objective comparison of heart rate, minutes logged, and calories burned.
Your IMFIT metabolic assessment results will also give guidance to your meal planning. Knowing your RMR and your daily caloric needs, a nutritionist can recommend a diet that’s chock full of energy, but not too heavy on the calories. Smarts like that will help you avoid making a poor choice when you need a quick bite as you get out of the gym and on with your day
As the weeks go by, you’ll feel the improvements in your health and in your athletic performance. More importantly, you’ll be able to very specifically track your progression over time with follow-up assessments. That’s the clear path to real results and true health.
