Tea, the second-most popular drink in the world, behind water, has its origin dating
way back to 4,000 years ago in China.
And one of the earliest types of tea is green tea, which you'll find in pretty much everywhere
in the world.
Its extreme popularity is owed to the extravagant amounts of health benefits it contains.
And, by and large, these benefits are definitely true and researched extensively.
From preventing cancer to just making you feel better, there's no doubt that green tea
can do amazing things for your health.
In this video, we're just going to focus on its properties pertaining to exercise and
fat loss.
A green tea leaf has two substances that are the primary players providing the highest
amount of health benefits.
The first one is very obvious and exists in pretty much all teas, and that is caffeine.
At about 75 milligrams per cup, it definitely trails the 150 milligrams from the king of
all caffeinated beverages, coffee, but it's still quite a respectable amount and still
deliver quite the caffeine kick if you drink two cups in the morning.
But one thing that green tea has that coffee doesn't are catechins.
Roughly one third of a green tea leaf is composed of four different catechins.
We have epicatechin, epicatechine gallate, epi-gallocatechin, and by the most important
catechin, epigallocatechin gallate.
Woo, that's a lot of epi gallo everything.
Once again, epigallocatechin gallate, also known as EGCG, appears to be the most potent
in regards to all four catechins.
And its effects are simply outstanding.
EGCG has the ability to inhibit COMT, an enzyme that degrades catecholamines.
Catecholamines are hormones used to increase muscle contraction, and also release energy
sources into the bloodstream, such as glucose and fatty acids.
By inhibiting COMT, EGCG stops it from inhibiting the effects of catecholamines, which ultimately
means stronger muscle contraction as well as increased lipolysis, aka fat breakdown.
And the cool thing is that when paired with caffeine, the effects of catecholamines are
further accelerated, since caffeine has shown to increase catecholamine production.
So caffeine and EGCG are kind of like a tag team fighting against fat.
But there's a big catch here.
Studies have shown people who've build up an intolerance to the effects of caffeine,
also see a wide drop in the effects of EGCG.
So if you've been downing a lot of coffee for the past few years and have recently decided
to switch to green tea, the benefits of increased weight loss as well as exercise performance
might not be there for you.
That also means the more you're not used to caffeine, the more you benefit from the fat
burning and performance increasing effects.
And one extra "benefit" of EGCG is how it might inhibit the body's absorption of carbohydrates.
Some studies show that EGCG does in fact suppresses the effects of a glucose transporter protein
called GLUT4, which means more carbs coming out of your back end.
The effects are only to a small degree, but for some, that might be worthy enough.
In order to achieve these benefits from green tea, however, you're gonna have to drink quite
a lot.
Fat burning effects usually kicks in at roughly 400 milligrams of EGCG consumed.
A cup of green tea has roughly 50 milligrams of EGCG.
Do the math and that means you're drinking at least 8 cups of green tea.
For some, that's actually not hard at all, especially since green tea is mostly water
and can serve as a water alternative.
And in case you're concerned with tea possibly being a diuretic, aka make you pee more, when
compared to water, studies show that urination levels are roughly the same.
And remember that green tea is usually effective only if you are sensitive to caffeine, and
it's best to drink on an empty stomach.
That being said, if there ever was a true superfood, or super drink, green tea perhaps
might be taking that title.
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