Simplest approach to weight loss?

[threeprong]

Here's some math.....

Let's say your friend is 220lbs and wants to lose 20lbs of mostly body fat.

He must exercise so that he burns 9 calories to lose 1 gram of fat.

So he wants to burn 9071 grams of body fat... that's 81, 739 calories of exercise.

A "good" workout on an elliptical for 30 minutes will burn 350-450 calories.

If he combines this type of workout with an calorie deficit of -500 per day....

He'll lose the weight in a couple of months.


If he starts running or jogging, combined with a calorie-deficit diet he'll lose the weight in 30 days or so.



It is math.

[simonm]

Not all 20lbs are equal. There is quite a difference between 20lbs for someone who is say 170lbs and someone who is 300lbs. Someone who is 300+ lbs can loose (and gain it back) 20lbs in a very short period of time.

Getting rid of 20lbs permanently for someone who isn't grossly obese is a project for at least 3-4 months. Just changing one element will not cut it. It is a long term habit change.

Salad for lunch may not give any benefit at all if it is covered in salad dressings.
Not eating after 7 pm is likely to cause the person to be ravenous and break down and stuff themselves with cookies just before going to bed. Skipping breakfast is almost always a disaster.


Your friend needs to do two things to achieve "calories out > calories in = weight loss"

1) Get some more exercise
2) Control food intake.
I personally think the fad diets should be avoided.

What worked for my wife was walking almost every day for about 1.5 -2 hours (started off with 30 mins and built it up plus looking after her diet. So your friend is off to a good start if he/she cycles every day: next step is to build up the distance. Is it possible to cycle to shops as well as to work? Is there someplace to do an hour's recreational cycling as well every day?

The key for most people is to watch the amount of fat you are eating. For a female wanting to loose weight this shouldn't be much more than 60g per day (2oz) and for a guy maybe 75g (2.5-3oz). Fast food is the killer here although may do actually have lower fat options as well.

The old trick of drinking water before you eat (maybe 20mins earlier) does help a little. Having a salad (careful about the dressing - preferably none) or a light soup (this could be just a diluted veg/meat stock) before you main course as a starter helps as well. The fast food culture of fries, burger an a token lettuce leaf all at the same time is the absolute worst method. You stomach doesn't know what is hitting it - it has no time to react and say "I'm satisfied." So "full" ends up meaning just that - so full that you can't stuff anything else in physically.

My wife got rid of about 50 pounds over about a year and 18 months later is is still gone by walking and by watching fat intake. She continues to walk and watches what she eats.

Forget "dieting" - it is a lifestyle change.
1st calories out > calories in = weight loss
2nd calories out = calories in = stable weight

[Pam]

So much garbage info on weight loss out there...

First, the scale sucks as a metric for progress. Throw it out. Take measurements and progress picts instead.

Second, realize that what you want to lose is body fat. Not lean muscle mass. Getting smaller/lighter is all well and good but when you're smaller because you've also lost lean muscle mass you are not going to be happy with the results. You'll just be a smaller lump.

Third, it *is* all about diet. At least 85% of your success will hinge on what goes in your mouth. And if you go on a diet plan that is not one that you can live with for life you will gain the lost body fat back.

Fourth, do not eat too little. 1200 calorie a day diets are diets that are sure to lose lean body mass and stall out your metabolism. If you eat below your basal metabolic rate you are screwing yourself. If you have too large a caloric deficit relative to your activity level you will screw yourself. This is not a race.

Fifth, steady state cardio is horrid for fat loss. Yeah, people claim to lose all kind of weight doing hours of cardio but it came mostly from their diet changes, the slight increase in lean muscle mass (initially), and the decrease in lean muscle mass (eventually can be catabolic). Cardio is great for the cardiovascular system. If you want to do a cardio activity for fat loss, do HIIT (high intensity interval training) for no more than 20 minutes no more than 3x week. There are a lot of HIIT variations but essentially you warm up on your equipment of choice, then up the resistance/incline and go flat out for 15-30 seconds, then back down and recover for 2 minutes, then back up for 15-30 seconds. Rinse/repeat for no more than 20 minutes.

Sixth, second to dietary changes weight lifting has the biggest impact on fat loss. By increasing your lean muscle mass you improve your metabolic rate and look better as the fat comes off. Getting on a good 3x week lifting program, including free weights, squats, rows, etc. will do far more than hours on a treadmill.

Seventh, weight lifting and HIIT can cause an increase in metabolism up to 48 hours after you leave the gym. You burn fewer cals while exercising than you did while doing hours of cardio, but because of the longer term effects you lose more calories overall. Train smarter, not longer.

Lastly, low carb diets work for many, until they stop. It's better to get on a good caloric intake diet and keep your macros around 40/40/20 (percentage of cals from protein/carbs/fat). You can use a site like fitday.com to track your diet. Not to be anal about counting cals, but to gather data and keep the macros in line. If you should lose weight at 2000 calories but aren't and your macros are 10/60/30, well duh. Tracking data can also help you see if you are more carb sensitive or more fat sensitive. Macros 50/30/20 and 40/30/30 may be a better fit. But you must stay on the same plan for several weeks in order to really make an assessment. Do not try for zero fat either! Fat is essential for good health and body fat losses. Olive oil, natural peanut butter, nuts, tuna, salmon, and avocados are examples of good fats.

http://www.thefactsaboutfitness.com/arti...ercise.htm
http://www.alwyncosgrove.com/hierarchy-of-fat-loss.html
http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/helpful_...uccess.htm
http://www.hotnfit.com/nutrition_design.htm#top

[wickedsteve]

volcs0 wrote:
calories out > calories in = weight loss

can't get much simpler than that.

People use a lot of calories each day to stay alive. If you don't get enough calories you will starve to death.

Seriously, that sums up what I was gonna say, eat less and be more active.

[Ted King]

As has been said by others, it is a matter of eating less but well and exercising. But which particular way of achieving those goals that is best for any given person is probably going to be unique. If one way doesn't work, don't get discouraged and think that you can't lose weight or can't keep the weight off - just figure that particular method wasn't the right one for you and try something else. There is absolutely nothing wrong with you if you try a particular method and it doesn't work! Keep trying, there is a method that will work, you just have to be persistent about trying to find it.

I lost 50 pounds - went from 210 to 160. I've bounced back about 8 pounds and pretty well stabilized - have been about the same for a few months now. I'm 6 feet tall so 168 is probably a pretty fair weight for me. I did and do eat less but well and exercise - those are probably essential. But all the other particular methods that people are mentioning may work for some but not for others. For example, I did weigh myself two or three times a day on a scale even though many people say that is a bad idea. It helped me monitor how what I was eating and doing was affecting my weight. I didn't expect to see a drop each time I stepped on the scale. Will that work for everyone? No. For some people it would be one of the worst things they could do. But for me, it worked. And I did primarily only extra kind of exercise - jogging on a tread mill. Would I recommend that as THE way to lose weight to anyone else? Nope. But it worked for me.

As I said, keep trying different things until you find the right one for you. It is not a failure of character if you try several different things and they don't work. It just means you haven't found the one that works for you. Keep trying, you'll find it.

[Sam3]

I would like to second dmann's post. That, in a nutshell, is what works.

My wife has battled weight loss a good portion of her life, two months ago she started a medical weight loss program that her doctor insisted she do. It looks similar to the South Beach diet, in that the first 8 weeks are 800-1000 calories per day, and one must only eat program products. Then the caloric input goes up to 1200-1500. She has to journal every piece of food that enters her mouth, once a week has a meeting with a doctor and they have a group AA-style meetings at the same session. They discuss exercise, meal planning, the reasons for weight gain, the psychology of weight management and so on.

She had back surgery a week after starting the program, so she could not exercise at all, and currently she has lost over 67 pounds by doing this program. She is getting ready to enter phase two, which is the "fit for life" portion, where she will learn how to manage what she eats. She's excited because now her back is healed well enough that she can start exercising, she's already started on the treadmill and will start swimming in January.

Just remember that her program is medically supervised! It grew out of the pre-bariatic surgery procedures.

What dmann said in her post is exactly what my wife was counseled at her meetings. Also, realize that this is a lifestyle change, one has to look at any change as permanent. My wife has told me that she needs to treat this as alcoholism, she will constantly have to fight her tendencies toward food abuse.

I'll have to print off Pam's post so that we have a guide when we go to the Y. It sounds like an excellent plan.

[Ted King]

What Pam said about cardio workouts and weight training is right on. I did make the mistake of relying too much on the tread mill. I have switched to alternating between the treadmill and weight machines. Much better.

[Go To Top]

I am a Loser on South Beach. Easy does it.

[davester]

As expected, most people here recommend essentially the same practices (because they work). I think Pam has the most technically comprehensive description. So, technically you know exactly what to do. There is no mystery here. You can start immediately.

The harder part is doing it. Your body has become used to eating too much and moving too little. It takes perseverance to change that for long enough so that you get used to the new way. From my own experience, here are the keys to "doing it":

1. You need to find an exercise program that is both high intensity/muscle building (walking is not sufficient) and ENJOYABLE. If you view exercise as torture then you will fail. For me this involved team sports. The camaraderie and expectation that everyone will show up makes it much easier to get up and get out there when you might be inclined to blow it off. It also really helps when teammates (or opponents!) tell me I'm improving. If team sports isn't for you, perhaps an exercise dance class, joining a gym with friends, rowing, tennis, etc might do the trick. Group activities that provide peer support/pressure are much easier to maintain than solo activities.

2. You MUST write down and add up everything that goes in your mouth, at least until you've reached a sustainable diet/weight. You will soon find out that fatty sugary snacks and soft drinks are not part of a healthy diet. They need to be banished from your life. It might take a while to get used to a change, but eventually the old diet will seem a ridiculous and not particularly pleasant part of your past. A peer group and system like weightwatchers is your friend here if you can't go it alone.

3. You need to psych yourself up and get excited about starting a new life adventure (Fitness at last!). View it as a project to increase your enjoyment of life and look forward to the changes this experiment will result in. If you view it as drudgery then you are toast.

[freeradical]

Here's a good website for finding out the nutritional content of various foods.

http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/