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Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

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Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#51

Post by specialp »

yuzi wrote: post #43

I went from 190 lbs. to 138 lbs. over 6 or 7 months. The only exercise I did was jogging for 45 min a day. What I noticed was that jogging made me feel better, which somehow got me to consistently eat better. After a days jogging I didn't want to put crap food in me and ruin what I had accomplished and by doing it everyday I felt good enough, often enough to stick with it. So, based on my experience, I simply can not…

This is very true. Exercise has more of an effect than the calories burned. It improves your health and you feel much better than when you had a sedentary life. As always the answer is that decreasing calorie consumption with moderate exercise is key to maintaining weight loss.

Just as exercising cannot offset massive overconsumption of food, massive underconsumption of food will make one that is dieting feel terrible, and thus not as likely to continue.

In addition the amount of exercise done is never going to really offset a sedentary job. Someone walking on their feet all day vs me being at a desk is going to consume much more energy than me even if I workout after work intensely for an hour. So I am still going to need to consume less than them. But if I did not do the hour of exercise, my body would break down from not being used, and my overall feeling of health would decline.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#52

Post by koluft »

Retric wrote: post #45
yuzi wrote: post #43

I went from 190 lbs. to 138 lbs. over 6 or 7 months. The only exercise I did was jogging for 45 min a day. What I noticed was that jogging made me feel better, which somehow got me to consistently eat better. After a days jogging I didn't want to put crap food in me and ruin what I had accomplished and by doing it everyday I felt good enough, often enough to stick with it. So, based on my experience, I simply can not…

Exercise is harder to keep up long term and gaining back the same weight after 5 years is not that useful.

Exercising every 5 years isn't so bad.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#53

Post by koluft »

lrei wrote: post #32
adrianN wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eating 4000 calories of anything will make you fat.

Eat (drink) 4000 calories of gasoline. wont make you fat. point is: only calories you can convert into "human fat" will make you fatter. that process can not happen without certain chemicals (hormones) in your body, like insulin mentioned above. it's not as straightforward as that which was op's point.

Are your confusing nutritional calories with physics calories? When people talk about diet, of course they are talking about calories obtained from digestion, not combustion engines.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#54

Post by Retric »

revelation wrote: post #50
Retric wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are far less than 100% efficient. Aerobic weightlifting is one of the highest energy burns per minute of any exercise type.

Humans are about 25% efficient, so feel free to multiply any number with 4 to get actual expended energy. That doesn't change the calculus, obviously. I can easily sustain 150W for an hour on a bike, I can't lift 225kg half a metre against gravity 500 times (the equivalent). (The idea here is that you try to back up lofty claims with some science numbers.)

Don't forget to add your body weight. Lifting ~110kg 6 feet (4 times 1/2 meter) 25 times in about 3 minutes ~= 6 mintues @ 150W on a bike. Plus whatever lifting your body weight from a squat adds up to. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_and_jerk

Start playing with the numbers and Weight lifters can get into crazy high energy diets.

PS: Works out to around 110kg / ~.82 ~= 135kg max lift. At 230 lb the record is 246 kg so it's not that unreasonable a goal for a fairly large guy.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#55

Post by maxerickson »

yuzi wrote: post #48
Retric wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exercise is harder to keep up long term and gaining back the same weight after 5 years is not that useful.

Not for me. I may have stopped working out for long periods, since then, but the 6-7 months of diet change stuck which was enough to maintain the weight loss (approximatley). 14 years now.

I see stories like yours and I wonder if the key factor is that you decided in a meaningful way to not be overweight anymore.

The exercise and better diet follow pretty easily from that.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#56

Post by [deleted] »

jtuente wrote: post #49
dualogy wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It you a eat a lot of fat you will get fat too. Its all about moderation. If you eat 4000 calories of FAT everyday you will get fat Calories-in-calories-out without considering the hormones that drive both satiety and crucially fat-storage-vs-fat-mobilization (and thus drive both how many calories are craved and how many are burned) is misguided. CICO isn't wrong, but for all practical purposes what drives CICO in…

> Calories-in-calories-out without considering the hormones Your argument here boils down to: CICO is easier with a balanced diet. I don't think a reasonable person is going to argue against that. > after a few weeks of keto-adaptation? They'd be a tad little bit fatter than they'd like Honestly, if they could stomach it, they'd balloon up just as much as its opposite. Keto-adaptation doesn't change how your body pro…

[deleted]

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#57

Post by xlm1717 »

e40 wrote: post #38
falcolas wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fat is very dense in calories, so if your goal is to reduce caloric intake, reducing the fat will go a long ways towards that goal.

But calories from fat are more satisfying and might very well let you eat less calories over all.

This is why I can't see anyone eating 4000 calories of fat without feeling so full they'll throw most of it back up.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#58

Post by yuzi »

specialp wrote: post #51
yuzi wrote: post #43

I went from 190 lbs. to 138 lbs. over 6 or 7 months. The only exercise I did was jogging for 45 min a day. What I noticed was that jogging made me feel better, which somehow got me to consistently eat better. After a days jogging I didn't want to put crap food in me and ruin what I had accomplished and by doing it everyday I felt good enough, often enough to stick with it. So, based on my experience, I simply can not…

This is very true. Exercise has more of an effect than the calories burned. It improves your health and you feel much better than when you had a sedentary life. As always the answer is that decreasing calorie consumption with moderate exercise is key to maintaining weight loss. Just as exercising cannot offset massive overconsumption of food, massive underconsumption of food will make one that is dieting feel terribl…

From my experience: I didn't have a sedentary life, well at least lets just say I wasn't sitting at a computer all day. I was always out and about. My extra weight was from a mix of overconsumption and poor food choices.

I noticed there were unforseen changes in behaviour due to diet that I still find strange. Things like quitting pop. I used to grab McDonald's food more often, but since quitting pop I avoid the place. Sometimes I still grab a burger from there, like 5 times or so over the last 14 years, but I'll never get a pop and I don't have a desire to go there and still avoid it with ease.

I still think diet changes are the single most important thing, but I just don't think I could have gotten there without exercise.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#59

Post by WalterSear »

taiboku wrote: post #40
maxerickson wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This effect is pretty small. Like 10 calories a day for a pound of muscle (which is quite a bit of muscle to add). It still matters, a few calories a day for a year ends up being pounds of weight, but adjusting calories out of the diet is going to be a better first strategy.

Hm, You seem to be right! I just spent the last several minutes reading reputable sources and they all seem to agree with you. In fact, they indicate a pound of muscle burns more like 6 calories. You win, Internet.

It's building the muscle that takes calories.

Re: Why you shouldn't exercise to lose weight

#60

Post by WalterSear »

takno wrote: post #37
gaberpt wrote: post #6

This a harmful, eye-catching, title. Whereas exercise is not required to lose weight, you still can use exercise to optimize the process.

About half of the article deals with why attempting to use exercise to optimize the process probably won't help much with it and for some people will completely derail it. The title is exactly aligned with the article

None of the article looks at weight training.
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