80% Consumption, 20% exercise: Change my Mind

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  • Mov3mor3
    Mov3mor3 Posts: 96 Member
    You don't really have to move at all to lose weight, you just have to lessen your calorie intake. I always recommend people take it slow and not go all in. Take those small steps and adjust.
  • Danp
    Danp Posts: 1,561 Member
    edited January 2020
    MikePTY wrote: »
    cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »
    People who are super active can outrun the fork but for your desk based person who is overweight, probably not.

    Unless they are a professional athlete, it's pretty close to impossible. LeBron James and Michael Phelps? Probably. But active guy who exercises 6 or 7 days a week for an hour or 2? Not likely.

    Now you have to understand what we say by this: Not that some people don't naturally eat at their maintenance or deficit level through activity. Sure. Some people are naturally better regulators than others. What "you can't outrun the fork" means is that you can't eat as many calories as possible and still lose weight, just because you exercise. It's an important distinction.

    Back before my lifestyle change, there were days I could regularly put back 4000-5000 calories in a day, without that much effort. Those type of days are not getting outran, even if I went to my 90 minute Krav Maga class every day.

    That's absolutely one part of it and probably the most important aspect. But there are other aspects or meanings I take from this saying.

    Firstly that increased physical activity comes with a corresponding increase in calorie intake in order to fuel that activity and, for the most part satisfy the corresponding increase in appetite. Significantly increasing calorie burn without properly fuelling that activity is going to lead to a crash and burn. So generally speaking the benefits derived from a sensible approach to working out will be realised in fitness levels while the weight loss will largely remain unchanged, since the overall calorie deficit will remain largely unchanged.

    The other aspect is that the effort required to reduce caloric intake is significantly easier than than burning those calories off. With largely imperceptible changes to portion size and a couple of substitutions or different choices removing 300-400 calories per day from food intake is trivial and requires WAY less effort than a 300-400 calorie daily work out session (which can't be fuelled with extra calories!). It's just straight up easier to achieve the required calorie deficit on the intake.

  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,252 Member
    I would agree with this estimation. The math just works out that way based upon the equation:

    Caloric Intake (CI) (Food) + Caloric Output (CO) (BMR + Exercise) = Deficit/Maintenance/Surplus


    It is far easier to ingest calories than it is to burn them. The majority simply do not have the time/energy/discipline to exercise at a high level for several hours unless in a program that requires this - professional sports, military, etc.
  • ryanfoley74
    ryanfoley74 Posts: 2 Member
    I always thought that if you were doughy to start and you dropped weight, you will still be doughy just a smaller version. So, if you track your macros, as opposed to just Calories In Calories Out, you can build muscle while burning fat. I would assume if your calories daily consumption consists of 1K calories of birthday cake, even with burning 1.1K calories in the gym, you will not get the aesthetics you desire. But if your calories come from lean protein and such, your physique will improve more with your gym work.
    Am I looking at this the wrong way? Is my logic flawed?
  • CashthePRO
    CashthePRO Posts: 6 Member
    Working out generally makes you eat more, since your body (muscles) require the extra energy. Because of that if you are not careful of WHAT you are eating, you will generally overeat. Athletes who strength train generally have high calorie diets. But it is generally high protein, lower carb and also they burn off more than they take in.
  • Duck_Puddle
    Duck_Puddle Posts: 3,237 Member
    edited January 2020
    ryanfoley74 wrote: »
    I always thought that if you were doughy to start and you dropped weight, you will still be doughy just a smaller version. So, if you track your macros, as opposed to just Calories In Calories Out, you can build muscle while burning fat. I would assume if your calories daily consumption consists of 1K calories of birthday cake, even with burning 1.1K calories in the gym, you will not get the aesthetics you desire. But if your calories come from lean protein and such, your physique will improve more with your gym work.
    Am I looking at this the wrong way? Is my logic flawed?

    Weight loss happens when you’re in a calorie deficit-whether you’re eating birthday cake or dry chicken breast. When you lose that weight, you will lose fat and some muscle.

    Getting adequate protein intake AND doing consistent, progressive resistance training (eg weightlifting) will help minimize the amount of muscle that is lost. That will improve your body composition as you lose-so your body fat % is lower and you look less “doughy”.

    However, as long as you are getting enough protein and your other nutritional needs are met, eating birthday cake will not inherently leave you looking doughy (as long as it fits your calories).


    So sort of a combo. You need consistent, progressive resistance training and adequate protein intake to really minimize muscle loss as you lose (which is what contributes to losing less muscle/lower body fat/better physique). Your diet beyond that will only matter for meeting nutrition needs and satiety/adherence.

    You don’t need to eat only chicken/rice/broccoli and eggs from now until forever to have a good physique. Also of note-just eating those things won’t give you a good physique.

    One could eat 700 calories of protein, 500 calories of birthday cake, do progressive/consistent strength training, burn 1300 calories and end up with a nice physique. They would probably not feel good because they will be missing lots of vitamins and minerals, and probably be hungry a lot because cake isn’t very satiating. But they would lose and be doing the things that are important to getting a good physique-the presence of cake in the diet doesn’t negate that.




  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,227 Member
    ryanfoley74 wrote: »
    I always thought that if you were doughy to start and you dropped weight, you will still be doughy just a smaller version. So, if you track your macros, as opposed to just Calories In Calories Out, you can build muscle while burning fat. I would assume if your calories daily consumption consists of 1K calories of birthday cake, even with burning 1.1K calories in the gym, you will not get the aesthetics you desire. But if your calories come from lean protein and such, your physique will improve more with your gym work.
    Am I looking at this the wrong way? Is my logic flawed?

    I think maybe just not very nuanced.

    I started out very doughy, lost a good bit of weight (50lbs +/-), and turned out to have a tiny nice bit of li'l ol' lady muscles underneath. That depends on what you were doing while fat. (I'd been active/athletic for over a decade, but eating enough to hold onto the doughy overlay).

    Nutrition is important for best health (of course) and some (especially protein) for best effect on muscle.

    There are some nutrients in cake. Make it one with walnuts and a rich cream cheese frosting, with a multi-egg sponge cake, and the nutrients may not be as vile as you'd assume. Some gym activities have more aesthetic or calorie benefits than others. From the overall thrust of your post, I assume you mean mostly weight training, but that's not the only muscle builder (it's the most efficient, for sure), and if those gym cals were pure cardio - if there is such a thing ;) ), you might not have much aesthetic impact beyond thinness.

    But sure, get good nutrition, and do a sensible mix of exercise, for best health and aesthetic results. (But don't assume calorie counting inherently means ignoring macros, any more than macro counting means you ignore calories.)
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    ryanfoley74 wrote: »
    I always thought that if you were doughy to start and you dropped weight, you will still be doughy just a smaller version. So, if you track your macros, as opposed to just Calories In Calories Out, you can build muscle while burning fat. I would assume if your calories daily consumption consists of 1K calories of birthday cake, even with burning 1.1K calories in the gym, you will not get the aesthetics you desire. But if your calories come from lean protein and such, your physique will improve more with your gym work.
    Am I looking at this the wrong way? Is my logic flawed?

    I know guys in the gym who have no idea of what their macro ratios are who have incredible physiques...they eat well and train, but they don't have a clue how their macros are broken down. I haven't logged in years and have no idea what my macro breakdown is...I'm a bit fluffy right now, but that's because I've been indulging in winter yuminess and haven't done much exercise wise the past few months due to injury.

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