Can't outrun a bad diet
Discussion
Reading a thread in NP&E but I cannot post in there. I found this article really interesting. It's quite long, so I will summarise.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-exe...
TL;DR - Members of the Hadza tribe are way more active than your average Western human, but expend approx. the same amount of calories every day as we do. The theory is that, if you use more calories doing exercise, then your body saves that amount elsewhere. e.g. not reducing inflammation, etc.
Conclusion: Eat too much, get fat. Exercise more, get fit/strong & other benefits.
Obviously, there are outliers - extreme athletes who burn way more energy.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-exe...
TL;DR - Members of the Hadza tribe are way more active than your average Western human, but expend approx. the same amount of calories every day as we do. The theory is that, if you use more calories doing exercise, then your body saves that amount elsewhere. e.g. not reducing inflammation, etc.
Conclusion: Eat too much, get fat. Exercise more, get fit/strong & other benefits.
Obviously, there are outliers - extreme athletes who burn way more energy.
It's subject that can be debated forever, for me we're all different therefore you have to work it out for yourself, doesn't matter how you do it so long as you're getting what you want.
I was stable at 185lbs for 30 years then put on 19lbs of weight through over eating, there was only one way for me to remove it, stop eating/drinking so much, it worked I'm now about 180lbs .
It's also important to move and do resistance training (for general health) but building muscle is as much to do with what you eat rather than how much you eat, eat too much of anything and you'll get fat.
There are extremes look at what the polar explorers had to eat to even have a chance of maintaining their weight, but conversely an obese person is very unlikely to be able to expend those calories either, if you have a bad diet for your lifestyle you'll never out run it.
Depends how much you eat, run and how much muscle you carry.
But of course you can.
You can also outlift a bad diet. Carry enough muscle and you can eat almost what you want (within reason).
I'm somewhat surprised that Hadza study keeps cropping up - exercise adaptation is nothing new and a newbie to jogging/running will recognise how at first you burn huge amounts of calories and do start to lose weight and gain a bit of muscle definition - but once your body is used to the exercise cal consumption drops off.
But of course you can.
You can also outlift a bad diet. Carry enough muscle and you can eat almost what you want (within reason).
I'm somewhat surprised that Hadza study keeps cropping up - exercise adaptation is nothing new and a newbie to jogging/running will recognise how at first you burn huge amounts of calories and do start to lose weight and gain a bit of muscle definition - but once your body is used to the exercise cal consumption drops off.
The more muscle you carry the easier it is to burn calories, as a nation we are chronically under muscled, take a look as the high street, how many in shape males are there, not many, there’s also a record number of men in their 20s with low test levels, blame s
t diet and zero exercise, but back to topic, pack on the muscle and food options become wider.
t diet and zero exercise, but back to topic, pack on the muscle and food options become wider.In my case - exercise - lose a third to a half a pound a day for two months. Bike touring. Though it's not a controlled experiment, my diet changes as well. I eat as much as I want and drink a couple of beers most days but have less snacking opportuniies as I usually wikd camp. So I only eat what I have carried at night.
It's calories in vs calories out.
The whole thing talking about ancestors and these tribes gets very repetitive on podcasts etc these days and how they eat honey and full animals, we live in different worlds.
Eating for weight and performance, gym for strength and functionality, and cardio for cardiovascular reasons and can assist to calories out but fueling to perform well for the cardio can cancel that pretty fast.
The whole thing talking about ancestors and these tribes gets very repetitive on podcasts etc these days and how they eat honey and full animals, we live in different worlds.
Eating for weight and performance, gym for strength and functionality, and cardio for cardiovascular reasons and can assist to calories out but fueling to perform well for the cardio can cancel that pretty fast.
grumbledoak said:
The same lesson, over and over again. Exercise has many benefits, but weight loss isn't one of them.
You repeat this dogma over again. It's simply not true. Fat is easily used as an energy source - it's secondary school biology. For an already lean person though you'd have to measure oxygen in and carbon dioxide out..not so easy to do at home.grumbledoak said:
The same lesson, over and over again. Exercise has many benefits, but weight loss isn't one of them. You get thin in the kitchen.
Army recruits are mentally and physically stressed constantly and eat a phenomenal amount of calories from just the cookhouse. Added to that they are chucking a ridiculous amount of junk food in their bellies in the evening. All of them lose a significant amount of weight at the end of recruit training.
I wonder how many respondents have read the linked study. The important thing to understand is that this is about populations not individuals. The results don't invalidate your personal observations.
It's fascinating and counterintuitive. The received wisdom and thermodynamic estimates held that the increase in in obesity over recent decades is due to inactivity, since westerners are much less active than they were a generation ago. The authors were fully expecting the paleo lifestyle hunter gatherers to comfortably exceed the lazy westerners' energy output but the results showed the opposite.
The comparison with other primates was even more fascinating if you'd asked me who burns more calories per kilo, a human or a bonobo. I'd have said 'Easy - bonobo and that's just wang and shg' and yet all primates have lower energy use than humans. Some of this is our big greedy brains but we've taken a different evolutionary path to our cousins.
The suggestion that our metabolism compensates for exercise by dialling down other energy consumption has huge public health implications. Essentially diet and exercise are independent contributors to health and although exercise is hugely important in preventing disease, it may have limited value in managing obesity.
It's fascinating and counterintuitive. The received wisdom and thermodynamic estimates held that the increase in in obesity over recent decades is due to inactivity, since westerners are much less active than they were a generation ago. The authors were fully expecting the paleo lifestyle hunter gatherers to comfortably exceed the lazy westerners' energy output but the results showed the opposite.
The comparison with other primates was even more fascinating if you'd asked me who burns more calories per kilo, a human or a bonobo. I'd have said 'Easy - bonobo and that's just wa
ng and shg' and yet all primates have lower energy use than humans. Some of this is our big greedy brains but we've taken a different evolutionary path to our cousins.The suggestion that our metabolism compensates for exercise by dialling down other energy consumption has huge public health implications. Essentially diet and exercise are independent contributors to health and although exercise is hugely important in preventing disease, it may have limited value in managing obesity.
popeyewhite said:
You repeat this dogma over again. It's simply not true. Fat is easily used as an energy source - it's secondary school biology. For an already lean person though you'd have to measure oxygen in and carbon dioxide out..not so easy to do at home.
I'm not sure scondary school biology can actually compete with real science
.gangzoom said:
popeyewhite said:
You repeat this dogma over again. It's simply not true. Fat is easily used as an energy source - it's secondary school biology. For an already lean person though you'd have to measure oxygen in and carbon dioxide out..not so easy to do at home.
I'm not sure scondary school biology can actually compete with real science.Evanivitch said:
I lost a stone over 6 weeks eating mostly fruit cake, noodles, burgers, chips and ice cream. You can always out-exercise your calorific intake.
Not if its sugar based- for many people they'd be dangerously yo-yoing with sugar crashes/bonking etc during heavy exercise. Evanivitch said:
I lost a stone over 6 weeks eating mostly fruit cake, noodles, burgers, chips and ice cream. You can always out-exercise your calorific intake.
A good example of Calories out Vs Calories in. Whilst I wouldn't condone the above diet from a nutrition perspective the principle remains the same. Expend more calories than you consume and you will lose weight. I think it’s true. If your diet is consistently bad then very unlikely excercise will make a dent.
However if your diet is good, then burning an extra 250 calories a day could well be significant. especially if you excercise before breakfast then you will likely burn fat and lose more weight
However if your diet is good, then burning an extra 250 calories a day could well be significant. especially if you excercise before breakfast then you will likely burn fat and lose more weight
mcelliott said:
As mentioned above you can eat all the crap in the world as long as your burning more than consuming the weight will fall off, i know someone who lost over a 100lbs by really not making any changes to his awful diet, apart from cutting booze and swapping full fat coke for Coke Zero.
Which could easily have been a drop of 1000 calories a day, you are what you consistently eat and/or drink. Gassing Station | Health Matters | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff