I have to be honest, I’m never overly concerned with the exact calorie amount of things.

I feel in such a fast paced world counting every calorie is a very time consuming business, as you know from previous articles my nutrition advice is based around eating healthy, solid, natural foods and cutting out the junk. It’s a simplistic approach but it’s very effective.

Losing weight is definitely overcomplicated, people think they need to do some fancy diet or starve themselves to lose weight, it seems that hardly anyone wants to just eat healthy and lose weight in the process.

One day maybe… as long as you people help to spread the good word!

That being said science proves that if you consume more calories than you burn off you put on weight, and if you burn more calories than you take in you’ll lose weight.

So if you are looking to lose a little bit of weight I have 10 ways in which you can cut around 250 calories each week by doing. Some tips mean you will burn more calories and others will mean you will consume less calories, both of which take you a little bit closer to losing weight and more importantly fat.

One pound is approximately 3500 calories, to lose one pound in a week you would need to create a daily deficit of 500 calories. This means if you can pick a couple of these tips I’m about to share with you and use them each day you can easily create that 500 calorie deficit which will mean you can lose a pound.

You may think a pound is nothing, but pick up something that weighs a pound and realise that this is no longer in your body. Forget the crazy diets where you will lose 10 pounds a week, keep that up for a couple of months and you’ll be dead! Do it gradually, one pound at a time.

Okay so as I said to help you out I’ve put together a list of 10 tips which will help you to cut around 250 calories a week.

Here goes:

1. Learn To Say No – If you get offered a chocolate bar in work 5 days a week and you say yes 5 days a week then just say no on 2 days and you’ve cut 250 calories. Simple as that. Say no each time and you’ll cut out over 500 calories!

2. Go For A 20 minute Jog – You can burn 250 calories just by jogging for about 20 minutes. Or you can up the intensity and do some sprints followed by a short rest for 10 minutes and burn a lot more in less time.

3. Ditch The Fizzy Drinks – Switch up your fizzy pop and have water instead, add a slice of lemon or lime to give it a bit of flavour if you find it boring. Did you know there are about 13 spoons of sugar in a pint of coke? Think how many calories that is!

4. Bring Food To Work – Don’t leave your lunch to chance, if you make it yourself at home you’ll be 100% in control of what you eat plus save some money at the same time.

5. Snack Swap – If you’re used to snacking on biscuits and crisps try swapping these for fruit. After dinner cravings are always high so the sweetness of fruit can help to satisfy these cravings.

6. Attend 1 Class – Attend one fitness class each week at your local gym, just 1! You’ll burn way more than 250 calories and have a bit of fun too.

7. Have A Day Out – Instead of taking the family to the cinema why not on a nice day go down the park/beach or go for a nice cycle. You’ll burn a tonne of calories playing frisbee, football and running after the kids.

8. Swim – You can use this as a family day out too. 30 minutes of swimming burns loads of calories, improves your fitness and is fun so doesn’t feel quite so much like exercise.

9. Walk More – Why not walk to work, take the stairs instead of the lift, walk to the shop, park further away from your destination. Within a couple of these trips you’ll have burned your 250 calories.

10. Limit Your Alcohol – If you drink 2 less beers you’ll have cut out over 200 empty calories, drinking beer also leads to eating junk so you’ll save a lot more in the long run. 

So there are my 10 tips to help you cut some calories.

None of them are too difficult or time consuming.

Just pick a couple of ones to try each week to start you off and along with your healthy eating and other training you’ll crank your metabolism up into a calorie burning furnace!!!

Eat Well Live Well,

Jamie Stedman