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ryantreadway942
Posts: 18 Member
Hi all,
I have to say, I am beyond frustrated and feel screwed. When doing research (YouTube) about losing fat through diet and exercise, I joined a gym and have been going 3-4xweekly and eating 1500 cals. To be in a deficit. All the YouTube gurus (lol) said I should be in a deficit and life heavy so I don't lose to much muscle in the process. I am 5'7 and 180 lbs. According to scales my maintenance is around 2400 cals. I had a free consult with a personal trainer at the gym who said that 1500 cals is not good as it will impede my ability to have enough energy to workout and to focus on high intensity stuff, not heavy weight training. So, originally I lost a few pounds at 1500 cals and my stomach was visibly flatter. Now my weight went back up to where I started (180lbs) and I just don't get it. I upped my cals and have done more high intensity exercises and not as heavy weight but more reps. I just don't get it. Thoughts?
I have to say, I am beyond frustrated and feel screwed. When doing research (YouTube) about losing fat through diet and exercise, I joined a gym and have been going 3-4xweekly and eating 1500 cals. To be in a deficit. All the YouTube gurus (lol) said I should be in a deficit and life heavy so I don't lose to much muscle in the process. I am 5'7 and 180 lbs. According to scales my maintenance is around 2400 cals. I had a free consult with a personal trainer at the gym who said that 1500 cals is not good as it will impede my ability to have enough energy to workout and to focus on high intensity stuff, not heavy weight training. So, originally I lost a few pounds at 1500 cals and my stomach was visibly flatter. Now my weight went back up to where I started (180lbs) and I just don't get it. I upped my cals and have done more high intensity exercises and not as heavy weight but more reps. I just don't get it. Thoughts?
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Replies
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ryantreadway942 wrote: »Hi all,
I have to say, I am beyond frustrated and feel screwed. When doing research (YouTube) about losing fat through diet and exercise, I joined a gym and have been going 3-4xweekly and eating 1500 cals. To be in a deficit. All the YouTube gurus (lol) said I should be in a deficit and life heavy so I don't lose to much muscle in the process. I am 5'7 and 180 lbs. According to scales my maintenance is around 2400 cals. I had a free consult with a personal trainer at the gym who said that 1500 cals is not good as it will impede my ability to have enough energy to workout and to focus on high intensity stuff, not heavy weight training. So, originally I lost a few pounds at 1500 cals and my stomach was visibly flatter. Now my weight went back up to where I started (180lbs) and I just don't get it. I upped my cals and have done more high intensity exercises and not as heavy weight but more reps. I just don't get it. Thoughts?
1500 calories would already be a substantial deficit for most males without any exercise whatsoever. 1500 calories is the basement for a sedentary male...not someone who works out. More than likely you are seeing a spike back up in water weight from more calories as well as more inherent waste in your system...if you only lost a few pounds at 1500 calories it is likely that most of that was water and waste as well. Also, higher intensity exercise/new exercise leads to inflammation which also leads to water weight.
What did you increase your calories too? With regular exercise I lose about 1 Lb per week on 2300-2500 calories per day.13 -
When I first started out I weighed 244lbs at 5'6. I ate 2000 per day and lifted 3 days per week and did cardio 4-5 days a week for 20-25 minutes a day. My lifting was 4 sets, 8-12 reps, mostly compound lifts and light steady state cardio.
In the beginning I lost only 3lbs in the first month but when I tracked BF% and went down 2.6%. Doing the math I was down 6lbs of fat and up 3lbs of lean mass. IMO, that's pretty solid though losing three pounds doesn't sound that great.
Might be worth tracking more than just weight, like BF%, measurements...ect.
When you first start working out it screws up our body and you cause a lot of inflammation and water retention. I really didn't start seeing regular 1+ pound weight losses until 2 months in when I started getting conditioned to exercise.
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I increased my cals to 2000.0
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Thanks for the info! I'll keep plugging away and see what happens. It's weird because I don't see it on the scale but can see a slight difference in definition in my arms and a slimmer belly.6
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Whip out your tape measure and record your results for chest, biceps, waist, hips, thighs. Take those measurements again in a few weeks. You'll probably see some differences regardless of what your scale says!7
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Also weight loss on the scale will be a long term situation - waste in gut, inflammation, water weight, etc - all come into play. A slight deficit plan is the best route IMO, helps maintain recovery and energy... while slowly cutting away fat. I use a 'sedentary BMR' to allow for adding back in workout calories. Workout calories should be verified from a few sources to prevent over-eat-back.1
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cwolfman13 wrote: »What did you increase your calories too? With regular exercise I lose about 1 Lb per week on 2300-2500 calories per day.
I lose about the same and that’s with zero cardio.
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I gained 7 pounds when I started weight lifting again. It was water retention, and went away in a few weeks.3
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My guess is With you weight training, you are building muscle and losing fat % making your weight stay the same....try not to focus so much on the scale, watch your body fat percentage & the inches you gain or lose.2
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My guess is With you weight training, you are building muscle and losing fat % making your weight stay the same....try not to focus so much on the scale, watch your body fat percentage & the inches you gain or lose.
A male under ideal conditions can gain about 1/2 lb per week of muscle.
A male at a reasonable deficit can lose about 1/2 to 1 lb per week.
When in a deficit, it is not ideal conditions for gaining muscle.
Still think that poster is losing fat and gaining muscle is anything close to a 1:1 ratio??9 -
So, question. What will get my body fat down faster and help me look leaner and toned? More calories or less? Heavy weight training or HI?1
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I would prioritize lifting over cardio, but still do some cardio.2
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My guess is With you weight training, you are building muscle and losing fat % making your weight stay the same....try not to focus so much on the scale, watch your body fat percentage & the inches you gain or lose.
A male under ideal conditions can gain about 1/2 lb per week of muscle.
A male at a reasonable deficit can lose about 1/2 to 1 lb per week.
When in a deficit, it is not ideal conditions for gaining muscle.
Still think that poster is losing fat and gaining muscle is anything close to a 1:1 ratio??
That's true but muscle and lean mass are different things.
When you start lifting you also gain bone density. Most methods of measuring BF% also are affected by water retention as well. I think it's not difficult to get an increase in lean mass of 1-3lbs in the first month. Some will be muscle, some will be bone, some will be water weight due to being a novice lifter.2 -
ryantreadway942 wrote: »So, question. What will get my body fat down faster and help me look leaner and toned? More calories or less? Heavy weight training or HI?
so if you want a leaner look that is due to lower body fat. lower body fat comes from eating at a calorie deficit.2 -
For what it's worth, unless you are actually weighing your food, you may be eating more than you think.6
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I would look at your macros if you are trying to lean out. There are plenty of free calculators out there.2
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Thanks for everyone's thoughts here. Where I think I get tripped up the most is that from my understand, lifting does not burn as many calories as cardio does. Do you think I should eat to my maintenance calories, add a little bit of cardio in order to go into a deficit of a few 100 calories and weight while doing weight training? Does this sound adequate?0
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ryantreadway942 wrote: »Thanks for everyone's thoughts here. Where I think I get tripped up the most is that from my understand, lifting does not burn as many calories as cardio does. Do you think I should eat to my maintenance calories, add a little bit of cardio in order to go into a deficit of a few 100 calories and weight while doing weight training? Does this sound adequate?
Your diet creates most of the deficit. You can choose to eat 500 calories or exercise for 1.5hrs , not eating the 500 calories is easier than 1.5hrs at the gym everyday.
Lifting, in fact, is better than cardio in many ways when trying to change body composition.
#1-Cardio burns more calories during the session but Lifting increases metabolism for 72hrs afterward while cardio just a few hours. Also, using super sets in lifting actually closes the gap quite a bit between the two in intersession calorie burn.
#2-Lifting builds muscle, more muscle burns more calories.
#3- Lifting increases HGH levels which increases fat utilization. (you burn more fat).
Cardio is primarily good for heart/lung health but if you are looking to change your body composition lifting is the best thing. I still recommend doing 20 minutes of cardio 5-7 days a week just for health purposes.2 -
The EPOC benefit and the amount of calories burned by adding muscle mass are often oversold. EPOC is estimated at 7% of the calories burned intrasession. If you burn 200 calories, that gives you a whopping 14 more calories burned that day.
Adding a pound of muscle burns about 6 more calories per day. 5 lbs more muscle gives you 30 more calories per day. Fat is metabolically active at about 4 calories per day. Lose 5 lbs of fat and you net 10 more calories per day.
There are many benefits to weight training. Fitness, strength, functionality, better appearance and hormone health. Calorie burn is not a big one.11 -
This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.The EPOC benefit and the amount of calories burned by adding muscle mass are often oversold. EPOC is estimated at 7% of the calories burned intrasession. If you burn 200 calories, that gives you a whopping 14 more calories burned that day.
Adding a pound of muscle burns about 6 more calories per day. 5 lbs more muscle gives you 30 more calories per day. Fat is metabolically active at about 4 calories per day. Lose 5 lbs of fat and you net 10 more calories per day.
There are many benefits to weight training. Fitness, strength, functionality, better appearance and hormone health. Calorie burn is not a big one.
Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise. .
Also, why would a muscular man of 200 pounds burn quite a few more calories than another of the same height and weight that's fat if it's not the case?
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liftingbro wrote: »
This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.The EPOC benefit and the amount of calories burned by adding muscle mass are often oversold. EPOC is estimated at 7% of the calories burned intrasession. If you burn 200 calories, that gives you a whopping 14 more calories burned that day.
Adding a pound of muscle burns about 6 more calories per day. 5 lbs more muscle gives you 30 more calories per day. Fat is metabolically active at about 4 calories per day. Lose 5 lbs of fat and you net 10 more calories per day.
There are many benefits to weight training. Fitness, strength, functionality, better appearance and hormone health. Calorie burn is not a big one.
Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise. .
Also, why would a muscular man of 200 pounds burn quite a few more calories than another of the same height and weight that's fat if it's not the case?
If you feel you have the studies that prove your points, feel free to post them.6 -
ryantreadway942 wrote: »Thanks for everyone's thoughts here. Where I think I get tripped up the most is that from my understand, lifting does not burn as many calories as cardio does. Do you think I should eat to my maintenance calories, add a little bit of cardio in order to go into a deficit of a few 100 calories and weight while doing weight training? Does this sound adequate?
Since you're new to training, you can build muscle in a slight deficit. I also think that adding a little cardio would be good for your overall health. You don't want cardio to take away from muscle gain - running seems to impede muscle growth with legs where biking doesn't, for example - but I wouldn't overthink it in the beginning, and would think that 20-30 minutes of something that gets your heart rate up at the end of your workout will be helpful. I think if you eat at maintenance you'll have enough gas in the tank to fuel your workout and you will find that you lean out over time. Also, the scale weight may mess with you in the beginning due to exercise-induced water retention, etc, so take some actual measurements that you can track over time.
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The discussion of muscle building and calorie burns yesterday got me interested in revisiting the research on this topic but I was away from my computer. So, back this morning and did a little research on the topic.
First,This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.
On this topic I hit the mother lode with a meta-analysis of 16 studies and 155 participants. Note the low calorie burns and shorter EPOC durations across multiple studies. Between set rest intervals and work volume had the 2 highest impacts on POC.
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2013/825026/
From the conclusions (bold added by me for emphasis):The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
Also, a search of multiple studies on PubMed showed a range of EPOC of 6% to 15%. No evidence of durations as long as 72 hours appeared. Quite opposite as confirmed by the meta-analysis above.Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise.
Searching both a wildcard search and PubMed, I found no evidence for calorie burn increases other than at rest. No evidence of increased burns by adding muscle mass when exercising. If anyone has evidence in the form of studies on this topic, I would be very interested in seeing them.
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ryantreadway942 wrote: »So, question. What will get my body fat down faster and help me look leaner and toned? More calories or less? Heavy weight training or HI?
Ryan, there are no simple answers to your question. The way to reduce body fat is primarily through calorie deficit. Exercise is a contributor but not the major one. Unless you are a long distance duration athlete, you burn fat more calories just being alive each day than you will burn though exercise.
But if you are too aggressive with your calorie deficit, you will sacrifice valuable muscle mass. So, a reasonable deficit and patience coupled with progressive resistance training to preserve (or even build a little depending on training status).
The word that concerns me in your post is, "faster". This is not a fast process. If you cut calories too hard that will work against you. If you overtrain, that is also counter productive. I would focus far more on body measurements and weight trend tracking with a tracking app than what the scale says on any one day.
With weight training you can gain some water weight, which is actually a good thing. It means you stressed the muscles enough for them to need to recover and repair. If your weight stays the same for a bit but your waist goes down and your arms, chest, and legs stay the same or get bigger, there would be no downside to that.
But this is not going to happen quickly. It going to take some months, maybe longer to get where you I think you want to be.4 -
The discussion of muscle building and calorie burns yesterday got me interested in revisiting the research on this topic but I was away from my computer. So, back this morning and did a little research on the topic.
First,This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.
On this topic I hit the mother lode with a meta-analysis of 16 studies and 155 participants. Note the low calorie burns and shorter EPOC durations across multiple studies. Between set rest intervals and work volume had the 2 highest impacts on POC.
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2013/825026/
From the conclusions (bold added by me for emphasis):The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
Also, a search of multiple studies on PubMed showed a range of EPOC of 6% to 15%. No evidence of durations as long as 72 hours appeared. Quite opposite as confirmed by the meta-analysis above.Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise.
Searching both a wildcard search and PubMed, I found no evidence for calorie burn increases other than at rest. No evidence of increased burns by adding muscle mass when exercising. If anyone has evidence in the form of studies on this topic, I would be very interested in seeing them.
See below, pretty clear. 7% is pretty significant, if your RMR is 2000 it would be about 140 calories per day extra.
To our knowledge this is the first study to use a whole room indirect calorimeter to measure changes in 24-h EE, RMR, SMR and substrate oxidation 72-h after the last RT session in response to a long term (6 months), low volume RT program in young overweight adults. Results showed a favorable impact of RT on body composition corresponding to a chronic adaptation of both energy expenditure and fat oxidation.
The ~7% increase in RMR and SMR are in agreement with other studies using single (25, 34) and multiple (3, 6, 16) sets. Further, increased energy expenditure as a result of RT observed in this study is at least partially a function of increased FFM, as indicated by the positive correlation for change in FFM and change in 24-hr EE, RMR and SMR. However, RMR and SMR both increased as a result of RT after adjustment for FFM, suggesting that other factors may also be contributing to the increase.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8175496
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2862249/2 -
The discussion of muscle building and calorie burns yesterday got me interested in revisiting the research on this topic but I was away from my computer. So, back this morning and did a little research on the topic.
First,This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.
On this topic I hit the mother lode with a meta-analysis of 16 studies and 155 participants. Note the low calorie burns and shorter EPOC durations across multiple studies. Between set rest intervals and work volume had the 2 highest impacts on POC.
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2013/825026/
From the conclusions (bold added by me for emphasis):The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
Also, a search of multiple studies on PubMed showed a range of EPOC of 6% to 15%. No evidence of durations as long as 72 hours appeared. Quite opposite as confirmed by the meta-analysis above.Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise.
Searching both a wildcard search and PubMed, I found no evidence for calorie burn increases other than at rest. No evidence of increased burns by adding muscle mass when exercising. If anyone has evidence in the form of studies on this topic, I would be very interested in seeing them.
I'm in agreement that EPOC while definitely a thing is overhyped in infomercials. If we assume the 7% mentioned by @liftingbro is reasonable and can be verified by scientific study, it's still too small to be measurable in real life IMO due to inaccuracies in all the other inputs, calories in (labels allow a certain margin of error), exercise calorie burn, NEAT, etc
I guess I wonder why you bolded the part about EPOC induced by a single exercise session as not a great impact instead of the part about the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions. I don't know many people who resistance train for a single exercise session then quite, aside from resolutioners (tongue in cheek joke).
Bottom line, IMO resistance training is good for the vast majority of people for health. After all we all want the strength to get off the toilet in old age. EPOC is just a bonus, regardless of how much it is.
From your post:
The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.3 -
Theoldguy1 wrote: »The discussion of muscle building and calorie burns yesterday got me interested in revisiting the research on this topic but I was away from my computer. So, back this morning and did a little research on the topic.
First,This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.
On this topic I hit the mother lode with a meta-analysis of 16 studies and 155 participants. Note the low calorie burns and shorter EPOC durations across multiple studies. Between set rest intervals and work volume had the 2 highest impacts on POC.
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2013/825026/
From the conclusions (bold added by me for emphasis):The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
Also, a search of multiple studies on PubMed showed a range of EPOC of 6% to 15%. No evidence of durations as long as 72 hours appeared. Quite opposite as confirmed by the meta-analysis above.Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise.
Searching both a wildcard search and PubMed, I found no evidence for calorie burn increases other than at rest. No evidence of increased burns by adding muscle mass when exercising. If anyone has evidence in the form of studies on this topic, I would be very interested in seeing them.
I'm in agreement that EPOC while definitely a thing is overhyped in infomercials. If we assume the 7% mentioned by @liftingbro is reasonable and can be verified by scientific study, it's still too small to be measurable in real life IMO due to inaccuracies in all the other inputs, calories in (labels allow a certain margin of error), exercise calorie burn, NEAT, etc
I guess I wonder why you bolded the part about EPOC induced by a single exercise session as not a great impact instead of the part about the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions. I don't know many people who resistance train for a single exercise session then quite, aside from resolutioners (tongue in cheek joke).
The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
Exactly, I'm not speaking about going and lifting weights one day an getting a metabolism boost. It's more of a cumulative effect, so no, on day 1 you might not see any effect but if we're talking lifestyle change and you do this long term and regularly it can affect metabolism. If it's 7%, IMO that's significant increase given it's an RMR/SMR increase. As I stated, a 2000 RMR would see 140 claorie per day increase which over time is significant. I would look at it in the same way I look at increasing NEAT, it doesn't fix bad nutrition and doesn't mean you shouldn't do cardio just that the amount of cardio required isn't as much if you lift.
The main argument here was lifting vs cardio. We agreed on most of the benefits of lifting but not the extended increase in metabolism. IMO, that part is pretty clear by what's been posting, yes, lifting increases metabolism even on rest days. How long do you have lift before that starts? Not sure. By the study I posted it seems that after you've been training for 6 months you're metabolism stays up for at least 3 days without lifting. I would think it probably happens earlier than 6 months but they didn't test that in the study.
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FYI - there's also an EPOC effect from cardio, especially intense cardio.
A smaller percentage but often a smaller percentage of a larger initial calorie burn.
(But I hope people primarilly exercise for the their health, fitness and enjoyment.)3 -
Theoldguy1 wrote: »The discussion of muscle building and calorie burns yesterday got me interested in revisiting the research on this topic but I was away from my computer. So, back this morning and did a little research on the topic.
First,This last part is factually incorrect. It is proven, go look up the studies, that you burn more calories over the next 72hrs when you lift than when you do cardio. You burn fewer in the session, though as I stated super setting can mitigate a lot of the difference, but metabolism is raised over the next 72hrs.
On this topic I hit the mother lode with a meta-analysis of 16 studies and 155 participants. Note the low calorie burns and shorter EPOC durations across multiple studies. Between set rest intervals and work volume had the 2 highest impacts on POC.
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2013/825026/
From the conclusions (bold added by me for emphasis):The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
Also, a search of multiple studies on PubMed showed a range of EPOC of 6% to 15%. No evidence of durations as long as 72 hours appeared. Quite opposite as confirmed by the meta-analysis above.Also, yes, at rest one pound of muscle doesn't burn that many calories but the story changes when you are doing physical activities. You have to consider that. Yes, if you sit there and do nothing muscle doesn't burn much more but when contracted under weight, yes it does. The point is that when you add muscle , lift weights (or really anything else that physical) you will burn significantly more calories during the exercise.
Searching both a wildcard search and PubMed, I found no evidence for calorie burn increases other than at rest. No evidence of increased burns by adding muscle mass when exercising. If anyone has evidence in the form of studies on this topic, I would be very interested in seeing them.
I'm in agreement that EPOC while definitely a thing is overhyped in infomercials. If we assume the 7% mentioned by @liftingbro is reasonable and can be verified by scientific study, it's still too small to be measurable in real life IMO due to inaccuracies in all the other inputs, calories in (labels allow a certain margin of error), exercise calorie burn, NEAT, etc
I guess I wonder why you bolded the part about EPOC induced by a single exercise session as not a great impact instead of the part about the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions. I don't know many people who resistance train for a single exercise session then quite, aside from resolutioners (tongue in cheek joke).
Bottom line, IMO resistance training is good for the vast majority of people for health. After all we all want the strength to get off the toilet in old age. EPOC is just a bonus, regardless of how much it is.
From your post:
The included studies indicate that RT may help increasing EPOC and EE, even though some of the differences in the EPOC between resistance exercises with different methodology may seem very small from a practical perspective. However, any additional caloric expenditure following exercise may contribute to long-term weight management. It must be remembered that weight-control benefits of EPOC should happen over a significant time period. Thus, even acknowledging that the EPOC induced by a single exercise session would not represent a great impact on overall EE, the cumulative effect of sequential RT sessions may be relevant in the context of long-term programs.
RE; The bolded points above, we are in complete agreement. It is overhyped, too small to measure in real life and to isolate. If we used @liftingbro's example; 7% in a person with 2000 cal RMR, that is probably within logging error ratio for that person and calorically represent about 1 extra cookie per day. And as you say, it's just a bonus. I also don't think many people have an RMR of 2000. Mine is 1765 as calculated. I am a 180 lb man who gets both cardio in the form of lots of walking and strength training 3x per week. For lighter people, men or women, it's going to be less. If you have a RMR of 2000, you probably have a TDEE of 2800 to 3000.
So, the benefit of that 140 extra calories if RMR is not that significant in terms of daily energy accounting. That has been the reason for my counter posts in this thread. I feel the calorie burning benefits of RT are being oversold, as I've stated a couple of times.
Is resistance training a great idea? Hell yeah!. But dietary control is going to be the far bigger factor in terms of fat loss. Philosophically and to put it simply, I am a proponent of RT for body composition and fitness and a fan of calorie deficit for fat loss. Do they have somewhat of a symbiotic relationship. Sure. But let's keep it in perspective as you have done above in your post.1 -
ryantreadway942 wrote: »Thanks for everyone's thoughts here. Where I think I get tripped up the most is that from my understand, lifting does not burn as many calories as cardio does. Do you think I should eat to my maintenance calories, add a little bit of cardio in order to go into a deficit of a few 100 calories and weight while doing weight training? Does this sound adequate?
I would lose the sprint over marathon mindset and think long term. There's no race, but sustainability is going to be a major factor. The more discipline you instill throughout this process, the more success you'll have.
Don't major in the minors here. Maintain a caloric deficit. Cardio will help this as will lifting, but get in the mindset that you're doing this for the health benefits, not weight loss.
Looking back the one thing I would have done differently is implementing a progressive lifting program earlier, rather than focusing on rapid weight loss.
Lift, do cardio, and implement a modest deficit. Adjust your calories so you continue to fuel your activity.
Regarding metabolism (BMR/REE) there isn't much that changes other than relation to mass (cell count actually). Individual metabolism isn't high or low, it's little more than a cascade of biochemical reactions multiplied by mass.
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