Losing weight, building muscle, and living a fit and healthy lifestyle are rooted in good nutrition, hard training, and quality sleep.
Without those three things in place, the chances of you achieving your fitness and physique goals are zero.
However, if you have those three things in place, it's only natural to wonder if there's anything else you can add to your diet, training, and/or lifestyle to accelerate your recovery and results.
That’s where supplements come in.
Supplements exist to "fill a gap" and help augment and extend results and overall quality of life.
As you dabble and expand your knowledge and usage of supplements, it’s only natural to create combinations (“stacks”) of ingredients to help you achieve your goals.
Today, we look at the best fat burning supplement stacks for cutting and getting ripped & shredded.
The Best Supplements for Cutting
Caffeine
No real surprise here.
Caffeine forms the basis for many best-selling supplements for cutting on the market, including Shredded Steel® and Steel Sweat®.
The reasons that caffeine is included in so many weight loss supplement stacks are many.
As you may have experienced for yourself, any time you're dieting for fat loss, energy, motivation, and focus are lacking. For starters, caffeine is a CNS stimulant which means it boosts energy. This is especially important during a cutting phase where calorie intake is lower than normal.
This can lead to reduced desire to exercise and less general movement during the day -- both of which can decrease total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) and thus hinder weight loss goals.
Supplementing with caffeine (either in coffee, pre-workout, or weight loss aids) can help increase locomotion (movement) and desire to train, which helps increase overall daily energy output.
Second, since caffeine is a stimulant, it can help suppress appetite, which helps prevent overeating and thus sticking to your fat loss nutrition plan.
Third, caffeine helps the body mobilize and oxidize (burn) stored fatty acids for energy, which helps promote greater fat burning during the day.
Fourth, caffeine (and other stimulants) help boost metabolism, thereby increasing how many calories the body burns during the day, even at rest.
Collectively, this makes caffeine one of the best ingredients to include in a supplement stack for cutting to get ripped & shredded!
Yohimbine
In a world where countless supplements promise the allure of helping lose "stubborn fat," few get the job done.
Yohimbine is one of those rare exceptions.
Found in various plants, including Pausinystalia Yohimbe, yohimbine is an alkaloid that serves dual purposes as both a CNS stimulant (the benefits of which we just discussed) as well as an alpha-adrenergic receptor antagonist.
To keep things simple, fat cells have alpha receptors and beta receptors.
When fat-burning catecholamines like norepinephrine bind to beta receptors, it supports fat burning, and when they bind to alpha receptors, they hinder fat burning.
In an ideal world of fat loss, catecholamines would only bind to beta receptors, which release stored fatty acids into the bloodstream so that they can be oxidized ("burned") for energy.
Unfortunately, that's not how the human body works. To make matters worse, specific fat cells (particularly those in "stubborn fat" areas -- hips, thighs, buttocks, etc.) have a higher density of alpha receptors.
Now, here’s where yohimbine comes into play.
As an alpha-receptor antagonist, yohimbine binds to the alpha receptors on fat cells, effectively blocking the catecholamines from binding, thus allowing a greater amount of catecholamines to bind to beta receptors, which ultimately supports fat burning!
Grains of Paradise
Grains of paradise is a cooking spice used in the traditional dishes of North and West Africa. It has a pungent, spicy taste and aroma and is related to ginger. The Grains of Paradise plant pods contain little reddish-brown seeds that are ground to create a warm, earthy pop similar to that of coriander.
Researchers have identified several compounds that are responsible for the distinct flavor and aroma “punch” of Grains of Paradise, including:
- 6-paradol
- 6-gingerdione
- 6-gingerol
- 6-shogaol
It just so happens that these compounds may help the cutting and fat loss process too!
Specifically, the compounds in Grains of Paradise stimulate brown adipose tissue, increase thermogenesis, and boost metabolism. [1,2,3] Supplementation with Grains of Paradise has also been found to decrease visceral fat.
SteelFit® includes Grains of Paradise at its research-supported dose for the following:
- Stimulant-Free Fat Burner - Steel Core®
- Extreme Thermogenic Fat Burner - Shredded Steel®
- Cardio Enhancing Pre-Workout - Steel Sweat®
Green Tea Extract
Green tea is one of the most widely consumed beverages on the planet. In addition to helping increase energy and focus, green tea is also rich in important bioactive compounds, particularly catechins like EGCG.
Various studies indicate that supplementing with green tea extract and its principle catechin EGCG may help increase fat oxidation ("fat-burning") and energy expenditure during periods of rest as well as during exercise.[4,5]
Additionally, green tea extract may also help reduce body fat and waist circumference by decreasing caloric intake during meals and reducing the amount of carbohydrates absorbed from a meal.*[6]
KSM-66® Ashwagandha
Dieting can be stressful; there are no two ways about it.
You're willingly consuming fewer calories than you'd like, in addition to increasing your level of activity during the day. This is all on top of dealing with all the everyday minutiae and machinations of daily life.
Being in a state of chronic stress leads to chronically elevated cortisol levels, which can hinder fat loss in a number of ways, including:
- Increased Cravings and Feelings of Hunger
- Reduced Feelings of Satiety
- Poor Sleep
- Decreased Desire to Exercise
- Disrupted Energy Metabolism
- Increased Protein Breakdown
- Decreased Muscle Recovery
In addition to utilizing various stress-management techniques like meditation, breathing drills, or exercising, you can also try supplements.
One such supplement that’s garnered wide appeal for helping deal with stress is KSM-66® Ashwagandha.
Ashwagandha is an adaptogen which means it helps improve how the body deals with and recovers from stress.
What's more, KSM-66® has been studied in humans and found to improve feelings of stress and anxiety and help with bodyweight management and emotional eating behavior.[7,8]
The Best Supplement Stack for Cutting to Get Ripped and Shredded
Getting cut begins and ends with proper nutrition and hard training. Without that, no supplement stack, no matter how well-dosed or expensive it is, will help to any meaningful degree.
However, when diet and training are on point, using the right supplement stack for cutting can help improve results.
At SteelFit®, we’ve formulated the best weight loss supplements based on your needs and goals.
Click here to learn more about our weight loss/management products and which one is best for your needs!
References
- Sugita J, Yoneshiro T, et al. Grains of paradise (Aframomum melegueta) extract activates brown adipose tissue and increases whole-body energy expenditure in men. British Journal of Nutrition, 2013, 110(4):1-6.
- Sugita J, Yoneshiro T, et al. Daily ingestion of grains of paradise (Aframomum melegueta) extract increases whole-body energy expenditure and decreases visceral fat in humans. Journal of nutritional science and vitaminology, 2014, 60(1): 22-27.
- Momoe Iwami, Fatma A. Mahmoud, et al. Extract of grains of paradise and its active principle 6-paradol trigger thermogenesis of brown adipose tissue in rats. Autonomic Neuroscience: Basic and Clinical 161 (2011) 63–67
- Boschmann M, Thielecke F. The effects of epigallocatechin-3-gallate on thermogenesis and fat oxidation in obese men: a pilot study. J Am Coll Nutr. 2007;26(4):389S-395S.
- Auvichayapat P, Prapochanung M, Tunkamnerdthai O, et al. Effectiveness of green tea on weight reduction in obese Thais: A randomized, controlled trial. Physiol Behav. 2008;93(3):486-491. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.physbeh.2007.10.009
- Lochocka K, Bajerska J, Glapa A, et al. Green tea extract decreases starch digestion and absorption from a test meal in humans: a randomized, placebo-controlled crossover study. Scientific Reports. 2015;5:12015. doi:10.1038/srep12015
- A prospective, randomized double-blind, placebo-controlled study of safety and efficacy of a high-concentration full-spectrum extract of Ashwagandha root in reducing stress and anxiety in adults. Chandrasekhar, K., Kapoor, J., & Anishetty, S. (2012). Indian journal of psychological medicine, 34(3), 255.
- Body Weight Management in Adults Under Chronic Stress Through Treatment With Ashwagandha Root Extract: A Double-Blind, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Trial Choudhary, D., Bhattacharyya, S., & Joshi, K. (2017). Journal of evidence-based complementary & alternative medicine, 22(1), 96-106.
