Originally Posted by Hermes

I have found that weight control is calories in versus calories burned. For me, the wild card is time. My weight is a function of eating habits. For example, if I add something to my diet and do it over a long period of time, I gain weight. For example, I would buy a candy bar when I would go into the drug store or the grocery store and eat it right away. Well, if I do that three times a week at 300 calories a pop for 52 weeks a year, that equates to 900 times 52 or 46,800 calories or 13.37 pounds. So that is a really bad habit. Eating chips, drinking soft drinks with sugar, drinking beer, eating whole grain bread, crackers and etc, etc, etc, can have a similar effect. So I do not allow any carb consumption outside meals to become habits. For me, habits overwhelm my metabolism even with a lot of exercise. And I have learned from my power meter that I do not burn as many calories as many "calculators" based on heart rate indicate.

On the exercise side of the equation, we were in London for a few days last month. Everyone walks a lot and the underground has few escalators so we climbed a lot of stairs. Let's assume one walks and climbs stairs every day and burns 150 calories each day. That equates to 54,600 calories each year or 15.6 pounds of fat. Couple that with food being extremely expensive in London and it is really easy to eat less and exercise more. Walking a lot every day is a good habit and it occurs throughout the day versus cycling which typically occurs once and after it is over, I tend to get hungry.

Weight control is a never ending attention to detail and discipline not to eat very much and pick high quality protein and fats and limit the carbs while keeping ones exercise up. Eat less exercise more. It is not complicated but it is extremely hard to execute.