Don in Austin

My wife is fanatic about studying nutrition and it seems every day more books arrive from Amazon so I often grab one when I go to hit the pot. In much of what I read it is claimed that exercise alone is pretty much useless for weight loss. Some authors that I respect, such as Gary Taubes, say this. They point out that just eating a bagel cancels the calorie expenditure of a half hour at the gym. But my observation is that there are many who DO lose weight from exercise even though they eat whatever the hell they want. It just has to be a LOT of exercise. My own case if fuzzy. I lost almost 40 pounds and it is staying off. But, while I eat as much as I want with no guilt or hesitation, have no fear or eating the fat on a good steak, BBQ or lamb chops, and I do not count calories, I completely eliminated soda and rarely consume other high glycemic index crap "foods."

Collecting some good solid anecdotal evidence......

BigJeff

diet and exercise works.

Doing just one is not as effective.

Avoid eating crap. Everything else in moderation.

Control your portions by making less/buying less.

MikeRides

I've found this to be key for me. I started biking last summer at 220 pounds, continued through this year and am down to 168 pounds. My diet hasn't changed, well except for quitting all sodas cold turkey. I eat whatever I want, when I want, and I continue losing 10 pounds a month. Granted I realize if I changed my diet (less fast food, smaller portions) I may have been down to this weight a lot sooner. Every body is different, I've known some people who work hard exercising daily and eat like birds and have a hard time losing an ounce not to mention a pound. I've also known people who can eat everything in sight and not do a single bit of exercise, and be as skinny as a toothpick.

I've recently improved my diet by switching out fried meat with grilled meat, and adding more fruit and veggies to my diet. I don't weigh myself often, as I rather not obsess over weight but I'm trying to get myself slimmer to be able to put more miles on the bike in faster times.

Machka 

I dropped to my lowest weight as an adult twice in my life:

1) Very little eating + very little exercise

2) Lots of eating + lots of exercise.


Regarding cycling, however, I didn't lose any significant weight with cycling until I started logging about 10,000 km a year + doing some weightlifting during the winters + cross-country skiing and snowshoeing during the winters + a lot of walking

ericy

I think a lot of it is resetting your mind so that you no longer crave junk. Junk will always be around you, and if you find it tempting, then resisting is all the harder. For me it was harder when I was young - these days I see nearly all of the junk that is out there as unappetizing, loaded up with various types of nutri-ceuticals, and generally not worth the calories.

A couple of years ago, I was on a dive trip to the Caribbean with a group of people, and on the trip was a family where both parents had undergone bariatric surgery. As soon as we landed there, they hopped into their rental car and went off to the grocery store and bought every kind of snack food they could find. Sodas, chips, cookies, cheesy-poofs, etc. Because of the surgery, they couldn't eat all that much at any one time, but they kept nibbling on the snacks for the entire week. I am told that people who have the surgery can in fact stretch out their stomachs if they aren't careful, which completely defeats the entire purpose of having the surgery in the first place.

hamster

I recall seeing an article claiming that humans respond differently to exercise depending on their excess weight. If you are significantly overweight, you don't compensate for the calories you burn exercising. If you're not, exercising stimulates your appetite and therefore you don't lose as much (if at all).

My personal experience would seem to agree with that. I went from BMI 28 to 25 at the rate of about 1 pound per week after I began exercising. I was "avoiding eating crap", but I wasn't trying hard to restrict calories. BMI 25 seemed to be a floor through which I couldn't break even when I was logging pretty substantial mileage. My height makes me a potentially good climbing specialist, but obviously not with BMI 25. 21 would've been a good target. And that wasn't happening.

This month I've been making an extra push, figuring that, if I exercise hard enough and regularly enough, I might start burning calories faster than I can replenish them. It seems to be working (I'm down 4 lbs for the month) but it involved substantial effort, as in riding every day (literally, today was 26th day in a row), putting tap water in the bottles unless I was planning to ride 4+ hours, and logging upwards of 700 miles so far this month. Like the original post says, exercise just does not burn a whole lot of calories. My 700 miles correspond to about 6 lbs of fat, and I get to keep 4 of them off.

goldfinch

After losing a lot of weight a couple of years ago, this year I gained 10 pounds. I also have ridden more than I ever had in my entire life all added together.

I am hungry all the time.

jon c. 

I dropped about 15 pounds when I started. Got down to a weight I hadn't seen since I was a teen. I wasn't trying to lose weight and the loss was so sudden with really a pretty modest amount of riding that it scared the hell out of me. In theory, I wasn't riding enough to cause it, but it must have jump started my metabolism. No other explanation could be found. My doctor ultimately said 'if you're worried about it, just try and eat more.'

mr_pedro

"Eating whatever you want", problem is that means something different to everyone. Also I have noticed that exercise makes me want to eat more healthy.

I lost 15 lbs by only eating less. Then I started cycling and I have lost another 15, but only because I was counting calories. As soon as I eat according to appetite, my weight stabilizes. And that is with cycling 100+ miles per week and averaging more than 1000 cycling Calories per day.

kris7047th

Getting closer to my target weight of 120 lbs and have lost nearly 20 lbs since May. I am 5'5" and 63 yrs old (lady) I did change up my diet with salads including Quinoa pretty much daily. I found a cabbage Mexican slaw/salsa recipe from the site called *Drunken Spatula* on facebook. I just finished a salad of home grown lettuce leaves, diced tomatoes, shredded cheese, vidallia onion, quinoa, Thai basil leaves and home made dressing. Yeah .. I have days that I go off because eatting out with my adult kids, invited out to dinner .. then it's back to the salads and hitting the road on my bike. While losing the body fat, I have toned my muscles considerably. My kids tell me that I really don't look my age. How I love them .. lol

Lanovran

I got on a bike in college, and I left behind my mother's deep-fried Germanic Texan cooking. I rode to and from classes every day. I would go to the university cafeteria (which was all-you-can-eat, by the way), and I ate good food. By that, I mean I ate real stuff instead of heavily processed garbage. I hit the salad bar for fruits and veggies, the make-your-own-stir-fry bar for some good stuff, and various kinds of ethnic cuisine, but I avoided the pizza, fries, and crummy burgers. I ate pot roast and mashed potatoes, but I never really felt the need to go back for seconds. I stopped eating fast food, and I have never missed it. I stopped drinking soda, and have never missed it. I continued eating desserts, and would definitely miss them if I stopped.

I didn't even ride my bike very far, and at the time I only rode to get to where I was going. Eventually, I started riding just to ride. The end result of eating good food (not less food...just good, real food) and riding my bike nearly every day was that I slimmed down quite a lot. Instead of gaining the "freshman fifteen," I lost it...and then some!

KBentley57

I could say nearly the exact same thing for myself. I started riding at a weight of ~230 lbs. I never was that big until the last year of college. I graduated HS at 185 solid muscle. Bad eating habits and lack of exercise turned me into flubber over a course of 4 years. It wasn't until I almost had to buy a pair of 40 jeans that I had an awakening. I think a mental change does more for a person than any diet or exercise. Without the right thought processes, it will all be in vein sooner or later.

I cut pop (soda some call it), ALL fast food, sweets, and started riding. It sucked. It wasn't fun at all. I stayed hungry for a whole year. Luckily I didn't have any real commitments to hold me back. I've slowly changed my tastes form OMG MT DEW to more bitter foods (hello coffee!); it's taken a few years of yoyoing, but I stabilized and plateaued at 170 lbs. It's where my body wants to be apparently. When I get ready, I plan to lose another 10 lbs to put my BMI right in the middle of normal. Even at 170, I'm looking at the wrong end of the normal scale.

It's very hard, which is why most people don't succeed. However, it can be done; look at all the posts in the C/A section! It's very inspiring.

Spld cyclist

I find that cycling (and exercise in general) often makes me want to change what I'm eating or eat less. So yes, I eat what I want and lose weight. There are two reasons for this. First, I consciously decide I want to sustain/complement my effort in exercising by eating less junk food afterward. Second, I think that exercise often generates a feeling of well being that cancels out feelings of depression, boredom, etc. that promote needless eating.

CbadRider

I lost about 10 lbs when I started exercising more. I eventually changed my eating habits so that I no longer eat until I'm stuffed. I don't like having a very full stomach and need to stop eating several hours before I go to sleep so I can digest. I eat what I want, but I find that I gravitate toward healthy food because it makes my body feel better than loading up on junk food.

wphamilton

I do eat what I want, but it's after a conscious decision about appropriate levels of consumption. It all begins and ends with a decision, and I'm absolutely serious about that. No matter how many calories you burn with exercise (most of us) you can eat more.

RiPHRaPH

It isn't so much how much you eat, it's when you eat it. After hard group rides I have my Muscle Milk (20 grams of protein) and don't feel the need to eat for hours. It is this model that I get my losses. At 49 it becomes increasingly difficult. Your body confuses the signal for thirst and hunger. Obey your thirst first.

Tandem427

I'm 59 and I went from over 300 lbs last year to 239 lbs today eating what I want without using portion control but... I also went from under 1000 miles cycling last year to 5468 miles so far this year (550 hours).

My morning meal is geared toward what I know will make me feel good on the bike like a peanut butter sandwich or an oatmeal-pecan pancake with real maple syrup (plate sized). During my ride of 2 to 8 hours I only consume PowerBars and gels or the like as needed with water and/or Nuun electrolyte drink. Post ride I have milk or juice mixed with whey protein and rehydrate with lots of water. The water fills me up and after a long ride I don't get hungry until supper time and then anything goes.

You could say "whatever I want" has slowly changed from what makes me feel good psychologically to what makes me feel good physically. Not exactly a strict diet, but cookies and doughnuts and chips just don't do it for me anymore so I don't buy them.

rwwff

Well... to the direct question, to maintain my weight and do what I like to do, I have to eat more than I want, or I can lean on sugar loaded sodas and juice, but my aging pancreas might take exception. But that's really not at the heart of your message. You want to know if you "exercise" can you eat what you want. The answer depends on volume. There is exercise, as in, I went to the gym, sat on the stationary bike for 15 minutes, was careful not to record my HR or effort while I read my kindle, then I "lifted" with the pully machines and went home after an hour. That "exercise" burned about 250 calories... maybe. Then there is exercise, as in, I got on my bike, headed South for a couple hours at 15mph average, ran a 3 mile trail loop, then biked back. That could easily be 3300 calories, depending on conditions and bike. If you do the latter a lot, it flat won't matter what you eat, because unless you have the gut of a certain Olympic swimmer of note, you can't eat enough to keep up with the expenditure, and you'll be stuffed to the gills, and losing weight... and miserable.

Somewhere in between is a sweet spot, where you are losing weight, never really hungry, and don't have to be terribly picky about what you eat as long as you delete or limit the really obnoxious items like sugared sodas, juices, ice cream, frozen yogurt... For me that sweet spot is about 7-10hrs of fairly intense biking per week. (mostly zone 4, if going by HR zones..) eg, today I did 10 miles of intervals (twice to 100%max), an hour on the stationary at 80% maxHR, and another 5 miles of cooling down. Did some upper body lifting, but that doesn't really amount to much. That is the sort of effort that changes the math with regard to eating and weight loss. Its doable, but most will refuse to do it, which is why nutritionist generally go with the "exercise doesn't matter much" routine.

Dunbar

Agreed, it has become vogue to say exercise doesn't burn enough calories to cause weight loss. While that may be true of the way most people exercise I think cycling can be the exception if you do enough of it. A 175lb. man averaging 150 watts (not difficult if you train enough) can burn 600-700 calories an hour on a bike. If you consistently do that 8+ hours a week it can cause weight loss IME without having to scrutinize what you eat or calorie restrict. Now contrast that with the way most people exercise. They might walk or get on a treadmill or elliptical 3-4 times a week for 45-60 minutes. They're probably burning 2000 calories a week from exercise if they're lucky. It's not hard to see why they might have a different experience than those of burning 2X+ that a week on our bikes.

I will say that averaging 8+ hours a week of cycling year round can be difficult for many. Especially when the days get short and/or if you live in a cold climate. The way exercise works is that you can't stop, or cut way back, for part of the year and expect to keep the weight off.

memebag

My experience:

I started cycling for fun just after Christmas, 2012. I weighed 220, which is overweight for 6'1", but I wasn't very concerned about it. At first I rode a mile or two each day. Gradually I realized I could go new places and see new things, so I rode a little farther each day. Eventually I was riding 10 miles a day, and that's when I noticed I was losing 1 pound every week. I continued to lose one pound every week for the next 25 weeks. I had to buy new clothes. It was the first time I'd ever lost weight without being ill.

I stopped eating a as much junk food, but that was mostly because I stopped wanting to, not because I was trying to lose weight. I still eat pretty much everything I want, with the single exception of the 3.75 pound bag of Kirkland brand peanut butter cups. I really can't stay healthy and eat one of those every week, so those have to stay at Costco, because if they come home I will eat one 3.75 pound bag every week.

I fluctuate between 190 and 195 now. I'm riding 15 miles a day during the week, 30 or more a day on weekends. I'm much healthier than I was 9 months ago. Happier, too.

rwwff

Funny how this works....
10 miles on bike * 50kcal /mile = 500kcal per ride * 7 rides/wk = 3500 kcal = content of energy in one pound of fat.

memebag

Your science is blowing my mind, man.

jessestylex

This is not always true. I never changed my diet when i took up cycling 7 months ago. Ive lost 37 pounds and counting.

Usually when people want to lose weight they workout and diet cause they want the fastest weight loss as possible and they read that diet combined with a workout is the quickest.

How many people do you know that just worked out and didn't diet? Prob none! Well I'm living proof you can eat what you want and still lose weight cause I've actually did the study on myself for 7 months now and it works like clock work.

I'm not saying pig out and eat more calories than you burn, but you can still eat McDonalds and Pizza every week. Most people starting out fail because they think they must give up the food they love. You don't have to! Eat what you like and ride your bike or run at least 5 times a week.


Now once a person gets to the weight they want to be at, then they can start the diet part, because overall you want to be healthy inside and out. But giving up your fav foods to lose weight is a myth.

I'm 10 pounds from my recommended weight, And i'm just now ready to look into replacing my fav foods with healthy ones. I had to keep eating my fav foods as motivation for weight loss. Sounds backwards doesnt it? lol

jessestylex

Someone should write a book or make a DVD for a new weight loss program.

Eat Burger King and Pizza Hut while losing weight! The funny part is, that's it freaking true! People on this forum can confirm from their studies. This wouldn't appeal to the hardcore health nuts. But to the average American this would be their dream weight loss program. You could make a killing too. Eating real healthy would be the last stage of the program making it more practical to people.

BigJeff

Not all books sell, the ones that do claim to have secret sauce for success... doing something odd or extreme or so complicated you need to book to follow along.

Reasonable "create good habits, and don't stray too far or quit" doesn't sell books... it barely sells magazines.... unless they promise 700 secret tips of the rich and beautiful.