What Sumo Wrestlers Can Teach You About Weight Loss

There is only one sport in which athletes try to gain weight and gain as much body fat as possible: sumo wrestling. Size is a clear advantage for sumo wrestlers, so they actually do their best to gain weight.

We thought it would be interesting to see some of the things sumo wrestlers do to GET FAT, so you can know how doing the opposite will help you LOSE fat.

1. Skip breakfast. Starving their bodies of food after eight hours of fasting during sleep keeps their metabolism running at half speed, as if they were still asleep, so they burn fewer calories during the day.

What You Can Learn From This: If you are trying to lose weight, eat breakfast as soon as you wake up. Eating “wakes up” your metabolism and starts your body’s fat burning engine.

2. Exercise on an empty stomach. Without food for fuel, a sumo wrestler’s metabolic rate remains LOW, so they burn fewer calories while exercising. Doing any type of exercise can quickly deplete the available sugar (your body’s source of energy) in your bloodstream. When your blood sugar drops, your body thinks you are starving and tries to conserve fat by turning off your metabolism.

What You Can Learn From This: If you’re trying to lose weight, it’s important to eat before and after resistance training. Always eat a meal or a good snack 30 to 60 minutes before exercising and then again within an hour after exercising to avoid a drop in blood sugar.

3. Eat only a couple of meals a day. A famous sumo wrestler is reported to have eaten 10 plates of stew, eight plates of rice, 130 pieces of sushi, and 25 servings of barbecued meat … all in one meal, and STILL has room for dessert. Since their bodies can only process a certain amount of food at a time, the rest is stored as FAT.

What you can learn from this: When you pack all your calories in a few large meals, you get fat. If you’re trying to lose weight, a much smarter approach is to spread your calories throughout the day by eating three or four meals and snacking in between. This keeps you from being so hungry that you overeat.

4. Take a nap or sleep after eating. Sumo wrestlers always go to bed for a long nap or a long night’s sleep after their “big” meal of the day. This is because when a sumo wrestler’s body is in sleep mode, all of its functions, including its metabolism, slow down. So all that food that is in your belly is stored as fat.

What You Can Learn From This: If you are trying to lose weight, wait at least an hour after eating before going to sleep.

5. Drink alcohol to excess. To gain weight, some sumo wrestlers drink beer by the way, often consuming 50 or more bottles at a time. This causes your adrenal glands to discharge a hormone called cortisol into your bloodstream. Cortisol works to slow down metabolism and increase fat storage.

What You Can Learn From This: If you are trying to lose weight, moderate your alcohol consumption. When you start to feel a “buzz”, you’ve had enough.

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