How Empty Calories Kill Your Gains

Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

If you are not familiar with “empty” calories, it’s basically food that doesn’t do anything nutritionally for us. Sure it may taste good, but the way it makes us feel afterwards is usually anything but . I thought the donuts picture was appropriate since I love me some donuts. Not much tempts me when it comes to junk food, I can completely ignore candy or cake, but sit a box of donuts in front of me and I will probably start pacing while I have an argument in my head over having one.

Food cravings are real, and realizing that is the first part of the battle. The second part is telling yourself and making yourself believe that you don’t need it. Because you truly don’t . Eating empty calories like donuts, or sugary cereals, or sodas (diet or not), white bread, etc. All this may satisfy those taste buds for a few minutes, but they are destroying your gains as they give your body no nutrition to build with.

When you chew up and swallow food your body immediately goes to work using healthy carbs, proteins, and healthy fats for a variety of functions in your body, from energy stores, to muscle development, to hormone levels. Anything the body can’t use for any of these purposes it stores as fat.

Not only do these empty calories go into our fat stores, but the energy our body spends trying to digest it without any benefit slows us down, giving us even less energy.

So before you grab that donut in the break room remind yourself how you don’t need it, your body doesn’t need, and your muscle gains don’t need it.