Sweating doesn’t mean you are burning fat

People often say to me, “You are so lucky that you sweat so much.” Well, I suppose that in terms of staying alive, sweating is a good thing. It’s likely that if I didn’t sweat the way I do, my body would not properly cool down and I’d overheat and die. So I guess in that sense, yes, I am lucky.

However, in the context that they are referring to, I am not. Sweating doesn’t mean I’m burning fat or that I’m losing weight. If that were the case, I’d be one of the leanest people on this planet. Considering how profusely I sweat. Sweating does happen when you train, but some people think that the quantity of sweat is attached to how much fat you are burning. Sure, if you work harder, its likely you will sweat more, but understand that not all of us sweat a lot!

In the summer, you sweat walking. I know that I do. I sweat more because the weather is warmer and my body is cooling itself down. But I’m not leaner or carrying less fat because I’m sweating more. It just doesn’t work that way. This oversimplified example should illustrate why sweating itself doesn’t correlate with fat loss.

If you are not sweating as much as I am in the gym, there are a dozen possible reasons for that. But that doesn’t mean you are working any less harder or not making progress. Just keep working and eventually you’ll hit your goals. Whether or not you leave pools of sweat behind.

I’ve seen people putting on sweat or sauna suits to try and sweat more. Others wrap up their trouble areas in hopes of melting the fat away. Ladies and gentlemen, it doesn’t work that way. If you wear a sauna suit, you will sweat a lot more, but you won’t burn more “real” calories. You’ll just lose water and appear lighter, but that’s only because of dehydration. This is not safe and some athletes have lost their lives due to these dangerous methods of dropping weight. It’s all temporary, it’s only water weight. The moment you rehydrate your weight will return to normal. Don’t do that, it’s really bad for you. At best you get a terrible headache and temporarily drop some water weight. At worst you die. Is it worth it?

There’s only one way to really lose weight, that’s through diet and training. You got this!

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