Exercise versus diet
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releas...90329130227.htm
Quote:
I'm not so sure about this. My personal experience of exercise--I exercise while losing weight, gaining weight, and maintaining. But my experience of exercise is very much affected by how I eat. If I'm calorie restricting, especially on a less ketogenic approach--I might have lots of extra energy when I still have lots of body fat to lose. As I get leaner, I get lazier. If I go for a three mile walk when I'm lean, and trying to live on large amounts of protein, and lower fat, I'll find myself really dragging my heels. When I work out, I'll feel like doing less, drop a few sets. If I'm eating higher fat, ketogenic, I'm liable to add a mile or two to that walk, or add some sets to my workout. So that exercise correlating with maintenance--I see that as potentially as much of a symptom that the body isn't fighting to avoiding wasting energy as an approach to force the body to be in energy balance. Another possibly relevant factor--rats experience exercise anorexia, sometimes. If you underfeed them, they'll run more. This isn't a good outcome, they'll actually run to the point where they'd starve to death sooner if the experiment was long enough. This doesn't happen in all people, but it happens in some. If it happens in the extreme, perhaps there's sort of a spectrum, and this does work for some people without the excess. But what do we have? When everybody is told, the best way to approach weight loss is X, everybody tries X, at the end of the experiment, maybe the only people left doing X are those it worked for. The Biggest Loser is mentioned--well, yeah. Everybody the approach didn't work for was sent home. |
Yeah, I've noticed since I've lost my weight that the notion of exercise comes more easily to me because it's easier for me to do now. It's not a conscious decision to exercise more in order to keep my weight off, in fact there's no decision for me to need to make; I don't really exercise much more at this point at all, though I certainly recognise that it's so much easier for me, and that I could do more if I wanted to. But at the same time, I haven't really needed to in my 2-and-a-bit years of maintenance so far.
Beforehand it was such a struggle, not because I didn't want to, but because it was so physically hard. I mean, you try carrying 100+ extra pounds with you for every moment of your life and see how motivating that feels. :p Not to say that exercise is a complete waste of time, but I do think these study results are being misinterpreted in a kind of chicken-vs-egg kind of way. I'm with Volek and Phinney on this subject: "exercise is a wellness tool, not a weight loss tool". |
I would think that both diet and exercise are factors, and the degree that each influences a particular individual would vary from person to person.
No two are alike. |
Hey Bob. Yeah, I agree. Exercise studies look at "responders" and "non-responders." How good our bodies are at maintaining a particular weight, whether they overrespond to certain foods, I think is variable.
I think one thing that might be left out between now and then, looking at whether previous generations were more active, ate more than us etc. is sort of how busy we were, and how that affected access to food. During the work week, I'm a lot more active--but with getting to and from work and work itself, that's a good ten hours or so where usually I just don't bother to eat. I work nights, usually do all my eating before work. On the weekend, I'll usually eat more. Mostly for entertainment purposes, but I also think I personally experience a bit less of an appetite when I keep busy. |
A couple of years ago I spent about a month in Spain. Madrid, Barcelona, Seville, and found that people walk a lot. In the cities, it's public transportation and a lot of walking. They have pedestrian 'roads' in the big cities that connect plazas with shopping and cafes along the way. The people seem to eat very heartily, but there weren't many overweight people. Bonus, the women had great legs (my wife even noticed that).
I walk 3-4 miles a day when I'm not working (usually 4). And work requires a lot of exercise plus takes a lot of time. If I go through a no walk period, I gain weight and my blood pressure goes up about 5 points. I like to keep it under 120. That's enough incentive for me. Also, certain foods might trigger weight, even on the keto diet. If I add MCT oil I slowly gain. I haven't figured out why because I subtract other oil based calories. This is the result of 2 tests, so it could be coincidence, so more tests will be held when I get down a couple of pounds under my target weight. Bob |
I always have a harder time losing or not gaining when I am more active. I suddenly whooshed a lot away recently after being laid up with a hamstring injury. It's frustrating because I like to move and I teach a sport and I would love for my active lifestyle to help with the reverse. I'd rather be heaver and active than thin and inactive any day, though.
|
Generalizations... just that. When people say exercise just makes them more hungry etc., I believe it. But it's just one of those things that can happen, and we don't know that it will happen to everybody. Damage the hypothalamus one, way, you might get a lethargic animal, normal appetite, another way, increased appetite same activity levels, another way... not that we're all explained by damaged hypothalamuses, the point is just that regulation of body mass isn't a simple linear system, where decreased food intake inevitably leads to decreased activity levels (though it seems to work that way for me personally, but eating more ketogenically even within low carb weakens the effect) or increased activity inevitably drives food intake up--again, it may be a common enough occurence, but it's not a simple system, it's just one possible outcome to that input.
|
Quote:
I think it's more complicated than that. Vigorous exercise causes inflammation and that can cause gain even if the person isn't eating more or different. I have had problems with high cortisol in the past. Some of it is hormonal. People who blow out their adrenals training, that kind of thing. |
Yes, complicated as heck. But sometimes we get lucky, and controlling for a simple variable results in an answer we like shooting out the other end of the black box of metabolism. :lol: Even when a simple answer works, it's liable to work for more complicated reasons than we'd like.
|
Quote:
Hi Bob, we as a society side to walk much more than we do now. I walk about 3 miles each day. I have to smile when you said the women had great legs. San Francisco - back in the day - used to always refer to the women as the most shapely legs. Everyone walked and in San Francisco, it is all hills. Some times uphill brig ways. 😂. Not to many walk anymore. My bro is a Lyft driver and he picks up passengers that want a ride 2 blocks. 😳 |
Ladyhawk, yes, walking is great for the legs, my wife walks with me and has stunning legs. She would catch my eye, even if I didn't know here (in fact she did, 40 years ago and still does - I'm a lucky guy).
jschwab, exercising can build muscles which are heavier than the same volume of fat. If your weight is going up and inches going down, it might not be a bad thing. I also know that if I lay off the exercise for a few weeks, say on vacation or put into a position where I cannot, the first few days of walking adds weight to me. I figure it's water weight due to inflammation and don't worry about it. Bob |
Quote:
If I keep this up, when I meet my weight goal I'll have a lot more muscle--which ups one's metabolic rate over the same pounds of fat. I certainly think that would help maintenance. |
My two cents-- for a long time I held at 200-205, moderate activity. Had not depended on activity/exercise to drop the weight, but the loss of the weight helped me get off the couch.
A couple years ago I worked ware house: fast paced,heavy lifting go faster-faster- faster-- just starving and cram my mouth full of food. And not gain. THen boss moved me to a sedintary job-- just standing in a cubicle for 8-10 hrs a day. The pounds JUMPED on. In 2 months, TWENTY pounds heavier-- then back to the other job..... much harder with an extra 20. ANd not coming off. Too many factors affect weight loss and maintenace to say exercise is the definative difference between sucesss and weight gain. |
Exercise is just one ingredient in the 'formula' for me. Keto is another. Sensible caloric intake is yet another. Staying hydrated helps (mostly water and a modest amount of coffee/tea).
Quitting any one of these has an effect on my weight. One added benefit of the exercise though is physical well-being. I am capable of doing things I couldn't do if I were more sedentary. Bob |
Quote:
You are not too big for running. The best ten mile race I ever ran I was about 230. I ran ten and a half minute miles - not fast but respectable enough. And i was faster than when I was 180. |
All times are GMT -6. The time now is 02:34. |
Copyright © 2000-2024 Active Low-Carber Forums @ forum.lowcarber.org
Powered by: vBulletin, Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.