Clydesdales/Athenas (200+ lb / 91+ kg) - Is low metabolism a myth?

The other day I was working on my combine with one of my skinny friends. He's 5-10 150 lbs. I've always envied his "high metabolism" as he can eat as much or more than I.

The job requires climbing 14' up and then 7' back down into the grain hopper. So we get in the hopper and while I'm figuring out what tools we need and how to do the job with the least amount of climbing, he's already went and got the first tool. So this goes on and on. Me trying to be efficient and planning the work out. He just reacting to whatever is needed right then.

We finish the job and I buy him lunch. I'm watching him eat whatever he wants, while I'm forced to eat my 500 C snack. I'll admit feeling sorry for myself for having such a "low metabolism".

Yesterday, I was confronted with another repair requiring climbing and many steps to complete. As I was planning the work out, it occurred to me that maybe I'm just too efficient for my own good. I took my friend's approach and just did each step as it presented itself. I got the work done. I got a good sweat going while doing it. I felt great afterward. It probably didn't take me any longer to accomplish. I was blessed with a "high metabolism".

So to sum up. I'm going to try to be more inefficient in everyday tasks. I'm going to have a "high metabolism".

Might be some of both. Obviously, the more physical activity you do the more calories you burn. However it's actually depressing when you do the math and discover how few calories are actually expended, especially when it's something you do frequently and the body has learned how to become efficient. Most of us greatly over-estimate how many calories we burn.

I'm a clyde runner. I'll go out in the morning and run five miles. Then I go to work and if somebody brings bagels I can undo my efforts by eating just one.

I have skinny co-workers who don't do any sort of physical activity and can eat whatever they want. (I work in an office.) So clearly it isn't always just the simple equation of calories in/calories out that we've always been told.
If I ate the way my cubicle mate eats, I'd weigh 300 pounds.

Hence the recent trend toward commercial outfits that offer to measure an individual's basal metabolic rate. We have a chain of weight-loss centers that have opened around Indy lately that measure this for you, and help you with dietary choices based on that and your activity level. I don't know how they measure it, so I can't say if it's based on sound or pseudo-science. But it's a path that seems to be gaining popularity.

I have skinny co-workers who don't do any sort of physical activity and can eat whatever they want. (I work in an office.) So clearly it isn't always just the simple equation of calories in/calories out that we've always been told.

But it is. His "out" (burning calories) just happens at a higher rate without any extraordinary physical activity. He likely has a high basal metabolism.

So to sum up. I'm going to try to be more inefficient in everyday tasks. I'm going to have a "high metabolism".



So you are not ridding your bike? Or trying to ride it inefficient every day?

Hmmmm... strange way to do it. I hope it works for you

I have skinny co-workers who don't do any sort of physical activity and can eat whatever they want. (I work in an office.) So clearly it isn't always just the simple equation of calories in/calories out that we've always been told.
If I ate the way my cubicle mate eats, I'd weigh 300 pounds.

It is simple calories in - calories burned = net weight gain.

His Basal Metabolic rate happens to be higher than yours, is all. And, you have no idea what he/she does outside of work. He might be one of those people that runs 15 miles in the morning, and another 15 at night.


Hence the recent trend toward commercial outfits that offer to measure an individual's basal metabolic rate. We have a chain of weight-loss centers that have opened around Indy lately that measure this for you, and help you with dietary choices based on that and your activity level. I don't know how they measure it, so I can't say if it's based on sound or pseudo-science. But it's a path that seems to be gaining popularity.

Depends on their methodology. There are several ways of accurately estimating BMR, but there are some rather bunk ways of doing it as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_metabolic_rate#Physiology

So, it's easily calculable using body temperature, plus a couple of other factors (Body mass, etc). It boils down to (Pardon the pun) the amount of energy to raise a cubic centimeter of water by 1 degree Celsius.

So to sum up. I'm going to try to be more inefficient in everyday tasks. I'm going to have a "high metabolism".



So you are not ridding your bike? Or trying to ride it inefficient every day?

Hmmmm... strange way to do it. I hope it works for you

I'm not planning on changing my bicycling/treadmill/Pilates/resistance training program. What I'm going to try to do is quit planning how to do things with the least effort. I'll just be reactive. See---Do. Not See---Plan---Do. Make many trips instead of one. I'm not talking about running around town making many trips in my car. I'm saying it's OK to take single item down to the basement. I don't have to See an item that needs to be in the basement, Plan how many other items need to be down there, gather all the items and make one trip. Be inefficent in common tasks.

My brother has always been able to eat all he wants and whatever he wants and has always been thin. Not me. My two sons are opposite this way as well. Older son has to watch his diet and deliberately exercise to keep his weight in check. Younger son eats what he wants when he wants and is less active than his brother yet is very thin. Being inefficient will help but I don't think it will magically transform you into a calorie-burning machine.

I have skinny co-workers who don't do any sort of physical activity and can eat whatever they want. (I work in an office.) So clearly it isn't always just the simple equation of calories in/calories out that we've always been told.
If I ate the way my cubicle mate eats, I'd weigh 300 pounds.

Yes, it is always the simple equation of calories in/calories out. Physics demands it. The problem is that people are really poor at measuring both. And as the OP points out, different people can do things at different degrees of efficiency.

But people who want to deny the essential connection between what they put in and what they put out are simply deluding themselves.

KeS

I was told by my doctor that fat people do NOT under any circumstances have a lower metabolism than skinny people. In fact, because we are fat, our bodies naturally burn far more calories which means we have a higher metabolism.

Might be some of both. Obviously, the more physical activity you do the more calories you burn. However it's actually depressing when you do the math and discover how few calories are actually expended, especially when it's something you do frequently and the body has learned how to become efficient. Most of us greatly over-estimate how many calories we burn.


Indeed. I started cycling to work 1-2 days a week 13 weeks ago. I figured this was a brilliant way to fit more exercise into my schedule and the pounds should shed right off doing this. It was hard grueling work, 19 miles each way, nearly 40 miles a day. This morning I cycled into work and I realised that not only am I going far faster than I was when I started, but my heart rate is pathetically low compared to what it used to be, I'm pulling up hills a whole 7 gears higher than I used to be able to do them, and when I get to work... nothing on my body aches anymore.

I don't even feel like I worked out at this point in time anymore. My body cannot possibly be burning as many calories as it used to when I did this. Now the only time I ever feel exhausted is when I do rides above 50 miles. This sucks. Good thing skiing season is coming; at least I can switch things up more easily when that begins.

Yes, it is always the simple equation of calories in/calories out. Physics demands it. The problem is that people are really poor at measuring both. And as the OP points out, different people can do things at different degrees of efficiency.

But people who want to deny the essential connection between what they put in and what they put out are simply deluding themselves.

KeS

There very well may be differences, but they are slight.

I was told by my doctor that fat people do NOT under any circumstances have a lower metabolism than skinny people. In fact, because we are fat, our bodies naturally burn far more calories which means we have a higher metabolism.

Whatever it is from the time I was a kid until I got into my late thirties I could eat as much of whatever I wanted and could barely gain a pound, I started gaining some weight in my late thirties and early forties but still didn't change my habits.

I'm 6'6" and peaked at 242 pounds, I still eat pretty much whatever I want but I started biking and I'm down to 209 pounds now which is about where I was at the age of 19.

I wonder speaking of efficientence; if as fat people are body's are more efficient at useing tht Kcals we give it than skinny people. To put it another way; our body's use less of the Kcals we eat to do the same work and then store the leftovers as fat. So I guess I do wonder if the own test the BMR is a viable idea. If I ate the 2301 Kcals that my 177 lbs should burn at 13 Kcals/pound I would gain. I am currently eating about 1750 and maintaining that weight. So . . ?

I would suggest starting with 13-15 Kcals/pound and cut or add to drop pounds as fast or slow as you want!

It always amusing to me how people can look at car engines and realize that the way car engines "metabolize" gasoline is not a simple equation. The mileage you get depends on the age of the car, the timing of the valves, the octane content of the gasoline, and dozens of other factors.

Yet when it comes to the human body, which is thousands of times more complex than a car engine, metabolism is reduced to the simplistic equation of "calories in, calories out".

It always amusing to me how people can look at car engines and realize that the way car engines "metabolize" gasoline is not a simple equation. The mileage you get depends on the age of the car, the timing of the valves, the octane content of the gasoline, and dozens of other factors.

Yet when it comes to the human body, which is thousands of times more complex than a car engine, metabolism is reduced to the simplistic equation of "calories in, calories out".
No matter how amusing you may think it is, your straw man violates the laws of conservation of energy.

If you ingest more calories than you burn, you gain weight. Period. It flat out doesn't matter what's inside - if the energy in is more than the energy out, it MUST go somewhere.

All the wishful thinking in the universe can't change that.

No matter how amusing you may think it is, your straw man violates the laws of conservation of energy.

If you ingest more calories than you burn, you gain weight. Period. It flat out doesn't matter what's inside - if the energy in is more than the energy out, it MUST go somewhere.

All the wishful thinking in the universe can't change that.

Mostly correct, but it's slightly more nuanced than that. Protein calories have a significantly different effect on your body than carbohydrate calories. If you eat the same amount of energy of proteins you will be better off than if you ate the carbs. Your body will have more muscle and you will burn more energy whilst resting. This is where the difficulty comes in because there's no easy way to measure that energy expenditure.

Jethro, I think that is a valid observation - your co-worker is burning more calories by being inefficient and you probably could move your BMR up similarly by following his example.

On a tangent I have been thinking of the "problem" of efficiency with my riding. Riding for racers and skinnies seem to be all about conservation of energy while I want to lose weight must fight the urge to be efficient and "go for it".

I was told by my doctor that fat people do NOT under any circumstances have a lower metabolism than skinny people. In fact, because we are fat, our bodies naturally burn far more calories which means we have a higher metabolism.

Yup. People who weigh more burn more calories, even when at rest.

But, it isn't just how much you weigh, it is your percentage of fat. Muscle burns more calories than fat.

Most of the calories you burn are to maintain basic bodily functions and processing what you eat, for most maybe 70 to 80 percent. The rest will be burned in activity. Of course, athletes burn more in activity than non-athletes.

It is rare to gain weight because of a metabolism issue.

Jethro, I think that is a valid observation - your co-worker is burning more calories by being inefficient and you probably could move your BMR up similarly by following his example.

No, this isn't right. He has a higher base metabolic rate and is more energetic - possibly expending more energy in his normal activities but not necessarily inefficiently. It does take more calories to maintain the greater bulk, but I think the doctor is wrong if he said it means that large people have a higher metabolic rate.

An interesting book is The Fat of the Land by Michael Fumento. The author discusses how the idea of different metabolic rates is used as an excuse/promotion of obesity. I don't have the book at hand, but if I remember correctly he quotes a study that the press made a fuss about showing a slower metabolic rate for black women. Fumento showed 8 minutes of vigorous walking a day was enough to make up the difference in calories burned. (If someone has the book, can you double check me, please?)

As I posted above, there probably are differences, but too much is made of them.

Not getting scientific here - I know that as I increased my efforts in workouts, I burned more calories. That much is obvious, right? But I also noticed that once this became a steady lifestyle for me, my appetite got more intense and I have been able to eat more and still maintain weight. At my heaviest, I never wanted breakfast. I just wasn't hungry. Now I eat 4-5 times a day. And I'm talking EAT - not a 100-200 calorie snack, but more like a very large bowl of cereal (2.5-3 servings) for breakfast, 2-3 servings of fruit, 2 sandwiches and maybe some ramen for lunch, 2 more servings of fruit, and dinner is generally a large protein (ie - steak, pork chops, chicken breast) with pasta, pierogi, vegetables, etc. I may even have another bowl of cereal later on if I'm up late. I haven't kept track of the numbers in some time, but it's probably pretty close to what I was eating when I was over 400 pounds.

Long story short, (too late, I know), I believe my previously slow metabolism has been readjusted to burn better, if you will.

This morning is the beginning of day three of the new inefficient Jethro. Something is different. I slept better than I have in quite some time. I feel like I've already done my morning workout. This is far from what I expected. I expected to be sore and stiff. I feel energetic. It usually takes me awhile to get going in the morning. I'm ready to go right now.If this is a placebo effect, so be it. I like it. That's all that matters.

Not getting scientific here - I know that as I increased my efforts in workouts, I burned more calories. That much is obvious, right? But I also noticed that once this became a steady lifestyle for me, my appetite got more intense and I have been able to eat more and still maintain weight. At my heaviest, I never wanted breakfast. I just wasn't hungry. Now I eat 4-5 times a day. And I'm talking EAT - not a 100-200 calorie snack, but more like a very large bowl of cereal (2.5-3 servings) for breakfast, 2-3 servings of fruit, 2 sandwiches and maybe some ramen for lunch, 2 more servings of fruit, and dinner is generally a large protein (ie - steak, pork chops, chicken breast) with pasta, pierogi, vegetables, etc. I may even have another bowl of cereal later on if I'm up late. I haven't kept track of the numbers in some time, but it's probably pretty close to what I was eating when I was over 400 pounds.

Long story short, (too late, I know), I believe my previously slow metabolism has been readjusted to burn better, if you will.

You probably have a lot more muscle than you used to, which burns more calories. Add the exercise and you burn even more. If you are 30 years old, six feet tall, weigh 200 pounds and are very active you could burn about the same number of calories as a person who is the same age and height but weighs twice as much but is sedentary.

This morning is the beginning of day three of the new inefficient Jethro. Something is different. I slept better than I have in quite some time. I feel like I've already done my morning workout. This is far from what I expected. I expected to be sore and stiff. I feel energetic. It usually takes me awhile to get going in the morning. I'm ready to go right now.If this is a placebo effect, so be it. I like it. That's all that matters.

I like the idea of inefficiency. I just changed locations and was on my rear for two days traveling. I am going to make a point of jumping up and down being "inefficient" at putting things away and straightening the condo up for fall. Plus, the busier I am the less I think about eating.


No, this isn't right. He has a higher base metabolic rate and is more energetic - possibly expending more energy in his normal activities but not necessarily inefficiently. It does take more calories to maintain the greater bulk, but I think the doctor is wrong if he said it means that large people have a higher metabolic rate.

The inefficiency he is talking about is where you don't plan ahead to minimize the work you need to do, but instead you just jump up if you need something. Run here, run there. Don't conserve your energy.

The inefficiency he is talking about is where you don't plan ahead to minimize the work you need to do, but instead you just jump up if you need something. Run here, run there. Don't conserve your energy.

I understand. I just don't think that this difference in style can account for that many calories, and I also disagree with the supporting idea that the metabolic rates are reversed (smaller low, larger high). Although, I wasn't there and the co-worker could be much more peripatetic than I'm imagining.

The idea that people with a tendency to be fat have a lower base metabolic rate than others is probably a myth, yes. But that doesn't mean that there isn't a genetic component to obesity. Here is a report of a study (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/discovery-of-fat-gene-raises-hopes-for-fighting-obesity-2134189.html) which seems to indicate that the so-called "fat gene" influences your weight not by making you burn fewer calories, but by giving you a greater appetite. So "calories in, calories out" still works, it is just that some are genetically predisposed to put more calories in.

And if you read further, you'll see that while the genetic component exists, it doesn't account for all that much. Those with the "fat gene" were on average only 3kg heavier than those without. So we're not talking about the difference between 150 and 300 pounds, here...

I understand. I just don't think that this difference in style can account for that many calories, and I also disagree with the supporting idea that the metabolic rates are reversed (smaller low, larger high). Although, I wasn't there and the co-worker could be much more peripatetic than I'm imagining.

The larger person can have a higher basal metabolic rate simply because they have more body to maintain. At 4'11" and 116 pounds I burn a lot less calories than a person who is 5'11" and 200 pounds and who has a similar body fat to muscle ratio. A morbidly obese person who weighs 400 pounds is going to burn more calories than me, even if I exercise all the time. I just don't need as much fuel as they need.

A muscular person can have a higher basal metabolic rate because muscle burns more fuel than fat.

Unless you have a disorder your metabolic rate is primarily dependent on your weight, your muscle mass, your physical activity, your age, and the thermic effect of food (proteins take more energy to process than fat).

You can slow your metabolism down with a starvation diet, because the body is conserving energy. You may feel cold, you may feel that you have little energy so you don't exercise. You are forced to conserve energy. This can lead to a vicious circle because you will lose muscle mass which will lower your metabolic rate even more. So, if you start eating like you did before you can overshoot your initial weight because your metabolic rate has slowed.

Drugs can effect your metabolism, some antidepressants for example. Diabetes can effect your metabolism. Genetics effect you metabolism. Environment effects your metabolism. Metabolic disorders can effect metabolism, but they aren't common.

An interesting read showing possibly a counterpoint to the above http://www.ajcn.org/content/82/5/941.full

Summarizing as best as I can (anyone wanting the whole picture should evaluate it themselves), the greatest cause of variation in basal metabolic rate between individuals is fat free mass, which they said is consistent with previous studies. Fat mass played a much smaller role.

The apparent implication is that lean mass takes more energy than fat mass. Five times as much. However the researchers also caution that it is a statistical model not a physiological one and there are many possible factors at play.

The researchers found an enormous variation which is not explained by differences in body composition (lean vs fat), age or sex. It was 26% of the variation. I gather that's a fairly standard result, and although this residual variation isn't explained by current studies (according to the authors) I'd guess this is where the idea of genetic factors come from.

Like I said, the interested reader should evaluate it himself since I may have mashed the study thoroughly.

Sounds like the skinny guy "naturally" has a higher activity level. IE, he kept climbing up to get different tools, while you tried to think out the most efficient path... I would suspect this is a pattern of behavior for both of you.

I suspect that his pattern is what gives him a higher metabolism rate. BTW, nothing wrong with your approach, but it is likely why your bodies metabolic rate is lower than his.

An interesting read showing possibly a counterpoint to the above http://www.ajcn.org/content/82/5/941.full

Summarizing as best as I can (anyone wanting the whole picture should evaluate it themselves), the greatest cause of variation in basal metabolic rate between individuals is fat free mass, which they said is consistent with previous studies. Fat mass played a much smaller role.

The apparent implication is that lean mass takes more energy than fat mass. Five times as much. However the researchers also caution that it is a statistical model not a physiological one and there are many possible factors at play.

The researchers found an enormous variation which is not explained by differences in body composition (lean vs fat), age or sex. It was 26% of the variation. I gather that's a fairly standard result, and although this residual variation isn't explained by current studies (according to the authors) I'd guess this is where the idea of genetic factors come from.

Like I said, the interested reader should evaluate it himself since I may have mashed the study thoroughly.

Pretty good summary! Though I wouldn't attribute the unexplained variations to genes as it is still unexplained. :)

It boils down to (Pardon the pun) the amount of energy to raise a cubic centimeter of water by 1 degree Celsius.

When I was in undergraduate Physics, my prof told this story that he used this theory to design a diet whereby you drink large quantities of ice-cold water, because all that water gets raised from 0-->37 deg Celsius in your body, which means you've burned calories -- 37 per cc=ml, so drinking a liter of ice-water causes you to burn 37,000 calories. Boom! Weight-loss here I come!

But the punchline of his story was that he forgot that dietary calories are actually KiloCalories, so 1L of ice water burns only 37 kCal, and you'd have to drink hundreds of liters of ice water to have any significant effect! Oopx!

When I was in undergraduate Physics, my prof told this story that he used this theory to design a diet whereby you drink large quantities of ice-cold water, because all that water gets raised from 0-->37 deg Celsius in your body, which means you've burned calories -- 37 per cc=ml, so drinking a liter of ice-water causes you to burn 37,000 calories. Boom! Weight-loss here I come!

But the punchline of his story was that he forgot that dietary calories are actually KiloCalories, so 1L of ice water burns only 37 kCal, and you'd have to drink hundreds of liters of ice water to have any significant effect! Oopx!

What's really pathetic is that I did that same calculation - albeit correctly - while sitting in traffic once drinking a can of Diet Coke...

KeS

It is simple calories in - calories burned = net weight gain.

His Basal Metabolic rate happens to be higher than yours, is all. And, you have no idea what he/she does outside of work. He might be one of those people that runs 15 miles in the morning, and another 15 at night.
Not a chance! His idea of exercise is walking from the car to the front door of the office. He thinks I'm nuts because I bike a whole 4 km to work, in fact he thinks exercise in general is for suckers.
In Thomas Bouchard's twin studies, groups of identical twin men were fed 1000 fewer calories than the supposed amount that was needed to maintain their starting weight. Some lost as much as 20 pounds in a month, some as little as 4. The only constant was that whatever one twin lost, his identical twin lost about the same amount.

Not a chance! His idea of exercise is walking from the car to the front door of the office. He thinks I'm nuts because I bike a whole 4 km to work, in fact he thinks exercise in general is for suckers.
In Thomas Bouchard's twin studies, groups of identical twin men were fed 1000 fewer calories than the supposed amount that was needed to maintain their starting weight. Some lost as much as 20 pounds in a month, some as little as 4. The only constant was that whatever one twin lost, his identical twin lost about the same amount.

There's a guy I work with. Skinny as a rail. I'd say about 160lbs. He does not exercise. He works an office job like myself. He also eats like a madman. We go out to eat pizza, 2 slices will fill me up to the point where I feel sick. He'll eat 4 and leave complaining he's not full yet. I've seen him devour a dozen garlic knots in one sitting. He thinks 1 pound burgers are too small.

He makes me hate life sometimes.

There was an article in the last week, that I think I saw linked in BF somewhere, where new studies are saying that the 3500 KCal = 1 lb of weight loss is not true, and the more accustomed to exercise one becomes, and the lighter one becomes, the 3500 starts to climb dramatically. It was interesting, and described causes for many of the weight plateauing things that people experience in trying to shed pounds (I have been stuck in one for 10 months).

And there is the discussions of digestion that say lots of small meals beat out fewer large ones. If all input - output then frequency of input should mean nothing.

No one knows the real, 100% answer, and we should all embrace an inefficient life style. Go Jethro!!!!

There was an article in the last week, that I think I saw linked in BF somewhere, where new studies are saying that the 3500 KCal = 1 lb of weight loss is not true, and the more accustomed to exercise one becomes, and the lighter one becomes, the 3500 starts to climb dramatically. It was interesting, and described causes for many of the weight plateauing things that people experience in trying to shed pounds (I have been stuck in one for 10 months).

And there is the discussions of digestion that say lots of small meals beat out fewer large ones. If all input - output then frequency of input should mean nothing.

No one knows the real, 100% answer, and we should all embrace an inefficient life style. Go Jethro!!!!

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2811%2960812-X/abstract

The problem is partly one of a changing baseline. The more weight you lose the less calories you need because you are not maintaining as big a body.

There's a guy I work with. Skinny as a rail. I'd say about 160lbs. He does not exercise. He works an office job like myself. He also eats like a madman. We go out to eat pizza, 2 slices will fill me up to the point where I feel sick. He'll eat 4 and leave complaining he's not full yet. I've seen him devour a dozen garlic knots in one sitting. He thinks 1 pound burgers are too small.

He makes me hate life sometimes.

I use to work with a guy who was approximately 5'7" and about 140lbs. I've watched him at lunch eat about as much food as I did the whole day and this is when I was still gaining weight. The guy never gained an ounce. I knew him pretty well and he wasn't a crazy exerciser. It just baffles my mind.

I was confined to the cab of my combine harvesting soybeans yesterday. Rather difficult to be inefficent. I will say a couple years ago and 200 lbs heavier this would have wore me out. For the naysayers out there, What's the harm in this inefficent lifestyle? I'm not saying this is some magic cure. If anything it keeps one focused to be more active.

A couple weeks back I had a day off and was bringing the laundry upstairs to be put away. I decided to do it two pieces of laundry at a time. Going up and down stairs for 30 minutes is pretty inefficient.

I havent been thinking of it as being inefficient (though I probably will now). but i have been trying to find the harder way to do things lately.
-Bring the 50 lb bag of dog food back and forth from the garage every time I feed the pups instead of bringing the bowl back and forth
-When cleaning, move EVERYTHING (counch, TV, tables, curtains, etc)
-get an exercise ball instead of a chair for the dinner table (and no base)
-shovel/rake something outside. Find an excuse
-throw the kid on my shoulders anytime we go anywhere
-etc.
-etc.

Not a chance! His idea of exercise is walking from the car to the front door of the office. He thinks I'm nuts because I bike a whole 4 km to work, in fact he thinks exercise in general is for suckers.
In Thomas Bouchard's twin studies, groups of identical twin men were fed 1000 fewer calories than the supposed amount that was needed to maintain their starting weight. Some lost as much as 20 pounds in a month, some as little as 4. The only constant was that whatever one twin lost, his identical twin lost about the same amount.

You'd be surprised at what some consider exercise, and what they don't. They might not consider playing mud football on Saturdays for 4 hours on end to be exercise (When I was 10 I didn't, I called it fun).

I'll bet each pair of twins had different BMRs and RMR's...


There was an article in the last week, that I think I saw linked in BF somewhere, where new studies are saying that the 3500 KCal = 1 lb of weight loss is not true, and the more accustomed to exercise one becomes, and the lighter one becomes, the 3500 starts to climb dramatically. It was interesting, and described causes for many of the weight plateauing things that people experience in trying to shed pounds (I have been stuck in one for 10 months).

And there is the discussions of digestion that say lots of small meals beat out fewer large ones. If all input - output then frequency of input should mean nothing.

No one knows the real, 100% answer, and we should all embrace an inefficient life style. Go Jethro!!!!

That's because the more regularly you do a particular exercise, the better your body gets at doing it, hence, burning fewer calories to perform the same task.

And, the lighter one gets, of course they'd have different BMRs and RMRs... It only take X calories to move a person from point A to point B if they weigh 160lbs. It takes X+300 to move a person from A to B if they weight 250lbs...

Nothing there changes the simple math:

Calories in - calories burned = net weight gain

You'd be surprised at what some consider exercise, and what they don't. They might not consider playing mud football on Saturdays for 4 hours on end to be exercise...
How many different ways do I have to say it? THE GUY DOES NOT EXERCISE AT ALL!!! He's about 60, smokes like a chimney, watches other people play soccer on t.v.. Believe me, this fellow is NOT playing 4 hours of mud football on a Saturday. He doesn't even walk to the nearest McDonalds (10 minutes walk, at most) to get his breakfast.
Believe it or not, not every thin person is fit.
And what exactly is BMR and RMR if not "low" or "high" metabolism.

Nothing there changes the simple math:

Calories in - calories burned = net weight gain

The simple math isn't all that interesting or helpful alone. After all, people don't have the ability to tell exactly how many calories they are burning. Metabolism is all about the calories out. What is interesting is the individual variability in metabolism, how changes in your body changes your metabolism, and how appetite is an important factor in how much you eat, how what you eat regardless of calorie content effects how hungry you are, how you adapt to exercise, how you lose muscle as you age, how fat tissue burns the least amount of calories, how eating too few calories will slow your metabolic rate, how if you return to normal eating habits you will gain weight fast because your metabolism has slowed, and on and on. Knowledge about these factors can help when you are losing weight and with maintenance of weight loss.

The simple math isn't all that interesting or helpful alone.

No, but it has to be constantly reiterated because people constantly reject it. Someone who has been "plateaued" for six months while trying to lose weight is not going through some magic metabolic reorganization dictated by Cthulhu. They're eating too many calories.

KeS

-throw the kid on my shoulders anytime we go anywhere


And that'll work even better for you as the kid gets fatter! :lol:

KeS

So to sum up. I'm going to try to be more inefficient in everyday tasks. I'm going to have a "high metabolism".


I was confined to the cab of my combine harvesting soybeans yesterday. Rather difficult to be inefficent. I will say a couple years ago and 200 lbs heavier this would have wore me out. For the naysayers out there, What's the harm in this inefficent lifestyle? I'm not saying this is some magic cure. If anything it keeps one focused to be more active.

I remembered this thread today when I was reading an article about a study that looked at metabolic differences between people who had lost weight and were maintaining for at least a year and those that did not lose weight. The researchers were working on puzzling out some of the reasons so many people regain weight.

They discovered that there is in fact a decrease in metabolism, resulting in about a 150 calorie a day difference. But the real big difference is that people are less active and thus burn less calories. They become too efficient:

This doesn’t mean we exercise less, either, as exercise is a conscious choice. It means we unconsciously reduce our NEAT [non-exercise activity thermogenesis] and spontaneous activity. It also means we become more efficient in the activity we do; we expend less calories for the same movement. In fact, 35% of the decrease in activity energy expenditure can be attributed to an increase in efficiency (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12609816). Overall, we move around less, and we become more efficient at the movements we perform. Combined with a decrease in resting metabolic rate, we end up burning over 400 calories per day less than you would expect for someone of our same height, weight, gender, and body composition. This is not only why weight loss eventually plateaus, but also why weight is so easily regained.



The solution is activity. Maybe, as Jethro suggest, to adopt a somewhat inefficient lifestyle. :)

The article goes on to state:

Remember that physical activity doesn’t have to include formal exercise. NEAT makes up the majority of your activity energy expenditure, and thus has the greatest ability to impact it. In fact, walking at only 1 mile per hour will double your energy expenditure over sitting. Thus, anything that you can do to accumulate physical activity throughout the day will dramatically improve your chances of maintaining weight loss over the long haul. Even small things, like parking a car further away from a destination, or taking stairs rather than an elevator, can add up if accumulated throughout the day. But because activity can decrease on an almost unconscious level, you need to make a deliberate conscious effort to get as much activity as possible in throughout your day, every day


http://weightology.net/weightologyweekly/?page_id=415

It does come down to calories in/calories out. It's just that the standard formulas for Basal Metabolic Rate and Active Metabolic rate are gross approximations based on averages. The only way to know how your body converts food to weight is to track your calories in and your weight, along with an approximation of your average exercise, daily.

I've found that my body actually loses weight more quickly than would be predicted by the simple rule of thumb, a deficit of 3500 calories = 1 pound lost, meaning that my metabolism is LESS efficient than normal - which is probably pretty rare for someone who's been obese several times in his life, and overweight more times. But, when I plug my age, weight, gender and activity level into the BMR and AMR formulas, my weight loss would be consistent either with a much lower calorie consumption, or a much higher activity level than I actually have.

However - once this calibration has been done, you've got a formula that gives you calories in/calories out/weight that's pretty close to exact for YOU. (I did it by simply picking a multiplier for the AMR formula that minimized the mean squared error between the weights I measure over the course of a month and the weights predicted based on my calorie intake and average exercise amount).

Using this, I've been able to predict my weight to within half a pound, 30 days in advance, with a mean squared error of less than a quarter of a pound. If that's not deterministic, I don't know what is.

Try being someone with hypothyroidism. Thyroid controls metabolism, and even on synthetic thyroid hormone...losing weight is a huge struggle. :backpedal:

4 years ago I was a competitive cyclist who was laying down nearly 10,000 miles a year and was working in a machine shop where I spent my days tossing around and wrestling with steel, I hit the curb at 155 pounds, could dead lift twice my weight and had 20 inch legs on what is a five foot nine frame. Before I started working in such a physically intense job my weight for decades had been a very steady 140-142.

My calorie intake to maintain my body weight while cycling and working at a desk was 4000 calories a day and I bumped that up to 5000 a day to gain weight when I started working in the machine shop and I gained 13 pounds of muscle.

An injury forced me to quit that kind of work and has reduced my activities and my mileage in my best year since the accident was 6000 miles but another injury in December has really slowed me down and my weight has climbed from that 142 I had returned to, to 155 pounds and that extra 13 pounds isn't muscle.

I have a high base metabolism and can experience hypoglycaemic episodes if I do not eat regularly but with a lack of activity and a reduced calorie intake, my body will gain weight it does not need.

For many people the mere act of being sedentary for short periods will alter your body's metabolism and insulin levels and cause a sharp drop which will make your body store fat although some people are less affected by this.

Our bodies are designed to move and in moving and matching our intake to our activity levels we should be able to maintain a balance and healthy weight but slow us down and take in more than you need and we will gain unwanted weight.