Thread: A Question Of Diet and Exercise

When I first starting looking at the need to lose weight some years ago and it actually happened I lost 13kg in a few months by exercise alone without altering my diet at all, that was prior surgery and the problems that ensued from that. At the time I had a diet assessment and one comment from a medical professional was astonishment as I did not eat enough carbs to maintain an exercise program. I eat three slices of wholemeal bread a day, is that too much? The only other thing that might contain carbs is a few vegetables in the evening meal.

I've lost weight on a low carb diet (which was the opposite of what I wanted to do about a decade ago - I thought I would increase protein intake to try to get more out of the light weight training that I was doing. I just didn't pay attention to the fact that it's difficult to eat as many calories when you cut out most carbs).

I've also lost it just straight-up cutting calories. To me, it's easier to lose weight with a diet (and keep it off if you can make permanent changes) than it is to lose it by exercising. An hour of moderate or stronger exercise is about 500 calories worth of extra consumption. If you have a poor diet, as I generally do when I'm not dieting, it's a lot easier just to find 500 calories to cut out. Result is about the same. Except that it's very easy to cut 500 calories out every day whereas it can be difficult to find an hour to exercise each day.

P-Doc here says the same thing. Exercise for your brain, diet to lose weight. He has a lot of patients who try to exercise their way out of a weight problem without modifying diet, and they don't get far because you just can't exercise enough in an hour to make much of a change.

If you're really big and overweight, all bets are off. I think any change for the positive, exercise or diet, can lead to drastic weight loss for large people. The other unaccounted for variable is that when you pick up an exercise routine, you may naturally change consumption. I eat less for several hours after exercising and sometimes more at the other end of the day (sometimes not).

I keep coming back to the diet I have. I don't eat anything that should be eliminated my from my diet to allow weight loss because I don't routinely eat or drink high carb/sugary foods nor snack between main meals. I have recently been heard that someone I know has had chest surgery and suffers lingering symptoms that sound like I have so I will have a chat shortly and see what he says.

I probably said this above, but you mentioned the job change as equivalent to exercise and leading to pretty drastic initial weight loss. I think a job and exercise aren't comparable unless the exercise is only a small part of the job (for example, if you're on the run for an hour or two a day but in the seat for the rest).

Most exercise probably tops out at around 500 calories burned in a session - there will be the exception where someone can burn more, and once in a while you'll see folks claim that they can burn 1500 calories an hour or some nonsense (that is in the range of a doped professional cyclist).

But, when the exercise is part of your job and you have no choice but to do it for long hours of the day, then it can be significant enough.

I worked in a cabinet factory when I was in college. A couple of the people had jobs where they had to pull things from various parts of the plant all day. The rate that they had to work was above walking speed, and they were in great shape, but always tired. Any time we had a sanctioned break (15 minutes mid morning, half hour for lunch, 10 minutes in the afternoon), they slept. Instantly. The amount of exercise they saw and did was far beyond what anyones' exercise program would be, and they definitely would've lost weight - and a lot - if they hadn't ramped up the food consumption.

Fortunately, I never got called to do one of those jobs. I was fit back then, but I still doubt I could've done 9 hour shifts in speedwalk/slow jog all day.

The exercise was the job in reality, I was in a huge ware house and started walking at the beginning of the shift and never sat down at all for 10 hours except for a small meal break.

Originally Posted by D.W.

Most exercise probably tops out at around 500 calories burned in a session - there will be the exception where someone can burn more, and once in a while you'll see folks claim that they can burn 1500 calories an hour or some nonsense (that is in the range of a doped professional cyclist).

you should take up elite nordic skiing -- 1500 calories per hour (measurement was 260 calories over 10 minutes at 13 km/h). Note that the average pace in a 50 km World Cup level race is almost 30 km/h.

Elite athletes undertaking altitude training struggle to maintain their calories intake. During one high altitude training camp, the balanced calorie requirement for male members of the Swedish national cross-country ski team was measured at 8300 calories per day. The report went on to note "Some of the skiers had serious problems consuming enough food to compensate for these huge energy expenditures."


so if you seriously want to keep your current diet, but loose weight purely through exercise, take up cross country skiing.

I wonder if there is consistency between amounts worked and calories consumed across all of the endurance sports. I'd bet there is some.

15 years ago when I was biking, I read a lot of Chris Carmichael's writings - he was Lance Armstrong's trainer or something of that sort. He said at the time that lance could burn calories at 2200 or 2300 per hour in a hill climb stage, and that he generally burned about 10,000 calories a day during the tour. I don't remember the entire consumption diet that ensued after a stage, but it involved beer and a muesli recipe that Carmichael provided (probably among many other things).

I'll bet that I have never burned 5000 calories in a day!! Not even in my youth when I was doing physical work. Your point is valid, though - the amount of exercise has to be a lot if it's going to be a weight loss regimen. If it doesn't come with a change in diet, it will lead to additional weight gain once the exercise stops.

A couple of months ago I cut out bread/grains, rice potato, milk, sugar, fruit juice and anything carb heavy. I've eaten so much bacon in the last 2 months I had to take a break just to change the tastes. It's been my primary food group, along with the odd steak. Not shy with cheese, fry up frozen brocolli for greens and skip lunch most days. Some quality butter in coffee can keep me full and busy for the few hours until dinner. Cashews and other nuts for a quick munch maybe, careful not to let it get too morish. So far about 15kg down, about 2kg/week. The first month or so I didn't add much excersise as I adjusted to the change in diet, but still lost a few kilo.

The change in exercise was a minor adjustment. I used to be fit working warehousing, not I'm 7 years into being a mouse jockey requiring only minimal wrist movement and the occasional finger tap on the letter board. 7 years of that and a few too many pizza deliveries later, and my frame is a few 2x4s of jarrah heavier. I've never been the sort of bloke to lift things that dont need to be moved, or run somewhere I didn't need to go in a hurry, and I'm not paying to do it on the spot so hitting the gym is out.

Instead I've started looking for reasons to lift heavy stuff and move it somewhere else. Need to edge the garden? Why not use 38kg limestone blocks? Got a feeling you should get some cardio in? Find something to hand plane or sharpen. Chase an escaped chicken.

Rearrange the furniture. Build new furniture out of heavy wood. Rearrange that, put it back where it was.

Hell, I've even started offering to help people move stuff in my ute.

Just find an excuse to keep moving (and don't forget to rehydrate).

Originally Posted by turpene

A couple of months ago I cut out bread/grains, rice potato, milk, sugar, fruit juice and anything carb heavy. I've eaten so much bacon in the last 2 months I had to take a break just to change the tastes. It's been my primary food group, along with the odd steak. Not shy with cheese, fry up frozen brocolli for greens and skip lunch most days. Some quality butter in coffee can keep me full and busy for the few hours until dinner. Cashews and other nuts for a quick munch maybe, careful not to let it get too morish. So far about 15kg down, about 2kg/week. The first month or so I didn't add much excersise as I adjusted to the change in diet, but still lost a few kilo.

The change in exercise was a minor adjustment. I used to be fit working warehousing, not I'm 7 years into being a mouse jockey requiring only minimal wrist movement and the occasional finger tap on the letter board. 7 years of that and a few too many pizza deliveries later, and my frame is a few 2x4s of jarrah heavier. I've never been the sort of bloke to lift things that dont need to be moved, or run somewhere I didn't need to go in a hurry, and I'm not paying to do it on the spot so hitting the gym is out.

Instead I've started looking for reasons to lift heavy stuff and move it somewhere else. Need to edge the garden? Why not use 38kg limestone blocks? Got a feeling you should get some cardio in? Find something to hand plane or sharpen. Chase an escaped chicken.

Rearrange the furniture. Build new furniture out of heavy wood. Rearrange that, put it back where it was.

Hell, I've even started offering to help people move stuff in my ute.

Just find an excuse to keep moving (and don't forget to rehydrate).

We are of similar mind. I don't much like exercise that doesn't do anything. Even if my stationary bike generated a little bit of electricity, I would feel like it was more purposeful. Exercise does wonderful things for my brain that nothing else will do, but in the off time, I sit around and think about how much of a waste of time it is when it seems like we could actually do something.

We have a lot of wooded area around here. It would be fabulous exercise to fell trees and then crosscut and split them entirely by hand - and haul them to a way point doing the same. We cut and split our wood when I was a kid - it was fantastic exercise. The kind of drudgery and exertion you don't love as a kid, but as an adult who uses a mouse most of the day, it is something that instead feels good.

I recall seeing something on TV about 2 decades ago where Henry Ford convinced a bunch of the white collar wealthy types that it would be in their best interest to head to the woods and exert themselves. I can't find anything about it on the internet, though.