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To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
121–130 of 145 posts
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#122A few years ago I decided I was sick of being overweight and decided to make a change. My approach was two-pronged: 1) eat better, 2) exercise. For eating, I cut out as much sugar as I reasonably could. For exercise, I made sure I "moved vigorously" for 30 minutes per day, every day. I was never a runner. And in my early shape, that 30 minutes was just me walking. Eventually, though, I stopped sweating and being out…
I’m jealous, I’ve been jogging since May this year and 5 miles in 35 minutes is way faster than I can go. You could easily break a 20 minute 5k at that pace!
I've been running for 30 years, and 5 miles in 35 minutes was barely possible at the very peak of my training. There's no chance of pulling it off now, even though I'm in ultramarathon shape.
The point being, you run your pace. Congrats on starting and keeping up your running. It's a really good form of exercise -- inexpensive, readily available, and low-overhead. There will always be faster people, and there will always be slower people. You'll meet both at races (when races are a thing again), and mostly what you'll feel is camaraderie that you're all in it together regardless of your pace.
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#123I see a lot of comments from people I suspect have never struggled with weight loss here. "Put the fork down" is easy advice, but for many it's a lot more challenging than it sounds. For me, and I suspect a lot of people, focusing on exercise first is the key. I can plot the number of miles I post on the bike against my weight. Of course I absolutely do more than 300 minutes a week on the bike. Diet is super importan…
A pound is 50 extra calories a day for a week. It doesn't take much fork action to eat 50 extra calories a day.
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#124I see a lot of comments from people I suspect have never struggled with weight loss here. "Put the fork down" is easy advice, but for many it's a lot more challenging than it sounds. For me, and I suspect a lot of people, focusing on exercise first is the key. I can plot the number of miles I post on the bike against my weight. Of course I absolutely do more than 300 minutes a week on the bike. Diet is super importan…
A pound is 50 extra calories a day for a week. It doesn't take much fork action to eat 50 extra calories a day.
What? Don't know where you heard that but fat has about 9cal per gram. That's ~4000cal.
Did you mean 500?
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#125I wanted to not have to wonder why my weight was suddenly 30 pounds more than in college, without me remembering how that ever happened. I started exercising with some light running, gym use, breaking a little sweat. Didn't do anything, didn't show any noticeable result over like 4 months. Then I hopped on a rowing machine (above preparation probably helped to be ready for it) because I wanted to see something happen…
BTW your phenomenon of 1 lb/wk is quite sustainable. Trying to lose significantly more than that (more than say 5 lbs/2 kg per month is not only hard to achieve but usually results in vpreverting to the prior weight.
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#126There is a reason the fitness community jokes that the best exercise for losing weight is "fork putdowns".
It definitely mirrors my experience.
I gained a lot of strength and some muscle mass in the gym. But as for losing extra fat, exercise could not move the needle more than 2-3 pounds. What worked, and was surprisingly easy, was intermittent fasting.
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you ever struggled with weight loss? I mean serious 60-80 pounds overweight and done it successfully? I've spent 30 years bouncing between 260 and 185 pounds. Every single time I've successfully lost weight it started with exercise. Diet alone has absolutely never worked for me.
I think weight loss = (calories in - calories out) is a useful approximation but vastly over generalizes. The human body is a complex system with many more inputs. Hormone levels, inflammation etc. all can play a role.
It is like saying that for an airplane to fly level, the force of gravity must be precisely counteracted by the lift generated by the wings.
Scientifically true, but in order to successfully pilot the plane, not very helpful. Keeping the plane in air and keeping your body fit requires knowledge of its mechanisms, not just the physical principles of operation.
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#128The majority of weight is lost through respiration, that's the C in CO2. Exercise is great for health, and does help weight loss. But diet is the only thing that is going to resolve this. You consume far more calories in a regular sized Milkyway then you're going to burn exercising in 50 minutes that's for sure. Here's a chart of just those tiny "fun sized" Halloween candies. https://www.popsugar.com/fitness/What-Tak…
The problem with this is that the lizard brain takes over. Brain says eat your are staving to death, eat it'll make you happy, eat... or else. You can't control urges to eat, you can only do your best to resist them. However, exercise, is always under your control, so it is a great tool. Exercise also has all sorts of non weight loss health benefits that aren't tangential but complementary to weight loss, including s…
"You can't control urges to eat, you can only do your best to resist them."
My experience says that I feel a lot less hunger on intermittent fasting than trying to eat small meals frequently. Most other IF practicioners say the same. Hunger feelings ("brain says eat") are hormonally driven and not entirely mechanical in their occurence.
Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#129Re: To Lose Weight with Exercise, Aim for 300 Minutes a Week
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
A pound is 50 extra calories a day for a week. It doesn't take much fork action to eat 50 extra calories a day.
What? Don't know where you heard that but fat has about 9cal per gram. That's ~4000cal. Did you mean 500?
One pound of weight is equal to 3500 calories, so that's 7 * 500. Whoops, looks like I dropped the extra 0.