No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days • Hacker News Board

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#111

Post by 001sky » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 1:32 AM UTC

ironchef wrote: post #38

001sky wrote: post #17

I upped my exercise, cycling 30-40 miles a day, every day for the first couple of weeks. Good to see!! When you are burning this level of level of energy every day, its actually to keep a stable weight. (Author must have had some base fitness, too so good for him.) At its core, Weight change is simple input/output math. The key variable is %deplete your glycogen levels (as % of full everyday.) That is the "cache" of…

"At its core, Weight change is simple input/output math." But I also think that...at its core it's very complex. What if you do all of that input in a single large meal vs 6 smaller meals? That's a BIG difference. Similarly just doing lots of cardio (and "burning" calories) vs high intensity workouts (like crossfit) have very different results.

If you're interested in simplifying the analsis, don't look at people who are trying to lose weight for your data. Look at people who are fighting to keep it on!! Read up on people who have to do significant amounts of work under limited caloric availability (not caloric restriction per se). At that level, 6 smaller meals keeps weight on (more efficient digestion). Eating fat leads to more weight loss (heat entropy). At a certain stage, how you do the work (cardio/crossfit) etc is irrelevant, because the order of magnitude of output=input. For a normal person at a gym, they are at a fraction of this workload. Walking an 4m/hour a day burns 400 calories a day. That's an order of magnitude off your metabolic rate of 2500/day. Walk or run 10 hours a day, you will burn 4000-8000 calories a day. You will deplete glycogen at hour 3-4 without a couple of those six meals. If you do this for 60 days on a 2500 calorie diet, even if its 40% fat, you will lose weight. Probably pushing yourself into unhealthy territory afer only a fraction of that time (if you have a standard BMI). That's a non-cardio, non-intensive workout BTW. That stuff is irrelevant, provided your metabolism is set to max by dynamic caloric consumption requirements at the same order of magnitude as base metabolic reuquirements. Cycling 40 miles a day (as the author claimed) is much closer to this threshold than other examples.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#112

Post by ja30278 » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 1:33 AM UTC

jaggederest wrote: post #65

ja30278 wrote: post #36

Exercise is wonderful, and (particularly strength training) can dramatically change how you look and feel. If you just want to lose weight though, just stop eating carbs. It really is that simple. There are many ways to lose weight, but dropping sugar (in all it's forms) is the most straightforward. It's the closest thing to a 'weight hack' I've ever seen. If you are currently overweight, just cut out carbs completel…

Elimination diets work because people fail to replace the missing calories, not because there's something magical about the thing you choose to eliminate. You can do this with colors of food, textures, anything that eliminates ~30-40% of the available food options.

The problem with the 'a calorie is a calorie' theory (which I used to subscribe to as well) is that is that your body doesn't burn food like a calorimeter. Different types of foods require very different amounts of energy to digest; some are only broken down with help from intestinal flora (or not at all)..while others are digested quickly and completely. Combine this with insulin's role in triggering fat storage, and you should be able to see that _what_ you eat, and not just how much, absolutely matters.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#113

Post by netcraft » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 1:55 AM UTC

lena wrote: post #75

netcraft wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah, thats kinda where I am. I don't think I'm salt sensitive, I think I just have bad genes. And the bp meds are managing it rather well. I'm still trying not to go overboard with the salt (I think cutting out fast food was the biggest part of losing weight, beyond the carbs), but I don't worry as much about it. I have also read studies that show too little salt (in the one I read, 8000 / day)

Those studies are usually not very good. They often fail to recognize that people who are on a low-sodium diet are very sick, for example (just like those studies that say that a low BMI is very dangerous but fail to control for the fact that very ill people are thin). I just think it would be really strange if humans had such a high need for salt, because until a few hundred years ago people did not add salt to thei…

Here is the article I was quoting: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/15/health/panel-finds-no-bene... and the study it was quoting: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22110105

It looks like I had my high end off, it was actually > 7000mg / day.

> Another study, published in 2011, followed 28,800 subjects with high blood pressure ages 55 and older for 4.7 years and analyzed their sodium consumption by urinalysis. The researchers reported that the risks of heart attacks, strokes, congestive heart failure and death from heart disease increased significantly for those consuming more than 7,000 milligrams of sodium a day and for those consuming fewer than 3,000 milligrams of sodium a day.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#114

Post by grecy » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 1:59 AM UTC

glaugh wrote: post #104

grecy wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See, you're doing it. You're making it too complicated, which makes people give up. It's physically impossible for a body to gain weight if it's burning more calories than it's using. That's like saying my gas tank will overflow if I burn 10 gallons a day and put in 9 gallons a day... that makes no sense. I'm using more than I'm putting in, so it must go down over time. Keep it simple, stick to the basics, play the l…

I'm sympathetic to that argument. It's tough to write one comment that addresses two audiences: (1) person who wants some simple, clear guidance (2) you and me who are debating at a slightly different level what advice we should give to #1. So here's maybe a better way of making my argument: 1. Eat fewer carbs. 2. If you want evidence/science/logic, read the Taubes book. [Addressed towards #2ers only:] I agree that t…

I know what you mean about having the conversation at two different levels.

> 1. Eat fewer carbs.

I don't agree. I could cut out all the carbs I'm eating and still be eating well over 3000 calories a day (in fact, I do that right now, personally). Eating fat-soaked deep fried junk is the bad one. Carbs are no the enemy. Calories are.

I also never say to a beginner "eat less calories" because people trying to lose weight have a very, VERY big emotional attachment and reaction to the word calories. That's why weight watchers hides that with their points system. They just say you can eat x points today, we don't care how you do it, go nuts. (The formula is points = calories/50). Eat a whole loaf of white bread or a massive pile of pasta today for all they care. As long as you stay under your points allocation, it doesn't matter, you will lose weight.

In the long, long run, you can tweak that.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#115

Post by mixmastamyk » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 6:03 AM UTC

grecy wrote: post #114

glaugh wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sympathetic to that argument. It's tough to write one comment that addresses two audiences: (1) person who wants some simple, clear guidance (2) you and me who are debating at a slightly different level what advice we should give to #1. So here's maybe a better way of making my argument: 1. Eat fewer carbs. 2. If you want evidence/science/logic, read the Taubes book. [Addressed towards #2ers only:] I agree that t…

I know what you mean about having the conversation at two different levels. > 1. Eat fewer carbs. I don't agree. I could cut out all the carbs I'm eating and still be eating well over 3000 calories a day (in fact, I do that right now, personally). Eating fat-soaked deep fried junk is the bad one. Carbs are no the enemy. Calories are. I also never say to a beginner "eat less calories" because people trying to lose wei…

I think your larger point is right re: sheer calories.

But, there's a significant difference in what people want to do or think they do), and what they actually do.

The fact that sugars and starches spike blood sugar, which later falls rapidly causing hunger pangs, makes it very difficult to stay on plan. These people feel like they're starving.

Alternatively, a person eating fish and veggies soaked in olive oil never experiences the spike, burns fat slowly, and can stay hunger-free for most of the day. I.e., what may be a higher calorie meal in the short-term, allows one to take in fewer calories over the course of the full day... since there is little desire to snack.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#116

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 6:17 AM UTC

jaggederest wrote: post #65

ja30278 wrote: post #36

Exercise is wonderful, and (particularly strength training) can dramatically change how you look and feel. If you just want to lose weight though, just stop eating carbs. It really is that simple. There are many ways to lose weight, but dropping sugar (in all it's forms) is the most straightforward. It's the closest thing to a 'weight hack' I've ever seen. If you are currently overweight, just cut out carbs completel…

Elimination diets work because people fail to replace the missing calories, not because there's something magical about the thing you choose to eliminate. You can do this with colors of food, textures, anything that eliminates ~30-40% of the available food options.

[deleted]

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#117

Post by gonzo » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 7:16 AM UTC

gxs wrote: post #76

grannyg00se wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a crazy heavy power clean weight. What kind of weekly weight increase?

I did a well known beginner's program called starting strength where you add 5 to 10 lbs per week depending on the week doing it once or twice a week. Then I did crossfit for almost a year and went back to starting strength. By the time I went back to starting strength I was able to start much higher at about 180 and kept increasing from there out, again 5 to 10 lbs a week. The key I feel was consistency. You hardly…

how does one 'reach out' other than posting a comment here?

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#118

Post by Dewie » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 8:27 AM UTC

gxs wrote: post #21

This is great and certainly don't want to discourage anyone. Some people need extreme transformations like this to be successful. Most people, however, don't. You'll have a much higher success rate if you're patient and change just one little thing at a time. Once you're comfortable, you move on to the next. I myself have lost over 30lbs and increased strength tremendously (power clean 250+). I went about it by doing…

I have the impression that this is the strategy for a lot of people involved in personal development in general: change one habit at a time. Most people have enough time to not rush positive changes.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#119

Post by Dewie » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 8:33 AM UTC

lukifer wrote: post #49

gxs wrote: post #21

This is great and certainly don't want to discourage anyone. Some people need extreme transformations like this to be successful. Most people, however, don't. You'll have a much higher success rate if you're patient and change just one little thing at a time. Once you're comfortable, you move on to the next. I myself have lost over 30lbs and increased strength tremendously (power clean 250+). I went about it by doing…

I found the opposite to be true: Bright Lines are more effective than half-measures. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bright-line_rule I tried keeping soda and fast food to only one day per week, but bit by bit, "just this once", it kept spilling back into day-to-day habits, and/or miserable cravings. Only when the stimuli were removed entirely (and substituted with other goodies likes steaks and raspberries) did I start…

It's not clear that they is advocating 'half measures'. They is advocating changing one thing at a time. That could mean to only eating chocolate on the weekends, or to stop eating chocolate entirely - both of these measures are just changing one thing. I've had success just cutting out one thing at a time - instead of cutting out snacks entirely, I've cut out sweet snacks. Not salty snacks, just sweet snacks. This, in a way, "removed the stimulus entirely", because I find craving for sweets and salty/fatty stuff to be more or less distinct cravings. Now after I stopped having sweet cravings, I cut out salty/fatty snacks, and then I would hardly ever get cravings for chips and such.

Re: No Bread, Beer or Biscuits: How I Lost 63lbs in 100 Days

#120

Post by saurik » Sat, Sep 14, 2013, 11:08 AM UTC

grecy wrote: post #101

saurik wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's more like saying that "putting in fewer calories than you burn" is not actionable advice as the things you eat affect what is burned and what it does, and why you do anything at all. If you want to contribute to less air pollution: wear a jacket and a hat on cold days, and wear a thin t-shirt and shorts on warm ones; this is simple advice that will cause you to not keep messing with thermostats to feel c…

> I think it's more like saying that "putting in fewer calories than you burn" is not actionable advice It's extremely actionable, and I've seen it work for hundreds and hundreds of people (I attended Weight Watchers to support my roommates. Both of them went on to become WW leaders, and I made so many good friends there I kept going back year after year. I have personally been involved in the lives of well over 500…

>> I think it's more like saying that "putting in fewer calories than you burn" is not actionable advice

> It's extremely actionable ...

There is no clear-cut action from that optimization request. In comparison, "eat less" or "eat different in this specific way" are examples of things that are actionable.

> and I've seen it work for hundreds and hundreds of people (I attended Weight Watchers to support my roommates. Both of them went on to become WW leaders, and I made so many good friends there I kept going back year after year. I have personally been involved in the lives of well over 500 people losing well over 100lbs each)

This means that it is "effective", not that it is "actionable".

>> as changing what you eat can be easier than insisting that you have to eat less and go without something your body is demanding.

> I never said anything about eating less. You miss read.

Well, now it isn't clear what you mean at all, because you've said you advocate Weight Watchers while also advocating a simple belief that "it's physically impossible for a body to gain weight if it's burning more calories than it's using". The people at Weight Watchers are very clear that "we know that a calorie isn’t just a calorie": they advocate modifications in the kinds of things that you eat and the way you live your life that will lead to a healthier body and, as a side effect, weight loss; in the process, they have a fairly complex equation that assigns "points" to different food items based on a bunch of different quantifiable metrics. This is exactly the kind of "too complicated" advice that you complained at glaugh about.