How many calories must be cut from the diet to lose a pound a day?
To lose a pound of fat a day would mean a cut of 3500 calories a day from your diet. This is impossible unless you normally eat this amount, which is well above the average dietary content. Think of each pound of fat as representing 3500 calories of stored energy. To lose this amount of fat, you have to deprive yourself of this amount of energy. It stands to reason, then, that a diet that causes you to lose a pound or more a day is not working primarily through loss of fat. A low-carbohydrate diet may give you an immediate loss in excess of a pound a day, but the weight won’t be lost as fat. It will be lost as fluid. As soon as you go off the diet, the water is quickly regained.
