Fat busting pills

Banny · 19 Jul 2008 at 11:38

Do these work, I have a belly that I want to get rid off.
Doing abit more cycling these days, thinking of getting these to speed up the process or are there better methods.

daveydave · 19 Jul 2008 at 12:06

No they don't

aftershxck · 19 Jul 2008 at 12:11

You sound like someone that has just jumped into training to lose weight and wants some quick solution to 'lose your belly' (by the way. you can't spot reduce fat).

If you do something now and then go back to your old lifestyle it'll just come back.

I'd lay off supplements that'd complement burning fat, in your position anyway.

Otherwise, ECA is good ! :cool:

PoSaM · 19 Jul 2008 at 13:21

Not being funny.. but if it's losing weight you want to do.. the best thing to do is change the way you eat.. my wife was prescribed the fat busting pills and we had more problems and less results with those than just a simple change to the diet with more exercise (woo extra sex for me)... I can't say for the ones you can buy over the counter.. but I can say that those prescribed WILL work if you use them as told.. however if you don't you're in for a world full of embarassment.. a little leakage sir ?? And not out of man boobs... fatty deposits R us...

Just change the way you eat.. find healthy stuff you like, make sure it's balanced, eat more fruit and veg, fat free yoghurts if you have a sweet tooth... and less chips and burgers... all the fat pills seem to do is reduce your intake of fat on any given meal.. and if your body isn't absorbing.. it has to go somewhere...

Freefaller · 19 Jul 2008 at 13:25

How about addressing your lifestyle? Diet, sleep, exercise etc... There are no quick wins in sport and fat loss. You're either committed to it or not.

drunkenmaster · 19 Jul 2008 at 14:09

Freefaller said:
How about addressing your lifestyle? Diet, sleep, exercise etc... There are no quick wins in sport and fat loss. You're either committed to it or not.

Yes there is, supplements will do you the world of good, thats just the way life is. Theres loads that claim to do lots they can't, and theres loads that are very good, and theres loads that are an utter waste of cash.

THe "perscribed" things are mostly fat/carb blockers, which are essentially useless, they are for people with no will power, blocking absorbtion of bad foods is ridiculous frankly, just don't eat bad foods and those pills become completely useless.

THeres several "fat burners" that can and will raise your metabolism, the reason they are good, and semi not bad for you is that when you diet your metabolism will drop, this is fact, it will happen, its a pain and its why losing weight is hard. With a normal metabolism, taking a bunch of stuff to support your thyroid and this that and the other and you'll simply burn too many calories, its not healthy, using them as a "maintainance" to your metabolism when dieting to try to prevent the massive drop can be very effective and really not be unhealthy. Of course there are dangerous supplements still, and safe ones.

THink of it like this, in a normal maintainance diet, you have all the food parts required, to burn a "normal" amount of energy, you have the right intake to keep your body in balance. Now when you want to lose fat, you HAVE to drop calories, this is basic science, now if you are eating LESS, you are getting less macro and micro nutrients, but your body is trying to burn a lot more fat than usual, however it will, really will struggle to make all the things you need to keep fat burning going efficiently. This is where, IMHO, supplementation is key. L-carnitine, Co10 enzyme are two important substances, completely safe, 100% safe, 100% normal in the body and heavily involved in the production of ATP in cells, ATP is energy, to burn fat cells have to be turned into energy, run out of either, or both of those and the production of ATP slows, your body has less energy floating about, your metabolism drops. A multivitamin, omega 3/6 supplementation(perfect ratio is eating same amount of omega 3 as 6, but most foods have a much higher 6 content so really supplementing omega 3 only as much as possible is great for you). If you're eating less food than your body requires, it only makes sense your body doesn't have normal levels of these things.

Theres a whole host of things your body will be fairly deficient in as its doing more work, on less nutrients. THerse literally millions of other things aswell, some healthy, some having been used for 1000's of years, some brand new, some are passing fad's and placebo's, some are great. ECA stacks do work, but aren't "that" great. Caffeine is pretty damn good supplement that most of us take anyway, keeps you alert when you're on less food.

MAgnesium, zinc, phosphorus and your B Vitamins will most likely all run low when dieting so a multivit that includes all of those, and maybe some specific tablets for them aswell will be helpful to you.

Banny · 19 Jul 2008 at 15:35

I am eating right aswell now, wife has seen to that, I am getting into training now and will stick to it.
Did used to be very fit once, so can get it back.
Thanks for the answers didn't think they would work, but thought I would ask.
Surely exercise is the best way of fat loss, know food is important but if you burn more than you eat can only be a good thing.

Freefaller · 19 Jul 2008 at 15:39

drunkenmaster said:
Yes there is, supplements will do you the world of good, thats just the way life is. Theres loads that claim to do lots they can't, and theres loads that are very good, and theres loads that are an utter waste of cash.

THe "perscribed" things are mostly fat/carb blockers, which are essentially useless, they are for people with no will power, blocking absorbtion of bad foods is ridiculous frankly, just don't eat bad foods and those pills become completely useless.

THeres several "fat burners" that can and will raise your metabolism, the reason they are good, and semi not bad for you is that when you diet your metabolism will drop, this is fact, it will happen, its a pain and its why losing weight is hard. With a normal metabolism, taking a bunch of stuff to support your thyroid and this that and the other and you'll simply burn too many calories, its not healthy, using them as a "maintainance" to your metabolism when dieting to try to prevent the massive drop can be very effective and really not be unhealthy. Of course there are dangerous supplements still, and safe ones.

THink of it like this, in a normal maintainance diet, you have all the food parts required, to burn a "normal" amount of energy, you have the right intake to keep your body in balance. Now when you want to lose fat, you HAVE to drop calories, this is basic science, now if you are eating LESS, you are getting less macro and micro nutrients, but your body is trying to burn a lot more fat than usual, however it will, really will struggle to make all the things you need to keep fat burning going efficiently. This is where, IMHO, supplementation is key. L-carnitine, Co10 enzyme are two important substances, completely safe, 100% safe, 100% normal in the body and heavily involved in the production of ATP in cells, ATP is energy, to burn fat cells have to be turned into energy, run out of either, or both of those and the production of ATP slows, your body has less energy floating about, your metabolism drops. A multivitamin, omega 3/6 supplementation(perfect ratio is eating same amount of omega 3 as 6, but most foods have a much higher 6 content so really supplementing omega 3 only as much as possible is great for you). If you're eating less food than your body requires, it only makes sense your body doesn't have normal levels of these things.

Theres a whole host of things your body will be fairly deficient in as its doing more work, on less nutrients. THerse literally millions of other things aswell, some healthy, some having been used for 1000's of years, some brand new, some are passing fad's and placebo's, some are great. ECA stacks do work, but aren't "that" great. Caffeine is pretty damn good supplement that most of us take anyway, keeps you alert when you're on less food.

MAgnesium, zinc, phosphorus and your B Vitamins will most likely all run low when dieting so a multivit that includes all of those, and maybe some specific tablets for them aswell will be helpful to you.

Supplements are just that... they supplement, they don't replace.

Nothing beats hard work, a good diet and a good healthy lifestyle. I don't buy into the whole supplement thing. You can throw all the science you want at me I just don't buy it, for the average Joe it's just not a reason. I succeed very well without them, I just work bloody hard at it

Proper prescribed fat blockers, ALONG with a good diet change, lifestyle change can help yes, but you have to be committed and are a short term fix to get you on the right road.

nichorob · 19 Jul 2008 at 15:43

There is another pill doing the rounds at the moment which is an appetite suppressant. Its the latest craze round here, a local medical centre seems to prescribe these pills (£15 for a weeks supply) to anyone and they just basically stop you feeling hungry and they seem to work. A friend of mine lost 12 pounds the first week he was on them and typically most people seem to be losing 8 pounds or more a week.

I would need to look into it further but I imagine there must be side effects.

Chong Warrior · 19 Jul 2008 at 16:58

In my experience the only pill that works is ephedrine (when combined with caffeine) It really does the business but there are quite a few potentially serious side effects.

Forget all the others, not worth the money. Exercise more and eat less... but then everyone already knows that?

nichorob · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:07

Chong Warrior said:
In my experience the only pill that works is ephedrine (when combined with caffeine) It really does the business but there are quite a few potentially serious side effects.

Forget all the others, not worth the money. Exercise more and eat less... but then everyone already knows that?

Are you allowed to list the side effects? I know were probably treading a thin line between this thread and a medical thread.

Jeffstar · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:13

Freefaller said:
Nothing beats hard work, a good diet and a good healthy lifestyle. I don't buy into the whole supplement thing. You can throw all the science you want at me I just don't buy it, for the average Joe it's just not a reason. I succeed very well without them, I just work bloody hard at it

Bang on Mr Freefaller :cool:

I love bodybuilding just as much as anyone, it plays a HUGE part of my life, but i point blank refuse to go anywhere near Psuedoscience BS. I respect myself far, far too much.

My advice is, if you want to be blinded by Psuedoscience/supplement hype, there's dozens of forums out there with brainwashed members who will be more than eager to fill your head with nonsense. Would be a real shame if this place went the same way.

Just my opinion

heeeed · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:24

supplements for fat loss I would suggest are largely crap. I suspect most fitness supplements to be largely crap anyway, but even more so for fat loss. They just prey on people desire to be skinny and make outrageous claims. Those that are willing to fine tune their diet and exercise will often claim them to be wonderful, but it's the fine tuning diet and exercise that is wonderful not the supplements, and for those people the placebo effect can be strong so they sing its praise.

Even the prescription stuff is not very good, and most people have to stop it, because they fail to lose enough weight to be allowed to continue it on the NHS rules. The fat blockers like orlistat I am sure work mainly because the side effects are so horrible that your average fatty becomes very aware of the junk they take in daily, this either leads to them stopping the tablets or changing their diet depending on how committed they are. I see more success with the appetite suppressants, but these have much more potential to be dangerous and again many people can't stay on them either due to failing to lose enough weight or running into side effect or safety issues.

Diet change is the biggest thing to concentrate on imo. It's nearly always the way you got fat in the first place, and will therefore have the biggest potential changes. Exercise is also important, but probably has a lesser overall effect than diet

drunkenmaster · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:29

Freefaller said:
Supplements are just that... they supplement, they don't replace.

Nothing beats hard work, a good diet and a good healthy lifestyle. I don't buy into the whole supplement thing. You can throw all the science you want at me I just don't buy it, for the average Joe it's just not a reason. I succeed very well without them, I just work bloody hard at it

Proper prescribed fat blockers, ALONG with a good diet change, lifestyle change can help yes, but you have to be committed and are a short term fix to get you on the right road.

Fat blockers, perscribed appetite supressors, all utter crap and don't work for anyone. If you block the fat and carbs you eat, you are still eating them. Say you take them for a month, you eat what you want, say 3000 calories of food, the pills block out 2000 calories, you lose loads of weight. but when you come off them, you're still eating 3000 calories, but your body has adjusted to use only 1000 calories during that previous month, you gain a ridiculous amount. Same with appetite supressors, you screw with your metabolism, when you come off them your appetite over compensates and would send you insanely hungry, you start eating massively more than your body has adjusted to using, all the weight goes back on and more.

Supplements are only supplements, when you get the full needed amount of the substance already and you're increasing the amount you get to help. When you've reduced the amount you eat to diet, you are often simply unable to eat the same amounts of nutrients as if on a full calorie diet, its not throwing science at you. If you eat healthily at 2500/3000 calories, and healthily but at 1500 or 2000 calories, you will simply NOT have the same intake of macro/micro nutrients. However your body is actually working HARDER and needs MORE nutrients when you're losing weight. THeres no having to throw science, there is a VERY heavy amount of research to be read and trawled though to see which supplements actually help, which are placebo and which are BS. But the simple fact is that you can lose more weight using the right things along with a healthy diet and exercise.

if you can explain to me how, when your body needs more chemicals, vits, minerals to create more energy from body fat and its getting less nutrients from eating less, it makes sense that you will have enough of the key ingredients I'll fold my view point, but its completely illogical that when your body eats less and works harder, you think you won't be deficient in anything.

Think of it this way then, your maintainance is 3000 calories, you drop to 2500, your body follows down to 2500 even though you should theoretically have more than enough body fat to burn for the excess calories, why can't you just use body fat for the extra? If you had ample supplies of the things needed for lipolysis and your body had a constant supply of energy from fat, surely it could use it, not drop metabolism and increase rate of fat loss.

ephedrine, or ephedra is/was the standard, more than anything because it was found, and worked, so why research anything else when you can just rebrand ephedrine a billion times and make money on it. I'm not quite sure at the moment to be honest, ephedrine was banned, ephedra was, but I believe has been unbanned in the UK, mostly as its so widely available again after everywhere stopping selling it for a time. Caffeine is frankly a great supplement on its own but works synegistically with ephedra, and aspirin again improves the effectiveness.

But there are lots of other things that are very much worth the money(and cheap) and work very well. Again, ephedrine increasing your metabolism is only so good, if you can't actually supply the body with ample supplies to burn fat, you'll just burn off muscle, or your body will adjust and put out less norepherine of its own to compensate to get to a lower metabolism.

The key is not raising metabolism, but keeping it where it was before you cut calories, by giving the body every damn last vitamin it needs in every energy making process to keep fat burning so effectively that you don't run out, that your body never starves and doesn't reduce metabolism to compensate for lack of food.

Theres two or three things I've found, non stimulant, that work much better than ephedra(which is 90% epinepherine and 10% Pseudoephedrine).

The main key is stimulating the thyroid tbh, theres some fairly damn strong, fairly problematic ways to directly stimulate it but all those things need cycling and downtime as they end up replacing normal production, which is very bad.

Theres infact a ridiculous number of drugs that can increase metabolism, increase fat burning quite easily but are all so interfering that they replace the bodys normal production of the drugs they increase, negating their effects quite quickly. Finding alternate paths is the tricky thing, do some reading up on the subject, you might be suprised at just how many things can effect the metabolism and I'm talking about natural things in the body, not adding anything, theres so many systems and so SO many balancing mechanisms that its insane. Add one chemical or hormone and you can effect a dozen different systems easily and everything effected will have 5 ways to counter whatever the effect is.

The difficulty in finding the perfect fat burning or muscle building drugs is simply how complex the human body is.

Epinepherine is "known" to work simply because it directly effects the heartrate and for most gives you a jittery feeling, because the effects are so plain to see you can tell it works. But in a sense, epinepherine is almost emulating cardio work, raising heartrate, its like a non intense workout, it only burns so many calories a day. Weights to increase type 2 muscle which increases basal metabolic rate(resting rate) is what you want to be doing, the other thing that effects basal rate is the thyroid, so all its functions, and every vitamin and mineral it uses to function at its best, are things you want to make sure you are eating.

If you burn 2500 calories a day, 300 is down to moving around, 2200 is down to your thyroid and muscles dictating resting metabolic rate, you can screw around an take stimulants to increase the 300 to 600, or you can give the body everything it needs so the 2200 doesn't drop down to 1200 because you're eating less calories. I know which I chose to "help" out.

THe other thing is that "supplements" are a total rip off in the uk in general. For most bottles of things that last a month or two and cost £30 here, they'll cost $30 in the US, as long as you aren't ordering anything illegal for sale in the UK(of which I can't think of anything as ephedra is legal here and banned there, and nothing else seems different) then order from the states and save a ton.

People are to up in arms about natural food, and whey isn't as good as normal food, well its not, its not food, its Protein, meat isn't protein its a food. The protein in whey is better than that in steak, its simple fact, but its worse as a meal, if you eat whey with other things it is better for you. Supplements to me, are just easy to eat food. I can choose exactly what I want to eat and when, its simple, these aren't things you can't eat normally, just simplified and quick and with much more knowable quantities.

heeeed · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:40

If there is so much wonderful evidence drunkenmaster for all these supplements and the prescription stuff doesn't work well (I kind of agree on the latter point for many people). Then why do you think you can't get any of these other miracle supplements on a prescription? It's either because there have safety issues or they don't have the good evidence you think they do.

drunkenmaster · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:42

Jeffstar said:
Bang on Mr Freefaller

I love bodybuilding just as much as anyone, it plays a HUGE part of my life, but i point blank refuse to go anywhere near Psuedoscience BS. I respect myself far, far too much.

My advice is, if you want to be blinded by Psuedoscience/supplement hype, there's dozens of forums out there with brainwashed members who will be more than eager to fill your head with nonsense. Would be a real shame if this place went the same way.

Just my opinion

For every 10 supplements out there which provide you with something you aren't deficient in and/or don't need anyway, there is a decent supplement of something you don't get enough of. if you only see Psuedoscience because you can't look beyond the stupid claims of some supplements then its you thats blinded.

If all you can see is the marketing, you're blind, if all you see is the claims and accept them at face value and buy anything, you're blind, if you're willing to check out supplements, check medical research, check physiology and science books and check into what the chemicals are, what they do, how they might help, what food you can normally get them in, see if you are actually eating that food, or enough of it and make a decision for yourself ignoring all the marketing that it could help then thats using your brain.

Jeffstar · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:44

heeeed said:
supplements for fat loss I would suggest are largely crap. I suspect most fitness supplements to be largely crap anyway, but even more so for fat loss. They just prey on people desire to be skinny and make outrageous claims. Those that are willing to fine tune their diet and exercise will often claim them to be wonderful, but it's the fine tuning diet and exercise that is wonderful not the supplements, and for those people the placebo effect can be strong so they sing its praise.

Even the prescription stuff is not very good, and most people have to stop it, because they fail to lose enough weight to be allowed to continue it on the NHS rules. The fat blockers like orlistat I am sure work mainly because the side effects are so horrible that your average fatty becomes very aware of the junk they take in daily, this either leads to them stopping the tablets or changing their diet depending on how committed they are. I see more success with the appetite suppressants, but these have much more potential to be dangerous and again many people can't stay on them either due to failing to lose enough weight or running into side effect or safety issues.

Diet change is the biggest thing to concentrate on imo. It's nearly always the way you got fat in the first place, and will therefore have the biggest potential changes. Exercise is also important, but probably has a lesser overall effect than diet

Totally agree.

In regard the appetite suppressants, is it true they used to prescribe Amphetamine for weight loss? Very effective but many nasty side effects and addictive.

Freefaller · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:46

Well what can I say, I must have a perfect body/metabolism. I eat when I'm hungry, I eat well. I exercise well, have a varied diet and don't smoke and don't eat any crap or processed foods. All that I've achieved and by the very admission of members here I have achieved incredible results, I've done this purely down to eating well, and being careful but working hard. Sure I appreciate that your body may need supplementing as it utilises extra nutrients, but I've achieved what I've wanted to achieve through nature.

People are lazier these days. Look over the past millennium, there were many fit strong human beings they never supplemented their diets. Why should I have to do so now?

I don't do the whole bulk/cut thing - I guess if I was trying to drop weight I'd maybe have a different idea, however I was over 17st once (when playing rugby) and just ate less, worked out harder, did more exercise and dropped down to 13st over a couple of years. I'm in perfect health - well I'm happy enough, and it's been down entirely to me. Sure I spend close to £60 a week on food for myself alone, but I buy good quality foods, vary my diet and eat well. Nature has all it has for me. I don't need supplements. Some people who need help who use them to take it to the next step will help, and I KNOW that some supplements DO work and work well. Someone like Chong, his physique is awesome, but my goals are different to his. I can't be bothered with pulsing supps, and taking them here and there, and keeping an eye on them. I'd rather just live my life.

The gym is a big part of my life, but as much as it's important it moves around me, not me around it.

I know the effects of a lot of these drugs and supplements, and I know they'd work if I wanted to take them. But you don't need them.

Killa_ken · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:48

hydroxycut/fat strippers are all bs. dont waste your cash.

drunkenmaster · 19 Jul 2008 at 17:49

heeeed said:
If there is so much wonderful evidence drunkenmaster for all these supplements and the prescription stuff doesn't work well (I kind of agree on the latter point for many people). Then why do you think you can't get any of these other miracle supplements on a prescription? It's either because there have safety issues or they don't have the good evidence you think they do.

Or , supressing appetite is easily provable, as is blocking fat, and frankly, you can get both things in over the counter drugs too. RAising your metabolism isn't something to be toyed with either, and mixing and matching too many things is incredibly dangerous. not to mention appetite supression and blocking fat are relatively old idea, relatively easy, have been worked on for decades and thats why they are available now. THey do work, i have no doubt they DO work, they do exactly what they say on the tin. THe problem is the effects they have on metabolism and what people do when they come off them make them completely ineffective.

As for perscription, you can get tons of the stuff on perscription to, T4, t5, thyroid hormones you CAN get on perscription, but remember at the end of the day, NHS is supplemented, everything you buy, EVERYTHING is reduced in price and not everything we all want is provided at cost value via government funding, thats just not remotely feasable, or a good idea.

The problem being, you don't really want to take t4/t5 from perscription, its incredibly strong and will severly harm your natural production of the thyroid hormones. As with pain killers, you can buy weak over the counter stuff fine and its effective, but the strong stuff you get by perscription because its slightly more dangerous. theres no logical reason a pretty safe supplement should ever be provided by perscription, thats just not what the NHS is for frankly.

As with anything, drugs perscribed by governments(if they did want to add them) go through much longer, tougher approval and take years, decades even to get approved. Science tends to move faster than that.