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 one small thing at time. First I got used to going to the gym a couple days at a time. Once I was used to going to the gym, I started a strength program. Once I was used to going to the gym and being on a program, I started crossfit. Then after I was used to that, I started omitting wheat from my diet. Once I was used to that...you get the point.
Each time that I lost weight it was due to vigorous exercise while doing sports for fun.
Each time I gain weight it is due to insufficient exercise and eating wrong stuff.
What works for me is keeping starchy foods scarce in my diet. As long as my diet subsists of fat, protein and vegetables I am fine. If I start consuming flour, rice, potatoes, sweets and alcohol I gain weight.
I have only recently realized how eating a meal rich in protein and fats keeps me fed for as long as eight hours. If I eat some sweets or a piece of bread I will feel famished in two and a half hours. Whats even worse I will crave more of simple carbs.
Losing weight on protein and fats is easy and effortless. Eating a "balanced" diet in small portions feels like torture to me.
As an added bonus it is really hard to consume a large ammount of protein and fat.
I'd have to say of the three things, the one that definitely has to be given up to lose the weight is beer.
Beer is not only caloric, but contains alcohol. When alcohol is ingested, the body's fat metabolism practically stops until it's out of your system. Drinking a beer each day would almost make it impossible to lose fat efficiently.
It wouldn't matter if you were eating under, because your body would not be able to easily burn fat for fuel. Instead, it would burn other things, acetate (from the alcohol), carbs, your own muscle, then fat, etc.
Instead, it would burn other things ... your own muscle, then fat, etc.
That's the first I've ever heard that a human body would burn muscle before fat. Also, a beer each day would be out of your system relatively fast, so it should have no lasting affects on your body's metabolism.
Also, if you're drinking a beer a day, then be sure it's at least bottle-conditioned craft beer since the suspended yeast has many nutrients. ;)
The only circumstances where you will burn a significant portion of muscle before fat is if you are eating a high fat diet with less than 30 grams of carbohydrates or protein per day.
If you are fasting or in nutritional ketosis, your brain still needs about 120 grams of glucose (or as low as 20 grams after it adapts to producing and using ketones for fuel). If you aren't getting the glucose it needs or ingesting carbohydrates that can be broken down into glucose, your body will begin gluconeogenesis, a process that turns amino acids (from the breakdown of protein) into glucose. If you are still consuming dietary protein, it will break this down first, but if you are not, it will get these amino acids from your muscles and other "lean" tissues.
Basically, if you are consuming an adequate amount of protein, it's pretty hard to lose muscle mass without losing a significant amount of fat.
I might not be right on the money that the body would burn muscle first, but I can say with certainty that drinking causes your muscles to degenerate: http://ajpendo.physiology.org/content/277/2/E268
RE: the only circumstance -- I think sleep deprivation would do the trick, too.
I used to work out a lot, and was in good shape- muscular and probably 12% body fat.
I haven't been working out for about eight months and I've lost probably ten pounds. I don't feel leaner though. I'm pretty sure I'm still at least 12% body fat, and that I've lost a significant amount of muscle.
I think I have been significantly losing muscle without losing any significant amount of fat.
If you're at 12% body fat, the ratio will be about 3:1 lean to fat loss[1] unless you're working out very, very hard and eating a ridiculous amount of protein (1+g/kg)
You'll need to work out a lot and be very careful with how much of a deficit you're running if you want to isolate fat instead of just reducing total body mass.
I just want to point out that (1g protein / 1kg body mass) is high, but not a ridiculous amount for someone doing lifting. The rule-of-thumb number I've seen quoted a lot is (1g proten / 1 lb body mass), or in metric, (2.2g protein / 1kg body mass), as the maximum useful intake.
1g/kg is at least double what most people eat :) it's ridiculous from a general population standpoint. Personally I aim for more than that, but I'm not sure it's indicated for people who don't work out.
Alcohol doesn't go away after you stop feeling the effects, it stays for many hours more than that. If a person on a learners license was at a big party overnight, and had a big binge, then they likely still have enough to trigger a positive breath test the next morning.
I'm unsure what amount is required to produce the supposed fat effect though.
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 to get results, both in behavior and health (45 lbs in two months).
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.
Note that 3 years ago you were actually recommending 100% wheat bread, now it's no wheat.
Let's just agree that no-one seems to know a reliable method yet. Some people find a way, I've a couple of friends who have, a couple who haven't. One did it on Dukan, which I found repulsive and made me feel ill. One simply pretends he lost no weight. Although if you've got good citations I'd be deliriously happy to eat my words and try it. Now, it really is time to sign up to the gym under my work...
EDIT: I suddenly realized, if it's working for you and you're happy with it, don't doubt what you're doing at all. My point was meant to be it seems different things work for different people.
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 notice the weight going up if you're consistent.
I am a huge proponent of strength training for general fitness. Please do reach out if you have any questions!
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.
After attending hundreds of weight watchers meetings, and being involved with hundreds and hundreds of people losing a ton of weight, I still genuinely believe too many people make weight loss too complicated, which leads them to give up. Keep it simple (as the article did)
If you burn more calories (energy) than you eat, you will lose weight.
Obviously, you have choices. You can cut down on all the really high calorie stuff. You can increase your exercise to burn more. You can (ideally) do a bit of both.
Of the hundreds of people I've known that have lost life-changing amounts of weight, I would estimate less than 1% of them had any idea how calorie dense the foods they were eating (and drinking) every day really are.
For the majority of people that are severely overweight, all they have to do is cut out high calorie snacks like chips, soda and anything deep fried and they'll lose significant weight, without even getting off the couch.
This is true. I found by simply cutting out soda and juice I began losing weight. I also found that after not drinking soda for several weeks, when I would drink it I would find it far too sweet and have actually lost the taste for it.
Try "flavored" seltzer water. I'm addicted to it now, and regular soda is largely undrinkable. You start to get used to the very, very subtle flavor in the seltzer water and after a while it just tastes like soda, but you're basically only drinking carbonated water.
Agreed. Unflavoured seltzer is fine too. I don't like plain water, and was never a big fan of carbonated drinks (and definitely not soda water), but I do like carbonated water.
Since there is no inexpensive seltzer in my region (only stuff that costs more than milk or juice) I finally got a CO₂ tank and carbonate tap water myself, usually with a squirt of lemon. It's easier than I had expected.
I think this thinking is tempting and reasonable, but it misses the role of hormones.
As an example, women gain weight during menopause because of hormones, not because they eat more.[1] So thinking of the body and losing weight as being purely calories in/out misses some important factors; namely, the hormone response to different kinds of foods.
It's uncontroversial that the body responds to carbohydrates with insulin, and also that insulin tends to provoke fat to store more of the available energy vs. it being available to muscles, brain, etc.
Putting that together into "Don't eat too many carbohydrates. Replace with healthy fats like grass-fed butter and meat, eggs, avocado, etc." is controversial; feel free to disagree. I've personally gotten a lot of mileage out of making that change, and even though I eat way more calories I'm 10 pounds skinner, more alert, etc.
That said, basically the anti-carb and anti-fat folks all agree on getting rid of chips, soda, deep fried stuff, so I'm not trying to say that advice won't work.
If this is interesting, it's all cribbed from Gary Taubes's "Why We Get Fat", which I can't recommend enough, lots of good science.
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 long game (i.e. you're in this for the rest of your life, not the next few weeks/months)
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 comfortable, using less electricity and gas. In contrast, the "simplest" advice to "use less fuel" is going to cause you to sit there cold and sad while you try to force yourself to not mess with the thermostat; maybe you figure out the jacket thing, maybe you don't: it wasn't really useful advice, and it required willpower. If I want to burn more calories than I metabolize, I can either force myself to be hungry all the time (which might have negative ramifications), or I can eat foods that are more likely to provide bioavailable energy over longer periods of time that are less likely to turn rapidly into fat due to resulting insulin spikes: I will then be less hungry, and I will eat less without even realizing it <- that's "more complex", sure, but it is in another way "much easier", 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 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 people losing well over 100lbs each)
> 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.
>> 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.
>> 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.
You know what the complicated formula is? calories/50.
(Full disclosure: It has some very tiny adjustments if it has too much fat it gets an extra 1/2 point.. lots of fiber gets -1/2 point.)
You wanna know how well this works? I've seen people eat their daily points intake by eating nothing other than Big Macs (for most people it's around 4 daily). I've also seen a guy eat nothing other than chips and beer, but not go over his points.
They all lost weight, because they ate less calories than they used, which the WW points system is all about.
As I said, I've seen hundreds of people lose staggering amounts of weight, and I've never seen a single person that didn't lose weight when they ate less calories than they used. It never made a lick of difference what they ate, only the amount of calories they consumed.
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 too often people make great the enemy of the good. But I actually think it's just unhelpful to say "Eat less or exercise more" relative to "Eat fewer carbs". The amount of energy your body burns is dramatically influenced by hormones and the type of food you eat, that's by far the easiest lever to pull to lose weight. The Taubes book talks at length about the flaws in the thermodynamic metaphor. I confess I'm doing a poor job of communicating the argument.
Also thanks for the feedback, the good vs. great thing is a bit tricky.
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.
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.
Yep, and the diet part is the key because while you may burn 400 calories in an hour on the treadmill, you can eat a 400 calorie cookie in seconds. So I agree with the general idea that weight loss is 80% diet and 20% exercise, abs are made in the kitchen not the gym, etc.
Where the exercise comes in is keeping your metabolism from dropping off when you cut your calorie intake.
Indeed, for most people it's much easier to eat less calories than it is to burn a ton of them, but that's over complicating the issue and doesn't really need to be explicitly told to first-timers.
Let them figure that out on their own.
Once they have an appreciation for how many calories are jammed into that cookie, and how long they'll have to run on a treadmill to burn it off, they naturally won't be so interested in that cookie, which is great. Then show them how few calories are in an enormous garden salad.
That's been my philosophy. I started by cutting out alcohol and soda and replacing it with water. What had been 3-5 drinks a week is now zero. I estimate that is about 500-700 calories eliminated per week for the past year, and I lost 7 pounds, so the math makes sense.
About 6 weeks ago I started replacing a few high calorie meals with low calorie meals per week (e.g. where I would have eaten a big breakfast, I just have cereal and toast, or instead of a big dinner, I'll eat a grilled chicken salad). I have been losing a pound per week for the last 6 weeks, but I can still go to lunch with coworkers, family, etc.
I didn't want to do anything drastic, because I'd get fed up and quit.
> I didn't want to do anything drastic, because I'd get fed up and quit.
That, in my opinion, is one of the most important attitudes to have. It's important to be realistic, and be aware of the fact that whatever you are trying to do, it's not just a fad you have to "tough out" for a few months until you get sick of it.
This is something you're going to do for the rest of your life.
We all need cheat days, and we all have bad weeks. The most important thing is to look at the long game, and always just slowly, slowly tend towards eating a few less calories, and trying to burn a few extra calories.
All calories are not translated to weight equally, the efficiency your body uses them matters greatly.
Sure dieting couch-potatoes will lose weight, but it will include losing a lot of muscle.
I believe the most well researched book on fat control is Carb-Back Loading by John Kiefer, the references chapter is 50 pages, it's terribly fascinating.
Kiefer's stuff is very well cited, but many of the citations are kind of specious - he has a history of citing studies that, upon perusal, are unrelated or contradictory to what he claims.
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 completely for 3 months..don't bother to count calories; don't fret about nonsense like whether your food is organic, or free range, or locally sourced. Just stop eating sugar. No rice, no potatoes, no bread, no sugared soft drinks, no pasta.
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.
There is indeed something magical about what you eliminate. By eliminating carbs you stabilize your blood sugar. Thats the magic. Sleep, drink water, don't eat (white) bread and its ilk. I lost 100 lbs in 2003 and 10 years later I have a very low body fat (low carbs and weight training). Body builders know their stuff.
Most of what's left if you eliminate high carb foods is either not calorically dense or hard to eat above maintenance calories. Going vegan limits a lot of choices while making overeating quite easy.
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.
You couldn't be more wrong. You realize you can stock different foods in your house, right? Or buy different things at the store? You really think people go to the store on a wheat belly / LCFH (low carb high fat) diet and buy 30-40% less stuff?
I've lost over 10% body fat cutting the bread and carbs with NO exercise. Get a clue and either 1. try a no wheat / sugar / starch diet for just 2 weeks 2. read up on insulin, its causes and effects.
I'm 31. A recent physical revealed that I have both high blood pressure and high cholesterol. They've put me on meds for the bp (which is now under control rather well) but they wanted me to try a lifestyle change before putting me on cholesterol meds. I was ~ 10 lbs overweight, nothing major - and while I wouldn't say I am fit by any means I wasn't out of shape either. But they wanted me to lose the 10 lbs and so they told me to stay under 2500mg of sodium per day, and less than 150g of carbs per day - no more than 50g per meal. And no red meat - all I can have meat wise basically is chicken, turkey and fish. Occasional lean pork.
I am two months into it - and have already lost 15 lbs, without any additional exercise. The carbs were rather easy to give up really - less sugar in my coffee, no pasta, few potatoes. Sodas were a little harder, but at 40g of sugar for a single Dr. Pepper, the choice between that or a whole sandwich is an easy one to make. The sodium is quite hard if not impossible though, unless you make every meal at home and only use fresh ingredients. If it is in a box, bag or can you can forget it. There is hardly anything at any restaurant you can get that is low sodium though. Even salads are absolutely loaded with sodium.
I will say I feel a little better, and not just from losing a couple inches around my waist. Water all day certainly helps. I don't think my cholesterol numbers are going anywhere really, I think my genetics are to blame, but I hope not.
Just a short anecdote, but if you sit behind a desk all day and have put on a few lbs, its fairly easy to give up the fast food and watch your carbs. It sure didn't seem like it at first though.
I'm 32, my last physical revealed that I'm 63 lbs overweight, I smoke (pack a day), drink fairly regularly, my blood pressure is fine, my cholesterol is fine, and have a great insulin response. Lung capacity is definitely not where it should be though.
I also eat almost entirely meat and carbs, save for lettuce/salad. I can drop 5 lbs in a couple weeks just giving up soda, 10 lbs if I give up carbs entirely.
I think the low fat / no meat thing is a load of crap. At least for me all I have to do is drop the carbs, and especially sugar.
Have you kept going past the 5 - 10 pounds? It's doubtful that you'll continue to shed weight at that rate. What happens is that without carbs your body's glycogen stores begin to deplete when you stops eating carbs (carbs are essential to glycogen production). Your muscles will take a week or two to flush out all the fluid they were holding on to before eventually stabilizing at a new level. Most people tend to drop a lot of weight at the beginning of a diet, especially low or no carb, however once the initial glycogen depletion happens they level off with the weight loss.
Some people hit a plateau and get discouraged or think they're done and start eating carbs again and shoot right back up. Others continue on at a healthy 1 - 2 pounds/week until they reach their goal.
"Carb sensitivity" is also a thing, and some people get a much stronger weight gain response from eating carbs (and weight loss response from not eating them) compared to other people. You might have a relatively high sensitivity to carbs.
Salt sensitivity is also far easier to manage, and its impact is limited to putting you over the top when shit hits the fan (eg: high-sodium diet can make or break you when you stray into heart-attack territory).
There was a Finnish study where they had some people try to control salt intake and others just eat as much salt as they want. The "as much salt as they want" group actually had better health outcomes. Their conclusion was that for most people, the body's salt regulation is actually very good.
Link?
Studies about salt are notoriously difficult, because hardly anyone actually adheres to a truly low-salt diet, so you get the equivalent of a study that tries to discern whether smoking 1.5 pack of cigarettes (which takes lots of restrain) is any better than 2.
Personally, it took 2 months for my blood pressure to start coming down on a high-vegetable low-sodium diet, and I notice that many people already think they are not salt-sensitive if it doesn't work in 2 days. I'm still astonished when I take my blood pressure and it is 115/70 or so. It used to be consistently 150/90.
During the Mars-500 experiment they ran a low-salt-diet test.
They found that the body cycle for salt is more complicated that thought before and "It is not only worthwhile reducing the amount of salt added to food for those who are ill - even the blood pressure in healthy individuals such as the Mars500 test subjects was reduced." [1]
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, < 3000mg / day) was just as bad as too much (>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 their diet, getting only the naturally occurring sodium from food, and people did just fine.
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.
In general, I would advice to not get your health advice from the NY Times. This is a response from Harvard's Nutritionsource: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/2013/05/17/the-n... who calls it "highly misleading".
Nutrition research is difficult, like I said, population studies often fail to account for the fact that in western countries practically the only people who are on a very low sodium diet are people who are already very sick.
Interesting. A few months ago I was really ill one day. The night before I had drank heavily, but I think in this case I also got food poisoning from something. Anyway, I vowed to stop drinking that day, and have. What I realized is how much alcohol was affecting me. Even two days after drinking, I feel tired, less enthusiastic and more depressed. What I have found is that now I can exercise routinely (for several months now), where as before I would give up after a few days or weeks of trying. I think it's important for everyone to evaluate what in their lives may be holding them back, even if they don't realize it. Also, want to point out that I am not advocating everyone stop drinking, just that it seems alcohol affects me more so than others.
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 <hard> 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 energy from your daily diet. If you burn enough energy to deplete this, you will lose weight, as your body replenishes itself from non-dietary reserves (fat, protein en extremis).
Surprisingsly, these are highly realistic numbers (<1lb/day>), even for relatively fit (height/weight proportionate) people. Moderating the pace to emphasise endurance over power will lead to more loss of net-mass. Asympotically, you will reach a point of gradual returns, but it is not at all surprising to lose significant mass under such prolonged workloads.
"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.
I dropped around 60lbs (5'10" SW: 285) in first half of 2012 and have roughly maintained since (crept back to 235 - down to 230 again, still aiming for 200!).
I made two small habit changes that I feel made a drastic difference:
* Bring lunch to work everyday (brown bag, leftovers)
* If I want to watch TV, I must be moving on the treadmill
I would still go out to eat at work about once every two weeks and I would sometimes sneak in an episode of Breaking Bad on the couch, but overall, I stuck to those rules and everything else seemed to fall into place.
Hah, awesome! I started in a similar build, and am down about 35 pounds mostly just through dietary changes (and stress, sadly). I've been biking everywhere this month and I can pretty clearly feel a difference. Congrats man.
While it's always great to hear success stories, I think the broader point of this post (and others like it) is that there's no "great secret" to weight loss. There's no silver bullet and certainly no short cut. The simple truth is: people in the western world eat crap and don't exercise.
The success stories all boil down to a few simple points: eat real food, cut down on alcohol, and do some exercise that you find enjoyable enough to do it every day.
Agreed, this story is as much about self-motivation and determination as it is about weight loss techniques. They both go hand in hand. I saw myself at 192 and didn't like that number, so I got myself down to 174 after a year and maintain that weight. It's not a huge difference in size, but I feel better because of it. I also learned the value of staying away from bad habits, like junk food and sedentary activities.
Since this is another weight loss post on HN, I'll tread out the old lines again[1]:
If you only care about weight loss: calories in vs calories out.
However
If you care about maintaining muscle while losing fat, the story is still pretty simple, and calories still count, but the macro ratio of those calories are very important. In this case, keep protein high and get the rest from carbs and/or fat. I personally recommend a more Keto approach in this case because most people will be satiated longer.
The point being, weight loss is one thing, but muscle sparring while losing weight is another. Understand what you are going after and know the correct path.
[1] - When most people say they want to "lose weight", they really mean fat. Really, who wants to lose muscle? Probably no one. That is why calories don't tell the whole story. If, however, you absolutely don't care about muscle (and if you say "yes" here, I would personally question that), sure, just pay attention to calories and ignore the macro ratios.
This person has rediscovered the William Banting original low-carb diet from 1863[1] : "The emphasis was on avoiding sugar, saccharine matter, starch, beer, milk and butter."
Banting knew carbs made you fat over a century ago, but of course since the scientists couldn't figure out WHY they discredited it. And so it ever was.
They also knew carbs should be avoided by diabetics, but when insulin was invented they chose to (more profitably) just shoot people up all the time and make them sicker. Do you know what shooting yourself up with insulin constantly does, by the way? [2]
Waist sizes for pants in the US are deceptive. When I started working with a personal trainer, I was wearing pants with a '34 inch' waist. However, when it came time to take measurements, and I finally relaxed my gut instead of sucking it in so we could get an accurate measurement, my waist measured 38 inches.
Also, one can get 'adjustable waist' pants with elastic slots in them that allow the waist to expand such that someone with a 42 inch waist might fit into a pair of '34 inch' pants comfortably. They don't help the situation any.
If you start rapidly losing (or gaining) weight with no obvious explanation that is a cause for concern. If you start eating much less, and exercising much more, you probably don't need to ask a doctor why you're losing weight.
I dropped 40 lbs in 5 weeks when I changed my diet to solely fruits and vegetables (no gluten or dairy). Dropped from 185 to 145 with no exercise. The point wasn't to lose weight but to eliminate most of the possible food allergies (and later slowly add them back, to figure out what you're allergic to), and as a side effect I lost 40 lbs. I felt perfectly healthy and I've managed to stick around 150 lbs since then, after switching back to a mostly normal diet (minus gluten). No idea why "2 lbs a week" would be the "safe" rate.
The average weight loss is supposedly that. Not everyone falls into that range and so long as you are eating enough to live, are enjoying yourself and not starving to death and are getting exercise it's not dangerous.
That said, he (and anyone doing it) should probably check in with the doc just to make sure something internal isn't getting out of whack.
This insistence in demonizing food groups or finding quick fixes by eliminating some sort of magic food stuff is fascinating to me.
Isn't it obvious this is incorrect?
I mean, go to Japan, where people live on white rice and wheat noodles and count how many obese people you see on the street.
You will also notice that consumption of bacon, butter, eggs and dairy is very low compared to western diets and even though they consume fatty fish they don't eat it in the portions westerners consume meat.
Minor point but Japan is one of the world's foremost consumers of eggs. One of their popular dishes is raw egg on steamed rice. More here - http://www.westonaprice.org/traditional-diets/inside-japan - it mentions they eat more eggs per person than the US.
I've lost a little over 40 pounds (272 to 230-ish) since February (and I'm still losing weight pretty steadily). Here's what I do:
1. Bike to work (~5 there plus ~5 miles back for a total of ~10 miles per work day)
2. Stopped drinking soda (and most sugary drinks)
3. Switched to a standing desk at work (I pace when I think so it's almost like walking all day)
4. Do minor exercise during down time at work (push ups, dips mostly)
5. Regularly asking myself if I have time to go to the gym and actually going when I find I don't have a good excuse (I got this idea from that lucid dreaming trick).
6. Consistently trying to eat less in general (based on rough calorie counts) by asking myself if I need to eat more or cook that much.
7. Continually improving balance in diet (more fruits/veggies is usually what I need to do)
8. Cooking as much as I would eat in one sitting, but saving half for lunch the next day (no more seconds)
I've always been pretty physically active, but I've also always had a tendency to eat as much as I wanted constantly. This led to rapid weight gain whenever circumstances had me exercising less. Restraining myself was a steady process, but now I actually can't eat as much as I used to, and I find I actually eat less when exercising less, which is good.
I have never looked fat, in baggy clothes. In tight fitting clothes, years ago when I was at my grossest, someone called me "the fattest skinny person i've ever seen."
I began to exercise a lot. A lot to lose that beer belly. Finally it mostly came off. Then I fell for the excuse of "you need to eat more to gain muscle!" and ate the amount of calories some online calculator told me i'd need to maintain a given weight.
I've never had abs, and I didn't get them then. I could out-run, out-squat, out-jump any crossfit contender I met; and I was still kind of flabby. My motivation sank. I moved away and stopped my routine. I went back to drinking and eating a lot, without working out as much. I lost strength. The belly began to return.
Recently I arbitrarily decided to cut out drinking for two months, which helped a lot. Then I decided to cut out wheat. Not gluten, just wheat and products made from it. So far? I'm looking more cut than I ever did, and i'm hardly exercising. Eating smaller portions and less empty calories/alcohol is giving me the body image I always wanted. (It's probably just the lack of calories and not the wheat specifically)
OP probably has a gluten sensitivity. It causes inflammation and cuttiing it out of your diet like that can cause dramatic weight loss, even without exercise.
I was going to post a link to this movie. I think they have it on AMZN Prime. Netflix has it. It's pretty inspirational, and discusses a great way to eat.
Another one of interest is Forks Over Knives, which talks about the benefits of eating a mostly plant based diet.
Reddit /r/loseit and /r/fitness have excellent FAQs for weight loss and becoming fit and they offer communities if you are looking to learn or for support.
Drink a lot of calorie free, caffeinated liquids. I probably drink more diet soda than I should, but tea and coffee are great as well and healthier
I find eating small amounts of crap can actually help. If your diet wasn't amazing in the first place, and your goal is to lose weight so you cut out all unhealthy foods, you're fighting two battles at once - cravings for sugary/unhealthy foods, and hunger cravings. Eating a small amount of ice cream or a few french fries can satisfy the unhealthy cravings, and work as diet foods as long as your calories are sufficiently low.
A good diet should almost never leave you hungry. The problem is the no meat/no fat diets that people try to go on. When you eat high carb you get very little bang for your buck in terms of both volume and satiety.
1 pound of chicken is only 520 calories and the protein will keep you fuller much longer than 520 calories of Oreos. 1700 calories is a good target for a typical male who wants to lose weight, which on a high protein diet can look something like:
Breakfast: 16 oz non-fat cottage cheese (300cal)
Lunch: 10 oz chicken breast (330cal), 1/2 cup dry rice = 1 cup cooked rice (300 cal)
Dinner: 10 oz chicken breast (330cal), two pieces bread (220 cal), bbq sauce (140 cal)
You're at 1620 cals so you can still have an afternoon snack and be right at your target. Add some veggies to your lunch and dinner and I challenge you to eat all that and still feel hungry.
I'm not even recommending keto or paleo or any of that stuff, just that the reason people feel hungry when they diet is that they generally don't eat enough protein.
This is an excellent writeup, and one that I have a few friends that could benefit from. I try to tell people that it is the little things you do every day that add up to big change. My friends mostly have this idea that you have to make huge sweeping changes to your life to see any results at all, but that is simply false. Start going on a walk or jog every evening instead of sitting in front of the television. Start having nuts instead of candy bars for snacks. Stuff like that adds up quick to some pretty impressive results.
"But I made a decision to stop right there and then. I didn’t want to wait until Monday, or until we’d run out of crisps in the cupboard. I was putting an end to it."
This is so true... why do we always say we'll start something on Monday? I'll start eating better... on Monday. I'll start my new workout routine... on Monday. Where did this come from? Why is it so hard to make the same commitment to yourself today?
Congrats on making up your mind and following through! Super inspiring!
>>I’m 6’4” and I’ll never be slight in appearance, that’s just genetics
Maybe not - I bet somewhere in your ancestry we're lean, ripped, warrior/hunters who were like that due to the type of work they did, and because people didn't bring donuts every time someone in their tribe had a birthday.
Serious congrats and well wishes to you in any case.
You should trade some of that fat with muscle gain (especially upper body), instead of shedding it all. Develop a consistent weight lifting routine at the gym. You'll feel a lot better about yourself. Stationary cycling might make your legs great, but your upper body will probably start to look "skinny fat".
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 one small thing at time. First I got used to going to the gym a couple days at a time. Once I was used to going to the gym, I started a strength program. Once I was used to going to the gym and being on a program, I started crossfit. Then after I was used to that, I started omitting wheat from my diet. Once I was used to that...you get the point.