Originally Posted by SimonEd

There are many advantages to any exercise that increases your heart rate. I have been out of the personal training game for a while, but IIRC here are some of the goodies to look forward to feeling the benefit of.

1: Increased ejection fraction. Each time your heart beats there is an amount of blood squirted out, this is called the ejection fraction, the more you work the heart the more it squirts each time so the more blood gets around per beat.

2: Lower residual volume. When you breathe in and out there is alway some air left in there, no matter how hard you try to expel it. The more you train, the more you get in and out each time. This is mostly a result of the muscles used to breath becoming stronger. So for each breath you take in you are getting more air and you can get rid of the old stuff and take in more O2 than an untrained individual. If you need to feed buring muscles O2 and get rid of exhaust fumes, the faster you can deliver new air and take out the fumes the easier its going to be.

3: lower resistance in Blood pathways. Bascially your body is full of little tubes that carry blood. If you are a lazy slob these are closed up as your body hates to pay for up-keep on something that isnt being used. The weird thing about the opening of these is that it usually happens all at once, its not gradual. This is why you will start off training and struggle and feel like you are only making a little progress and then WHAM! you feel like you can just keep going and going. All of a sudden oxygenated blood and waste products are being delivered and taken away faster than before making cellular respiration a lot easier and preventing a serious oxygen debt.

4: Lower systolic pressure. When your hear squirts out some blood it goes into the arteries and then the other blood ways, the faster it can drain out of the arteries, the less pressure on the left ventrical of the heart. Severely obese people or uber sedentary people have heart problems because the blood keeps backing up until it puts pressure on the heart valves. If you have lots of open blood ways it drains away so fast that your heart really has a nice time, instead of feeling like a part baloon on the end of a faucet.

5: Blood. Active individuals have more blood than sedentary individuals, so you have more of the the delivery system that delivers O2 and takes away the waste products.

This is going to sound a little caustic, its not meant to be, but its a way of illustrating a point.



We have well documented proof (POW's and Concentration camps) that show it has nothing to do with genetics. If you want to drop the weight you are going to have to eat the foods that allow for muscle growth (a higher % of lean body mass will burn more calories 24/7) without taking in fuels that dont contrbute to your goals.

Think lots of water (if you are not peeing every 90 mins you are not getting enough water)
Lean meats or fish
Complex carbs (Oatmeal is superb and there are lots of ways to eat it, even like cookies so it feels like a treat, but its actually good for you.
Fruit to feed your brain with glucose
Check wether you are insulin resistant, just get some Chromium polynicotinate and AKG supplements and see if cravings for fats and sweets lessen.
Lots of Vit C for connective tissue repair (you can take as much as 5g of Vit C a day)
For a snack have a Myoplex protein drink from EAS, 42g of protein in each one and they are quite sweet, so if you have a sweet tooth, this will kill the urge.

Originally Posted by Tom Stormcrowe

I have to disagree about it not being potentially genetic as a component....not the whole issue, but a component. You do give good advice though diet wise. Citing POW's and COncentration Camp weight loss is a rather extreme example though, due to the aspects of forced labor and sub-subsistance level diet. The general reference to genetics currently understood is that there is a definite marker gene that shows up in obese individuals. Under conditions of deep famine as a subsistamce farmer or Hunter/Gatherer this marker gene is likely a survival mechanism, but under current conditions in this modern world, it's a disaster. To properly cite POW's and Concentration Camp survivors in the aspect you did, you need to have a data curve showing rates of weight loss over a period of time indicating a correlation that we all lose weight at the same rate under identical caloric intake/output. This can't be shown even in a medically supervised diet and exercise plan. We are all "one off's", with unique genes and we all process caloric burn at a slightly different rate depending on the efficiency of our bodies. I know you weren't trying to be harsh, but unfortunately, you have taken a bit of a simplistic view of how we gain and lose weight is all.

Quick Edit: Maybe we should start a thread for this aspect of the dialogue? Hopefully it won't turn into one of those threads that sounds like the tone in P&R!

Originally Posted by Wogsterca

Tom:

Gotta question for you, at your heaviest, were you diabetic, and if you were, are you still?

If you don't want to discuss it on the group, but don't mind answering the question, then PM me.

As for the photos, I know a few folks who could tape the before and after (the cycling one), on the refridgerator, heck it would work better then locking that sucker up with a Kryptonite U lock and a hunk of cruise ship anchor chain, and throwing away the key.

One thing though about diet, and this is something you probably know, but some others here might not, so I will post it anyway, is if you don't buy it, you can't eat it. Going on a diet with a 20lb bag of potato chips and a case of beer in the house will not work. Toss all that stuff in the trash, clean out the cupboards of everything you should not eat, then start again, with a new trip to the grocery store, and only buy what you should be eating.

Oh well, enough said here, my bike is calling to me to go for a ride

Originally Posted by newsace

Yeah, I know that's just what it is: a justification. My problem is that I have just not chosen to exercise (pun intended) the willpower to do what I know I need to do. Thanks for the encouragement, and the spirit in which you delivered it.

Originally Posted by Tom Stormcrowe

At my peak, I was insulin dependent. I am still technically diabetic, but completely regulated now. Sugars run between 73 and 103 on avg now with 73 @ fasting. 103 is peak. I actually have to be careful about low blood sugar now. My intake is strictly regulated by my activity level. For example, on a long ride, I may take in 6000 calories in a day, but I'm still operating at a deficit that is quite significant with an output of up to three times that on for example my 160 miler in one day over Labor Day Weekend.