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Exercising but Gaining Weight

well.blogs.nytimes.com

41–50 of 56 posts

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#41
post #15

Anyone with even a rudimentary training knows this fact: Exercise don't help you loose weight. Even the heavy routines burn minuscule amount of calories that would be compensated by just couple of slices of bread. Exercise helps you build cardio and/or muscle strengths which is very different than loosing weight. The only sure shot way of loosing weight is diet control. Just stop eating simple carbs (aka white floor/…

> Exercise don't help you loose weight. Even the heavy routines burn minuscule amount of calories that would be compensated by just couple of slices of bread. Exercise helps you build cardio and/or muscle strengths which is very different than loosing weight.

Increased muscle mass produces increased resting metabolic rate -- exercise often isn't a short-term help to losing weight, but its a long term help.

More importantly, "losing weight" is usually not the real objective, its a proxy measure for improving overall health and fitness, for which exercise is useful, even without weight loss.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#42
post #3

Running on a treadmill for an hour is about 600 calories. Eating an extra snack before bed can easily be that. To be calorie deficient and lose weight, it is so much easier to eat less than to exercise more. On top of that, exercising more can stimulate your appetite... leading to over eating. Basically you just have to be vigilant with not eating too much. I don't think counting calories is important, but 3 small me…

> 600 calories. Eating an extra snack before bed can easily be that. I agree that it's easy to eat a lot of calories without paying attention, but it's only self-delusion that calls that a snack. That's almost two mcdonald's sandwiches. That's four bowls of cereal. 600 calories is an entire meal.

> That's almost two mcdonald's sandwiches.

Its a hair more than one Big Mac (530 cal), Quarter Pounder with Cheese (520 cal), or Quarter Pounder Deluxe (540 cal), or Large Fries (510 cal), exactly one Quarter Pounder with Bacon and Cheese (600 cal), and less than one Bacon Clubhouse Burger (720 cal) or Double Quarter Pouder with Cheese (740 cal).

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet when calorie restriction is done through restricting carbohydrates, the results are much more convincing http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2716748/

And if PubMed isn't your cup of tea, just head over to https://www.reddit.com/r/keto , unless you think those ~125K subreddit members are just lying. Not all calories are the same. I myself lost almost 40lbs on the keto diet (~200 to start, now around 160lbs). 31, male, sedentary IT worker. NO EXERCISE. I eat everything except carbs (fruit, beer, anything with sugars).

Beer and alcohol has quite a lot of sugar.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 600 calories. Eating an extra snack before bed can easily be that. I agree that it's easy to eat a lot of calories without paying attention, but it's only self-delusion that calls that a snack. That's almost two mcdonald's sandwiches. That's four bowls of cereal. 600 calories is an entire meal.

> That's almost two mcdonald's sandwiches. Its a hair more than one Big Mac (530 cal), Quarter Pounder with Cheese (520 cal), or Quarter Pounder Deluxe (540 cal), or Large Fries (510 cal), exactly one Quarter Pounder with Bacon and Cheese (600 cal), and less than one Bacon Clubhouse Burger (720 cal) or Double Quarter Pouder with Cheese (740 cal).

It's over one and a half McDoubles (390 cal), or one and two thirds McChickens (360 cal).

At least according to the top result. I'm not sure why different things say different numbers.

Edit: The official site actually gives slightly lower numbers. And apparently a cheeseburger or grilled onion cheddar is 290/300, so exactly two.

A quarter pounder deluxe is hardly a 'snack' either.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#45
post #35

People are ridiculously bad at estimating the caloric content of food they eat. We can see the volume of food, feel the weight, taste it but we cannot without practice and training easily guess how many calories it will be. Also people are just as bad at estimating how many calories they would burn by exercisng or walking. We've all heard it -- "I'll need to walk around the block after eating that piece of cheese cak…

People are bad at estimating calories, but our bodies are really good at regulating them, if you feed it properly. The low fat diet advice has done horrendous things to people's metabolisms, leaving people insulin and leptin resistant. The insulin resistance disregulates the flow of fat through adipose membranes, favoring storage; the leptin resistance disregulates the appetite homeostasis that should regulate appetite, hunger, and weight. It can all be tracked back to the disproven diet heart hypothesis, and the fear of fat that ensued (and became enshrined like a religion).

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#46
post #38
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. The real problem with fat gain/loss isn't sedentary vs. active lifestyles, it's calorie consumption. This is why smokers who never work out are usually extremely thin- they typically eat very little. That isn't of course to suggest that that is healthier than being a non-smoker who is overweight, but rather to show in an extreme case that for fat loss exercise is extremely overrated while simple calorie rest…

> Pretty much all breakfast foods other than eggs are just sugar and carbs and extremely fattening. I never understood that. I came from another country and live here now for many years. I don't get it how breakfast is a completely acceptable time to eat just dessert food -- pancakes and syrop, waffles, oatmeal smothered in sugar honey and cinnamon, cereal, even "healthy" yogurt with sugar in it, toast with jam on it…

There is no credible evidence that breakfast, as eaten as the morning meal before, say, lunch, has any special significance. There is credible evidence that intermittent fasting, which often includes skipping breakfast, has benefits.

A hypothesis about what was causing heart disease coupled with the marketing might of the sugar and grain industries replaced bacon and eggs with Lucky Charms, and American health has gone downhill since (and the hypothesis was wrong, but the dietetic world still has trouble admitting it because it would have to admit it has actively harmed people's health. Cognitive dissonance at its best).

Don't give up the fatty foods. They are the foundation of a good diet.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's no consistent evidence of large groups of people who started reducing calories and in return lost pounds predictably. The only inconsistencies come from inaccurate self reporting of caloric intake by study participants. There's been several meta-studies on this. Eating carbs/sugars is indeed a problem because of GI issues - you will feel hungry again soon after consuming sugar which makes it harder to stick…

Medicare has commissioned a research of calorie-restricted diets back in 2007, seeing how obesity was prevalent in the society and Medicare was on the hook to pay for consequences. The full study is available (among other sources) here http://motivatedandfit.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Diets_... But in a nutshell, from intro paragraph, "there is little support for the notion that diets lead to lasting weight loss…

You misrepresent the study. The paper you link to is very clear that people who diet lose weight while dieting, but gain weight when they stop dieting.

We've known that for a while which is why people now talk about "lifestyle change" instead of "dieting". We know dieting is harmful.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#48
post #7
post #3

Running on a treadmill for an hour is about 600 calories. Eating an extra snack before bed can easily be that. To be calorie deficient and lose weight, it is so much easier to eat less than to exercise more. On top of that, exercising more can stimulate your appetite... leading to over eating. Basically you just have to be vigilant with not eating too much. I don't think counting calories is important, but 3 small me…

Exactly. The real problem with fat gain/loss isn't sedentary vs. active lifestyles, it's calorie consumption. This is why smokers who never work out are usually extremely thin- they typically eat very little. That isn't of course to suggest that that is healthier than being a non-smoker who is overweight, but rather to show in an extreme case that for fat loss exercise is extremely overrated while simple calorie rest…

Exercise and diet combined is more effective than either alone. You get the health benefits from exercise, not from calorie reduction.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD003817...

> The 43 studies included 3476 participants. Although significant heterogeneity in some of the main effects' analyses limited ability to pool effect sizes across some studies, a number of pooled effect sizes were calculated. When compared with no treatment, exercise resulted in small weight losses across studies. Exercise combined with diet resulted in a greater weight reduction than diet alone (WMD - 1.0 kg; 95% confidence interval (CI) -1.3 to -0.7). Increasing exercise intensity increased the magnitude of weight loss (WMD - 1.5 kg; 95% CI -2.3 to -0.7). There were significant differences in other outcome measures such as serum lipids, blood pressure and fasting plasma glucose. Exercise as a sole weight loss intervention resulted in significant reductions in diastolic blood pressure (WMD - 2 mmHg; 95% CI -4 to -1), triglycerides (WMD - 0.2 mmol/L; 95% CI -0.3 to -0.1) and fasting glucose (WMD - 0.2 mmol/L; 95% CI -0.3 to -0.1). Higher intensity exercise resulted in greater reduction in fasting serum glucose than lower intensity exercise (WMD - 0.3 mmol/L; 95% CI -0.5 to -0.2). No data were identified on adverse events, quality of life, morbidity, costs or on mortality.

> The results of this review support the use of exercise as a weight loss intervention, particularly when combined with dietary change. Exercise is associated with improved cardiovascular disease risk factors even if no weight is lost.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#49
post #2

>While this study didn’t track the women’s eating and movement habits away from the lab, it is likely that those who gained weight began eating more and moving less when they weren’t on the treadmills, “probably without meaning to,” Dr. Gaesser said. Without knowing the whole picture, it seems hard to draw any sort of meaningful conclusion. Weight loss is almost entirely diet-based.

People often overeat when they start exercising, either because they're hungry from the exercise, or because they feel can indulge a bit as a reward. My view is that most people should ignore exercise and fix their diet first, only easing in to an exercise routine slowly once they start to see weight loss results.

>My view is that most people should ignore exercise and fix their diet first, only easing in to an exercise routine slowly once they start to see weight loss results.

Agreed. In the last few months, I've lost about 20 pounds via diet alone. I'm starting to incorporate exercise now, and it's a lot easier to keep going day after day since I can move easier, so I don't get discouraged as easily.

Re: Exercising but Gaining Weight

#50
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if PubMed isn't your cup of tea, just head over to https://www.reddit.com/r/keto , unless you think those ~125K subreddit members are just lying. Not all calories are the same. I myself lost almost 40lbs on the keto diet (~200 to start, now around 160lbs). 31, male, sedentary IT worker. NO EXERCISE. I eat everything except carbs (fruit, beer, anything with sugars).

Beer and alcohol has quite a lot of sugar.

Alcohol doesn't contain sugar. Rather, it replaces glucose in the blood and can be used directly as a fuel without any conversion.

This is unlike in low-carb diets, where fat must be converted to a fuel (via gluconeogenesis) before cells can use it as energy, and this conversion itself takes energy.

Effectively, alcohol reduces the benefit of low-carb diets but doesn't necessarily increase the insulin response as would a high-sugar diet.

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