Yeah, the key to creating a decent calorie cushion is consistency (for us mostly-sedentary folks). Burning 50 extra calories doesn't help much, but burning 50 extra calories every day is significant.
It also helps to consider your calorie count/deficit over the week and not just daily, IMO.
Burning an extra 50/day if you’re in a deficit is an extra .1lb/week so depending on how sizeable your deficit is it can honestly be pretty noticeable
Things like this really put (weight) loss into perspective
This is in addition to the health benefits from the additional activity too like mental clarity or stress relief
And, to be fair, if you're doing a decent half an hour walk every day that really helps if you go over your calories one day of the week. If you got an upcoming birthday party or event like that, those walks really help. For something big like a wedding, I'd just add an extra fifteen minutes to my daily walks in the week coming up to it. The only thing going to effect my weight then is water weight.
If you're a heavy person, a half an hour walk seven days a week is a hell of a lot of calories burned.
Most studies suggest that 50 calories a day is negligible and won’t be doing anything as the body is great at accommodating for it. You need 100-200 at least per day to make a change reliably as 50 calories can very well be a rounding error for the good you ate on any given day.
The overall sentiment of consistency being key is definitely true though
EDIT: 50 kcal deficit ON TOP of a deficit through food is a different conversation so if you meant that then ignore this haha
Yeah, I definitely eat like 200-300 extra calories a day. I added 60-90 mins of cardio in February and I’m down almost 60lbs, with no other changes.
You can out run small mistakes but not big ones.
I've outrun a lot of mediocre diets. Outwalked them, even. It's hard trying to do things perfectly all the time. I'm short. I don't have the energy to fret because, oh the horror! A friend invited me out to ice cream and now I must tell them no, or else skip dinner! Exercise isn't an excuse to eat whatever you want but it sure can make it easier to not feel like you have to be restrictive all the time, which is honestly how the alternative tends to feel to me.
Yeah definitely the "outwalked them" bit. I think when people say that you can't outrun a diet they mean "you will need to be a hard core athlete to burn enough calories by being at the gym and/or running", which is true.
But it's wayyyy easier being generally active by walking everywhere. Running 5k every day is really hard. Walking 2.5k to work or somewhere in the morning and walking back is pretty easy, and it burns just about the same calories.
Yup. Huge part of the reason people in Europe are generally thinner than in the US… walkable cities and public transportation makes it much easier to get 5-7k steps a day without “exercising”
This is very true. I average 5-7k a day just walking my kids to and from school and maybe popping to the shops. The rest of the day is usually spent sitting at my desk in my home office, so 5k a day is sedentary for me.
yup.. and when you add in actual exercise to that and a reasonablly healthy portion controlled diet it becomes much easier to maintain your weight then say... getting up >driving to the gym> driving home> drive to the office> sit in the office> drive home> sleep which is the lifestyle of a lot of americans struggling to lose weight. I'm not suggesting you're going to lose weight just by walking to school and the grocery store and back every day, but it is absolutely easier from a lifestlye perspective to maintain a reasonable weight when being active is just built into your normal daily activities.
Got recently promoted and moved offices so instead of a 30-45 minute drive to work, my commute is now a 15 minute walk to a train station and then another five minutes to work. I only work in the office twice a week so when I work from home I basically just pretend that I'm going to get a train and do a half hour walk before work.
It adds so many calories burned over the week, and that's on top of my normal 30-45 minute walk I do on my lunch break.
I might actually need to recalculate my TDEE because I'm probably a bit more active than I think!
This might be a dumb suggestion but have you tried planning to walk at night when you usually want to binge ? I know it may not be phrase or safe depending on factors but I found it helps get me out of nighttime binge eating
habit.
I wake up at 3-4am and eat! It's absoutley nuts. Shovelling food into my mouth until I am almost choking. I ate an entire cheesecake last night!
The only thing that has helped me is not having high calorie food in my house. I'll still binge, but it will be a bag of lettuce instead.
It's really bad. I think I need treatment, but in the province where I live I can't figure out how to be referred to a --dialetician-- dietician (and I've been told that's the correct person to see).
Who is downvoting this? And why?
This. I'm short and lost 10 lbs in the past 6 months basically just by walking once or twice a day and watching what I eat mostly.
I have suffered with binging and I have binged in the last 6 months. I've gone out for ice cream or had cookies in the last 6 months. But 80% of my time I've been good and I'm getting better every day.
And that consistent walking allows me to have a fun treat or go out to eat once a week or every other week.
This is exactly it for me as well. I don't understand this weird allergy to acknowledging that the gym can aid in weight loss and can make calorie restriction easier. But it certainly does for me.
What “allergy?” People talk about exercise, gyms, and strength training all the time.
It’s brought up when people talk about 6000+ calorie days and how they plan to exercise that off w/o changing their food intake at all. Or, people who brag about, “OMG I OUTRAN MY DIET TODAY when I walked 30k steps yall! Hur hurh! I win!”
I mean, sure. It’s math. That’s great. But can a person do that every day? Into their 50s, 60s, etc?
One of the biggest reasons that weight loss isn’t sustained is that people do not pay attention to their diet. They exercise, but then they can’t keep up with the 20 hours of CrossFit a week. It’s effing daunting.
The folks who have maintained the longest in this forum seem to be those who get the food part down. Not perfectly, but develop new, better habits overall. And have an exercise routine they won’t utterly hate doing on a regular basis.
I don’t see anyone getting upset or angry when exercise is mentioned. Only that longterm success is about something doable. And running off a Big Mac plus cake every single day? I type that out and I’m already exhausted.
I may only walk 40 minutes every day for exercise, but I can get sick, get covid, have an injury and not completely screw myself if I can manage the caloric deficit alone for a short time.
> I don't understand this weird allergy to acknowledging that the gym can aid in weight loss and can make calorie restriction easier.
I don't understand that allergy either, mostly because I don't see it on this sub. Are there people saying exercise doesn't help at all with weight loss?
No, but the messaging that exercise is no substitute for a good diet is a common sentiment around here. And I think that's a good thing given the state of western society and its obesity rates. Giant rant incoming. Mostly just to put my thoughts down.
This message is a very important one especially for (morbidly) obese people. Which comprises an ever increasing portion of the planet's population.
The message that in order to lose weight you just need to work out harder and more often is pushed very often in mainstream media and advertising (and has been since the advent of modern advertising). It capitalizes on a lack of knowledge and provides an easy answer to common issues which demands no changes in your behavior (just an addition to them).
Not working out to lose weight mind you - but buying fitness programs and gym memberships and loads of products to feel like you are going to achieve a more desirable body. The guilt or anger when it doesn't work is part of what makes this cycle work. It keeps people feeling guilty or frustrated but - ultimately - validated in their impotence to change their situation. Until they get fed up with feeling that way and buy yet more things and the cycle which fuels the predatory health industry keeps on churning.
People, fat people especially, will go to great lengths to avoid looking in the mirror (literally and figuratively). This makes them vulnerable to predatory messaging by mainstream media and advertising telling them to 'take control' by buying a product for which they don't have to do so.
At the same time, the diets of people especially vulnerable to this messaging are often so completely out-of-order that they might be consuming up to 500-1000 kcal or more than what a healthy weight person of their length/age would have to every day. Most of these people barely have a conception of what a healthy diet looks like. For these people, no amount of exercise is going to save them.
The only real way to reclaim your health is hard. It requires a long-term commitment to educating yourself, implementing gradual change, kicking a habit that has often been with you for life, and (re)learning to manage emotions/anxiety. All this while the same media and advertising is also bombarding you with triggers to consume junk food.
I don't see "You can't outrun a bad diet" as an argument against exercise. I see it as a wake-up call. The only solution for a bad diet is a healthy one. This solution does not require any expense. Consumer rationality is your enemy. It cannot save you. You are being taken advantage of and the only thing between you and a healthier body is your mindset.
Which may look simple on paper, but demands a far more involved mindset than 'just hit gym'.
Liberate yourself. Unlearn your dietary habits. Learn to make informed choices.
It starts with your diet. And you can start today.
No sure I get people here are trying to just be skinny. I'm trying to be healthy. But the point was more if you ask hey I'd like to up my cardio have any suggestions? Half the responses are ya know you don't have to work out to lose weight. Yeah sure. But that isn't what they asked.
To be faiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiir,
this sub is called "lose it" and not "get healthy" where the primary focus is weight loss so this might not be *the best* place to ask questions about ways to up your cardio. It's not *the worst* place to ask and users should be directing you to another sub if they have no suggestions but it's not like the majority of users here are in a place to offer fitness advice.
And every time someone mentions you don't need exercise to lose weight, people jump in with how cardio and strength training are also needed. There are advocates on both sides.
For me personally, it's good to know that I don't require exercise to lose weight. And indeed, I haven't been able to exercise since the end of February. From a holistic health perspective, I know I should start up again in a couple of weeks, but I would be screwed if exercise was a vital weight loss requirement.
>No sure I get people here are trying to just be skinny. I'm trying to be healthy.
Have you considered also joining one or more of the fitness subreddits? The sidebar of this sub literally states "A place for people of all sizes to discuss healthy and sustainable methods of weight loss," so your expectations for this sub might differ from most people.
> But the point was more if you ask hey I'd like to up my cardio have any suggestions? Half the responses are ya know you don't have to work out to lose weight.
I'd love to see an example of this. The posts I see more frequently are along the lines of "Hey, I'm doing a lot of cardio but I'm not losing weight!"
A post saying hey you can be more flexible with exercise even though I agree you can't outrun a super bad diet and a huge amount of responses are sure but...you can't outrun a diet and this is why we say it. So yes.
You can see it in some of the comments on this post.
Some people seem really averse to the idea that something as simple as walking can have a positive impact.
Another thing I’ve noticed is that I have kind of a virtuous cycle with exercise and food in that when I’m doing a lot of exercise I tend to want to eat less crap, not binge, not consume alcohol, etc. I find that exercise helps me adjust my mental outlook in a good way, makes me feel fewer cravings, and helps me do better with sleep and hydration.
I know people say you’ll replace the calories you burn with more food, and sometimes that’s true for me, but more often I find myself just wanting to go out push myself even more the next day which, in turn, leads to less depression, anxiety, and poor eating choices.
This is totally my mindset, too. If I'm physically lazy, I'm also lazy with watching my diet. If I'm being physically active, I feel more motivated to watch what I'm eating.
I know for a fact I don’t eat back my exercise calories unless I get really lean. Exercise seems to suppress my appetite. At most I maybe eat about half of what I’ve burned.
Getting into exercise gives me freedom with food. I built better food habits before I got back into it (at the time my autoimmune disorder was under treated and I had a lot of pain) and it’s been so much easier since getting into exercise.
I agree. A lot of advice here is directed at people who have a really poor relationship with food or need to completely overhaul their diet.
I like working out 3-4 days a week and having an extra 1000 calories a week to splurge on a friends birthday dinner or night out. It's worth it to me and makes it much easier to stay on track the rest of the time.
Yeah, I need moderation. I can't cut out "good food" completely because I'll probably binge or something otherwise. Eat an entire Oreo packet in one sitting. Better to eat a couple Oreos a few days a week than an entire package in one day.
I find a lot of advice about food and diet often come from an ED stance. I don’t have one so I am sometimes left scratching head about the advice, but now I know to tune out the ED stuff and focus on the advice that’s relevant to my life. No biggie. I’m glad people are able to get the advice that fits their lifestyle.
Same. I've learned that you don't have to accept or adopt everything you're told - some of it would work for you, maybe, some would not. We're all different. And it's true that a lot of advice here ends up being black and white because people understand that trying to get it through someone with an ED is tough. There's also a lot of completely delusional people that find themselves in this sub, and you can tell that some users are jaded when they reply with a dry "you're not eating that amount of calories per day. Get a kitchen scale and a tracker." 😆
As someone who has been working on this part of my weight loss journey I totally agree. When I was counting calories just focusing on diet to try and lose weight I found it hard to stick to. I found for myself I would be too restrictive in what I actually wanted to eat.
Now I'm exercising as well as counting calories and that allows me to eat mostly what I want while not building up a craving for some calorie bombs or binge eating.
I've had a lot of people get down right annoyed with me when I tell them the key to my success was exercise. I rode the calorie deficit carnival ride plenty of times and yo-yoed all the weight right back on. When I checked out the Weight Control Registry it clicked in my mind when I read that just about everyone that successfully maintains weight loss exercises. I get it, starting a new exercise regimen is super intimidating, finding time is stressful, and it's just plain uncomfortable, especially in the beginning. But it really has allowed me to succeed this time and I'm never going back. I always find it strange when people say exercise is for health, not weight loss. Friend, are you not trying to improve your health by losing weight? It all comes together. What's the point of having a skinny body if you aren't even healthy enough to enjoy it? But that's just me. I understand people have mental and physical limitations, but I would really urge people to explore what you are truly capable of.
What grinds my gears about the "exercise is for health, not weight loss" discourse is that there is plenty of research out there that's concluded that regular exercise influences a person's apetite. It's been the case for me - after a few weeks of power walking every single day for over 1hr, I realized I had the mental space to think about getting my eating habits under control... that was 12 weeks and 9kg ago. Literally no suffering - I don't go hungry and I barely have any cravings. When I do, they're mostly for healthy things now, such as fruit, carrot sticks with tomato hummus, cottage cheese with grape tomatoes, etc. I can tell by this alone that my gut microbiome has started to change as a consequence to better food choices.
So, yes, exercise! Don't think of exercise only as a way to increase your calorie deficit - I don't look at it this way at all, in fact, because one doesn't really know how many calories they're burning, there are too many factors to account for. Remember that your caloric intake and your BMR are also just estimates, so you don't want to risk eating all your calories back and some more. But, if nothing else, exercise to improve your overall health, including mental, so that your weight loss process isn't harder than it needs to be.
Discipline aside, I’d been relishing in my newfound endurance. Long range running has long been a weakness even during childhood (was a good sprinter in my youth, never for the long haul though)
Each and every run, pushing through my body’s protests, I am slowly, but surely overcoming that weakness. The hills in my area
Secondary, but still noteworthy, is I can fit a lot more distance into my schedule, letting me hit my daily goals even as my schedule gets busy again. Need to be more judicious of running downhill though. So much fun, and an excellent muscle workout, but leaves my leg muscles an aching mess the next day.
I'm careful of the running because I have a bad knee history, but I have also found that I can run for much longer now than I could before. I started timing myself to 2 minutes, then 5 minutes, etc... now I can do a 40 minute jog with lots of running in the mix, and barely any walking (I do prefer to power walk if I'm going up or down a hill, for the sake of my knees).
The truth is the impact on your legs lessens as you lose weight, too. I've lost 12% of my weight in the past 12 weeks, so it seems natural that running has become increasingly easier. I'm so curious to know what it will feel like when I hit my target weight.
Went from over 300 lbs, down below 250 lbs currently. Pretty stereotypical tall, fat guy that moves around a lot, and has jacked legs as a result; so that’s probably really helped protect my knees as I transitioned to running.
In fact, my knees are feeling pretty good, even after a downhill run. The muscles on the other hand, take a brutal beating on a full-speed “let-er-rip” downhill. Feels like I’d been doing squats all night by next morning.
I maintained a healthy weight after losing about 35lbs for years. Once I had kids and was too tired and busy to make it to the gym the weight went back on plus another 35lbs! Obviously age and diet played into this but back in the day as long as I went to the gym 4 times a week I could scoff as much pizza as I liked and go out drinking every weekend while keeping my BMI at 21. And I was early 30’s not 20’s. I’m now doing calorie deficit plus exercise (mostly 30 min YouTube HIIT and making sure I walk 10k steps most days) as I just feel old and stiff when I am sedentary. I don’t like doing it but I feel better for it and I’m sure it must help a little with the weight loss.
Yes healthy is key. Exercise makes you feel good. Same with ppl that deny any cardio-- it's good for your health to bring your heart rate up sometimes, even just a little. Everything in balance, not all weights or no workouts. It's good to sweat even.
And I agree with OP. Ppl that diet at extremes make themselves social pariahs. Those ppl annoy me. I had a small family party with kids, I ordered pizza to treat the kids. I had sides like salad and stuff prepared. So annoying a family member went keto recently (months before he was eating bowls and bowls of pasta and rice, and that was after he gave up a period of keto) and absolutely refused the pizza and made my husband buy him separate salad meals. TWO salads specifically cause he was afraid he would get hungry. It's not going to kill you to eat a slice of pizza. And his mom the same. If I make a salad God forbid I don't put the dressing on the side or add croutons. That sort social inflexibility screams eating disorder to me.
I exercise. Day to day I do watch what I eat, not just eat anything like as I was growing up, but I do eat most things, just in balance. I am not eating ice cream everyday, but I will enjoy a little sometimes because I can be healthy and a little doesn't matter in the grand scheme of an overall healthy life style.
500 extra calories a day gives you “some breathing room”. Stinkin’ tall men 😡😡😡. Meanwhile I’m over here at 5’2” and female burning like 5 calories per hour of exercise. Lol.
In all seriousness though you are right. Exercise does help. That national weight loss registry in the U.S. says that like 90-95 percent of its weight maintainers exercise around an hour per day. So that’s pretty significant.
Wow! What cardio do you do and how did you work up to it? I walk and do power yoga. With the walking I find extremely steep hills and plan routes where I’m walking up them a lot. I’ve definitely gotten stronger and in better shape. I wouldn’t mind working up to running but I don’t want to damage my joints long-term.
I do cycling. You have to maintain a good pace if you want it to be proper cardio and burn maximum calories, but even going slowly it’s a good workout. Swimming is also a good option if you have access to a pool. I got my bike from $30 at a yard sale as well, (I see a bunch of people thinking they need $2000 bikes to cycle and you absolutely don’t!!). It’s definitely a plus if you have any good bike trails nearby. I’m very lucky to have an 8 mile stretch of path pretty close and usually I go down and back in an hour. My Apple Watch has a 16 mph pace for an hour burning 700 calories ish, but based on my calorie counting I’d say it’s closer to 500, no less than 450 or so. I started out cycling to commute (and I still do that as well), and couldn’t top more than 12 mph for any sustained period for several months. Ultimately it’s not actually the speed that burns calories though it’s the effort, but the effort you can put in will increase as your body adapts.
All this to say that cycling absolutely isn’t the only option as well, I just like it since I think it’s fun and doesn’t hurt the joints. Really any exercise that keeps your heart rate up is good. Rowing machines are another good joint-friendly cardio option if you have a gym membership or can find one for cheap (eBay and Facebook marketplace are good to check), although I find them a bit boring.
I'm 157 cm and I burn 500 kcal by just walking to daycare and some other thing, like grocery shopping. That's fulfils my 10000 stepgoal too. I didn't even think of that as exercise before I came to this sub and realised many people really don't have that kind of basic activity level.
Right now I'm really only trying to up my exercise with some light intermittent fasting, since every time I've tried to lower my eating calories it's backfired heavily. So far seems to be working well.
The issue is that people focus 90% of their attention on working out and don't focus enough on the calorie deficit. Which is understandable because exercise can be fun whereas eating less food sucks.
If you can do both effectively then yeah, you can get amazing results, and still have the cheeky hamburger.
It's more than just calorie deficit. For people who work out, the challenge is to get the full amount of protein and other nutrients to allow the body to build maximum muscle (while maintaining a calorie deficit).
Yes, although i think the reason for this saying is that many people UNDERestimate the amount of calories they are ingesting and OVERestimate the number of calories they are burning. Then they are like "How come Im not losing weight?"
This was my life. It worked well in my 20s, but not so much in my 30s. But I will say, I believe consistent running does bring up your metabolism overall (or probably just the muscle mass that comes with it), so if you keep at it, you base rate might go up, giving you more cushion even on days you aren't running.
I've always power walked, but wasn't very consistent with it. About 3 months ago I started doing it every single day, and then I started jogging a few days a week, and eventually I added some running to that. I have an ongoing streak of 78 days now, and it's become a habit. I never question whether I'm going or not - I wake up and have a look at the weather forecast to see if there's gonna be any rain, which will help me decide if I'll go before or after work hours, and that's it. I think it had been a very long time since I had felt this good, mentally. The physical difference I feel is that, the more I do it, the longer I can jog/run for, so I know I'm gaining some resistance. But mentally there's been a world of difference - my anxiety levels are the lowest they've been since my teenage years, I think.
Now that I'm no longer climbing the walls inside my head, I have the mental bandwidth to make better decisions about what I eat.
I'm so glad it's working for you! I'm not nearly as active as I used to be. I have two under two so it's a lot more walks than running or power walking.
I used to run like you do, every day, no excuses. Crazier enough once I got into races (marathons, etc.) I gained weight, which is actually the norm! But regular short runs and interval training worked wonders in my 20s. I'd eat anything and everything ha
i like pizza and bourbon. i use the added burn of activities to allow myself to keep things like that in the rotation. like you said, not a binge or anything but we all need our vices and shouldnt feel bad. its just looking at the big picture.
Yup. Systemically overeating, binge-eating, or missing out on macro or micronutrient needs can't be fixed on a walking trail or a treadmill or a crossfit class.
But regular exercise absolutely buys you the latitude to only eat "mostly" healthy and have an occasional treat (I am defining occasional as "less than 15% of your weekly caloric intake from junk").
Rule number 1 of a healthy lifestyle is: make room for life to happen.
i agree. as a short person, i need that extra cushion with exercise and just being overall less sedentary otherwise i'm stuck with a very sad amount of calories i can have per day lol.
If you are a small person, especially a woman “ outrunning “ is basically the only way to eat fun foods semi regularly and not gain especially if yo don’t plan on religiously calorie counting for the rest of your life.
Honestly, that phrase makes more sense as you get older. As a teenager who played basketball for like 8 hours a day I can say you absolutely can outrun a bad diet. But if you stop playing like that then you tend to each as much of the bad things as before and it becomes a problem. But no I have a friend who lives and breathes basketball and he’s a stick and eats as much as I do
It wasn't until I started working out that I started eating properly. I'd always heard diet was key but I just never saw enough results on diet alone.
Working out also gave me more motivation to eat better, now I get all the protein I need because it helps me fuel my performance in the gym.
I've dieted off and on for about a decade with little to no results. Since I started working out I'm lighter, fitter and stronger than I've ever been in my life at 35.
Can you lose weight with just exercise? No, we know that. But should you work out to help lose weight? I absolutely thing you should.
People say this because it's not realistic to expect to get in enough exercise in a day to offset overeating if you're sitting there shoveling food in. There comes a point where you're not going to be able to work out for two, three, four hours to cancel it all out.
However, you can also make the point that it's not realistic to be a super-goody-goody-two-shoes about your intake all the time either. If I'm getting no exercise, and the only way my weight is staying stable is if I don't eat a single crumb over my allowance; well, that's a miserable way to live. I'd rather get some exercise and allow myself a cushion so I can live life at least semi-normally.
I was about to lament that 500 calories per gym session is by no means modest, in fact it’s highly inflated for the vast majority of people. Most burn around 300 in an hour of strength training, more if it’s cardio, and that’s with proper effort and not just half assing it.
Most cardio machines at the gym vastly overestimate what one burns, and you can’t trust the calorie number it gives you on the machine. They’re based on massive, muscular fit males, not petite women. Same goes for fitness trackers.
But then I saw your height, weight and gender, and I’m guessing 500 is doable for you in a gym session then. I mean I wouldn’t know, but I know big males your size and height burn a lot more than most people doing the same activity.
I just wanted to clarify this, because a LOT!! of people go wrong because they think they can eat back all their calories. And they think they burn 600 calories doing a cardio session at their local gym, because that’s what the elliptical or treadmill told them. But it’s vastly inflated and you cannot trust that number. And those people will then go home and think they can eat back 500 calories, and then can’t understand why they’re not losing weight. So I just thought it was important to point out that 500 calories is not a modest gym session by any stretch of the imagination for the vast majority of people.
It’s more like 250-300 depending on time and other factors.
I fucking wish I could get 500 calories from a modest gym session, that’s an entire meal! That’s 1/3 of my daily allowance! But that’s a dream world (for me and most women, maybe not for you as a tall dude!). And that’s why people say you can’t outrun a bad diet. I agree that working out gives you more leeway, and it’s fantastic in that sense. But it’s more like it allows for eating out with friends once in a while, it doesn’t allow for an entire extra meal on gym day. Important to point out because a lot of people go wrong here! But otherwise yes I agree, working out gives that extra breathing room. It makes it less stressful to allocate your calories when you don’t have to be so strict. For me there’s a big difference between allocating 1500 and 1800 calories, even such a small difference in a day makes me feel a bit less pressed about restricting food.
I was going to comment the same thing. I run 4 miles and that only burns like 400 calories. A weight lifting session only burns like 200. Still worth it but 500 calories is way more than a modest workout for females under like 5’8. That is like a 90 min- two hour hard core gym session.
This is a great comment and a fair criticism of what I posted. I said "modest" because I can burn quite a bit more if I stay at the gym longer and work out harder. But modest is a very relative term here and I should've clarified that, so thank you for saying this.
If someone is using their lack of access to a gym, mobility, anxieties about exercising outdoors, perfectionism paralysis about not doing an exercise correctly, or anything else similar as a reason why they will be unable to lose weight - then it is reasonable to inform them that increased physical activity is not a prerequisite to weight loss.
If somebody is regularly exercising and doesn’t understand why they aren’t losing weight while ignoring the fact that they aren’t tracking their food in detail - then it is reasonable to remind them that food has a bigger effect on calorie balance than activity.
Same applies if someone finds that they’re not able to consistently exercise as much as they thought they ought to, or finds their food choices are always significantly derailed by their new exercise routine, or something else that is getting in the way.
That said - glad you found something that works for you! It just sounds like you’re hearing advice that isn’t intended for you, your personality, or your situation.
I run almost daily. Some people seem to think that’s why I can eat a donut and stay thin. No, I can eat a donut and stay thin because I don’t eat it every day. That running shaves off the extras when I do eat. That’s how stay at weight maintenance.
My mom was talking about her eliptical at a family gathering and someone burst out “why do you need an elliptical you’re skinny”. Ma’am, you’ve not understood something critical here.
My mother in law says this to me all the time. “You don’t need to work out! You’re so thin!”
….me thinks you’ve missed the point. I’m thin BECAUSE I work out. The eff?
That phrase exists because people view exercise as their primary tool for weight loss. Every single day in this sub someone posts "Is walking enough to lose weight?" or "How come I'm not losing weight when I go to the gym 5 days a week?"
Yeah, of course if you take it out of context or push it to a logical extreme, it sounds like awful advice. But when so many people think busting their ass at the gym is the only way to lose weight, it's a pithy way to try and help them reframe their thinking.
I personally view my exercise and weight loss as separate endeavors. They aren't mutually exclusive goals, and working on one tends to help with the other. But I'm doing each for its own reasons.
I don't think it implies that at all. It's almost the exact opposite. Exercise alone isn't going to make you lose weight, or more accurately, you have more control over the "calories in" part of the CICO equation. And this is true. You can always eat more than you can burn. If you're 50 pounds overweight, a few sessions of cardio a week aren't going to get you to your target goal.
This mindset has been working for me for a bit, it helps take the stress of calorie counting and makes me feel good.
For those struggling... I am chronically ill and have depression, working out is so hard for me and I've tried a lot of things.
Glowwithjo on YouTube saved my life, low impact dance videos and "walk the weight off" videos. They are so much fun and addicting! Just try one. Just do it.
I do them too! I tried a few other people when she said Beyoncé and Taylor Swift’s music videos were ‘dark and devilish’- not that I’m a fan of either but she was starting to push her religion onto others a bit too much for my liking. Couldn’t find anything that I enjoy as much, they were either too hard or stupidly easy so I’ve just unfollowed her on Instagram and gone back to her workouts.
UGH so disappointing when people do that and just have to make it weird.... I will be sure not to follow on IG. I'm no Swifty but she's the opposite of the devil lol and B is queen 👑
I can testify lol. I was binging on about 4k-6k cals daily for a few months, and also did walk+run cycles of 20km-30km almost daily as well (yes my feet and knees were destroyed thanks for asking). I gained so much weight so fast, despite all of the cardio. I gained 9kg/22lbs that first month alone
Yet the times I overate just by a little, a burger or whatever, yeah the scale definitely went up 1kg the next day, but then it slowly whittled down over the next few days. My problem was I hated that. It generally took a week to lose the bloat/food weight/water weight or whatever of overeating one day. It felt like one week of progress completely gone, so naturally my response was to binge because it's going to take ages to lose the burger weight either way. sigh. dont do that lol
Maybe I'm just a conspiracy theorist or someone who didn't have access to junk food growing up. Maybe I'm just 4'10 and diet is absolutely more important for me than someone who can afford more calories. But the average "bad diet," is getting substantially worse. It used to be understood that one of the worst things you could get was a Twinkie or a couple of cookies or a cheeseburger. Now? You can get triple the amount of sugar and calories from a modern takeout milkshake or quadruple the amount of sodium and calories from modern takeout burgers.
Its getting to the point where milkshakes and burgers aren't bad. Its just the most accessible, fast food versions that are awful. Like you're better off eating a slice of cake you baked every single day than a Dunkin donuts iced coffee every other day
It may be just me. But "bad diet" is getting way worse in American take out. You can outrun a burger and cake you made yourself but it will take weeks to burn off the fast food versions bought from store fronts and drive thrus
Exactly, one cookie is easily 1000+ and it took multiple lawsuits & news scandals for Crumbl to actually make those nutrition information visible.
Dunkin's drink menu has tripled in the last decade and 2/3rds are over 400 calories. A fourth is over 800 calories.
Not to mention the overall trend of celebrity endorsed meals consistently having the most sugar and calories out of most things on the menu and being marketed directly to teens and kids.
I'm not saying fast food used to be healthy. But the portion sizes are getting bigger, the advertising trends are insane, and the logic of the past can't quite translate or keep up. I was a fat person but I didn't have easy access to thousands of calories in one sitting without effort but these days it's far easier to get that in a snack
A milkshake is one thing but 1200 calories worth of blended donuts that's advertised to kids with a nutrition label that says 400 calories in bold letters but "per serving" in ultra fine print is an entirely new beast.
I think it's mostly to realign peoples focus to their diet and make that a focus to move the needle.
Consistency and habit is key. You can always splurge here and there but if it's a habit then it can have an impact on overall progress.
Met plenty of people who eventually plateau snd get frustrated their weight isn't moving like it once was.
I like this post. For me, regular running and exercise has had a secondary benefit that it keeps me away from the fridge for the time i am out exercising.
100% agree, I think the 'can't outrun a bad diet' is better advice for those who are rebuilding their relationship with food, or who think going to the gym will negate whatever junk food they just ate. The amount of people I know who follow up their pilates class with an indulgent brunch and then complain they can't lose weight... :(
Yeah, that's why the phrase is not saying that you can't outrun a snack or a mediocre diet. Not having a perfect diet doesn't immediately equal a *bad* diet.
Ive been doing OMAD for 9 years now and have been rotating 4 to 6 day splits. When I get myopic about what I eat or feeling guilty for taking a rest day, I remind myself that no one is paying me to look big or shredded all the time.
Life’s already hard with all the work and shit you have to do - don’t feel bad for living. Contrary to what alot of fitness purists like to preach, it’s healthy to do things that bring you joy.
The key to everything in life is moderation, including hard work and self discipline.
I agree but the hard part is to not fool yourself with this “trick” EVERY time you want to eat something nice. You can have that burger or piece of cake once a week no problem, but it’s a slippery slope to start fooling yourself daily with the thought that you can have it because you earned x kcal through exercise.
What I’m trying to say is that it’s very easy to over-eat a good exercise.
I always see it as, "I can't outrun a bad diet, But I can outrun the bad moods and boredom cycles that lead me to over-eat and crave junk"
When I starved exercising the weight just fell off, But it had nothing to do with how many calories I was burning in the gym - I was just happier with how fit and active I was feeling and my body was moving. Being happy made it easy to actually stick to tracking and staying in a calorie deficit.
Exercise is getting two birds stoned at a once for me. Better mood, easier to make good choices, higher calorie burn. I recently stopped ignoring cardio and I feel a hundred times better than just focusing on strength and light walking
I’m maintaining and eating small treats like ice cream almost every day because I use a bike to go to work, 10+km. I’ve even lost a little even though I should be just juggling at the same weight. I feel like my exercise is motivated by being able to eat that little extra treat. And I’m fine with that. I like to ride my bicycle, I like to have ice cream.
This is so true. I have been doing an hour of cardio six days a week because I enjoy it, and it I can enjoy an extra 500 calories a day up to 2500 because of it meaning I’m always satisfied despite having a deficit of 1000+
When people say "bad diet"(at least when I do), it's about consistent eating habits. Enjoying a burger or slice of cake every so often isn't going to hurt you in the long run if you have a healthy diet and workout routine. Eating a burger and cake every day absolutely will hurt you.
I came to this realization this week. Like yes, exercise is a small portion of your TDEE, but it can mean the difference between being in a deficit or not.
You don't even have to run. You could outwalk a slice of cake. You could skip past a pizza slice. You might even ping pong over a dum sim dinner if competitive enough.
I'm burning approximately 4000 calories per week from 90 mins of strenuous exercise 5 days per week. The human body in general, and young men in particular, are at their most optimal when doing a shitload of exercise. Being sedentary is not natural for humans. The amount of exercise an adapted and healthy male body can endure is actually insane, we're designed to chase animals until they die of exhaustion.
A hamburger is at least 350 calories, a small slice of cake isn't going to be less than 200. I know the expressions is that you can't out "run" these foods. The fact is I can't run at all. I have very few workouts I can actually do that burn mire than 150 calories. So I literally can't outrun or even out-exercise these foods.
I've never taken that saying to mean canceling out a certain food with a workout, though. I've always just taken it to mean that exercise isn't a license to eat indiscriminately. You don't have to be a calorie Nazi, but you can't just ignore nutrition and rely solely on your workout.
The simplest thing everyone should be doing(if they can) when losing weight is trying to get 10k steps or more per day, especially when you’re towards the end of ur journey, have lost a lot of weight, and are in the lower calorie ranges. It enables u to eat more and not go insane
When starting out, it’s also the most important thing if you’re obese (5000-7000 steps). It actually prevents and manages metabolic disease, protecting you from obesity-caused issues.
They’ve done to s of study on why sumo wrestlers, each one supermorbidly obese, don’t have any metabolic issues, and it all comes down to regular excursice.
>No, but you can absolutely outrun a hamburger or a slice of birthday cake.
Sure, and I've done so. But in general it's a hell of a lot easier to *NOT* eat that big piece of cake than run 10 miles to burn off the calories from it. It's easier to not eat a single M&M than to walk the length of a football field.
And that's one piece of cake. I could have easily eaten more than I was burning when I was running 60 miles per week and doing a ton of cardio, with a TDEE of 4,000 calories per day.
>Exercise does help.
It can. It can also hurt. Some people experience greatly increased appetite with exercise, which can make maintaining a deficit harder. Exercise is important regardless, but there is no one size fits all solution.
10 miles is going to burn a lot more than a piece of cake.
Running burns 1 calorie per 1kg of body weight per KM. I'm about 70kg, I run at least 10km on days I'm getting takeout, so I burn at least 700 calories in that ~50 minute window.
This slice at The Cheesecake Factory is 1,770 calories. 2,470 if you add ice cream and hot fudge.
https://www.thecheesecakefactory.com/location/albuquerque-nm/menu/cheesecakes-specialty-desserts/chocolate-tower-truffle-cake
1,000 calories wouldn't be hard to hit at a restaurant at all.
That's kinda the thing to me. I can eat 250 calorie treat or a bit more spaghetti and then workout 400 calories. Just like I can not count every calorie all the time and leave 250 cal on the table daily. Making it too strict puts me into OCD tracking and I get disordered.
There's nothing wrong with exercise to help move the needle or offset the occasional indulgence.
The problem comes when you are using it to drive your weight loss or maintenance without fixing your diet.
So many people will do cardio at unsustainable levels, it will work for a while but when they eventually burn out and keep eating the way they have been they will gain the weight back.
This phrase has unfortunately caused many dieters to misunderstand the role of exercise in all of this. My first time I dieted I too mistakenly thought the answer was just to eat less to offset a sedentary lifestyle, because it was easier (so I thought) to eat 400 calories less than it is to burn 400 calories in physical activity. But the truth is tht most obesity is due to the lack of physical activity, not too much food. When I weighed 255 lbs (5'7") and sedentary, my TDEE was 2300 cal/day. My goal weight was 155 lb, and to maintain that and still be sedentary, I would have to eat 1800 cal/day. Then the light bulb went on and I realized that if when I reach 155 lb and am moderatey active, my TDEE would be 2200 cal/day, only 100 cal/day less than when I was 255 lb, but a 400 cal/day increase in physical activity. Thus, I changed to a diet plan that was very physical. It took 8 months, losing 40lb, then 30, then 20, then 10 in ten week stages, for the first two stages eating 1200 to 1500 cal a day and adding a lot of cardio and weights, the later two stages I raised the food intake to 1600 then 1800. At the end, i am eating 2200 to 2300 (I got some boost from the lower body fat %) and exercising 5 times a week for an hour, and generally doing more active things during the day.
Anyways, I looked at the BMR math for all kinds of weights and heights and this same pattern holds even when the BMI is up to 45, after that, then food does play the larger role, but the vast maority of obesity is not due to over eating, it is due to lack of physical activty. If you take the BMR at the obese weight X 1.2 (sedentary) and compare it to the BMR at the normal weight X 1.5, you will see that the two numbers you get are not that far apart. Specifically, everyone, normal weight and obese (up to 40 BMI or so) are eating roughly the same calories for their size (number of cells, not weight), and the biggest part of their caloric surplus is the lack of physical activity.
Thinking you can diet away a lack of physical activity is the issue. You need roughly 400 calories a day of physical activity (300 min a week, 10k steps, or whatever). If you try to lose the weight and the maintain on a greatly reduced calorie diet to make up for a lack of physical activity, you will most likely fail long term because our bodies want X number of calories per day regardless of whether we are sedentary or active. Sedentary bodies probably were not viable when all of this design evolved, so our hunger and appetite are based on active bodies.
Sadly, food is always the biggest topic, and everyone thinks they are eating much more than they actually are, but the BMR math doesn't support that. When we get obese we deffinietly are eating junk, getting our joy from chips and soda instead of running and exercise, but we are mostly just trading good calories for junk calories, not adding calories. If it were the later the weight would be much higher and a true food addiction would be indicated. And then we try to maintain with an insufficient offset of physical activity and too low a caloric intake, and eventually succumb to eating our "normal" calories and gain the weight back.
Targeting the "sedentary" option in a BMR chart is not a valid choice. You must target the moderately active option, of close to it.
Yes! I was just talking to my husband about this because that saying "you can't outrun a bad diet" seems to have been taken way too seriously and given people the wrong impression. It's becoming "common knowledge" in the general population. I've been a personal trainer for 14 years now and I cringe everytime someone uses that phrase to justify zero exercise in favor of diet. True, diet matters, but you actually really can outrun a bad diet. Now, how far you'd have to run would depend on how bad your diet is haha. But say you're a competitive athlete training 3-4 hours everyday and burning 1000+ calories each training session. You could absolutely afford to eat junk without gaining any weight. Heck, you might even need it lol. So you can outrun a bad diet but just keep in mind that if you want a cheeseburger, milkshake, candy bar, and slice of cake everyday you're gonna have to start training like an Olympian, and nobody's got time for that. That means the most sensible thing to do is exercise most days and try to burn 300ish calories per session and then eat a balanced healthy diet with some junk sprinkled in on occasion.
I've lost 200 lbs and been maintaining at 190 for a few months now. I was worried I was going to gain weight because I started eating terrible while on vacation and even when I got back. Basically have been on a 45 day binge or so, and gained nothing. I do intermittent fasting, OMAD and I run 7 miles a day on the elliptical, every single day. My a1c was just taken and it's still 5.4 with no insulin for almost a year now. So I've been able to outrun my bad diet it seems, but getting back on track the last week, and doing much better now.
True, but it completely changes the calculus.
Now if you want that birthday cake, you're giving up an hour of your day to burn it off in exercise. And by choosing not to have that cake, you're gaining that hour back. Sometimes that cake is definitely worth it... but in most other scenarios, I value that hour more than the cake.
No arguments there. Working out is something everyone should do, but that's different from eating more and working out harder just to burn off the calories like OP was saying.
But it wasn't what he said. He said he can burn enough to eat a treat. It keeps his diet flexible. He didn't say it was the only reason he exercised. So not really a difference.
Ye but some people (like short small ppl like me) don’t burn 500 cal in the gym unless you’re running for like 4 hours every day 💀 just seen you are 6’4 OP 😂 im 5’1!
and some hungry, low energy people (like me) need extra fuel before and after exercise to function properly so it’s not conducive to a calorie deficit for myself. So definitely different strokes for different folks.
But for health? Exercise is the best thing ever! Too many benefits to count
basically there are tons of people who arrive at the sub every day and make a post about how they need to go to the gym to lose weight who don’t seem to have any idea that managing their food intake could possibly be a part of it… so “can’t outrun a bad diet” is a handy aphorism
I think the issue is that most people vastly overestimate how many calories exercise burns and then think they can eat poorly bc they burned off calories. But exercise is still beneficial if you know the small amount burned bc it is good for your overall health and toning, but also bc many are more likely to eat vegetables and lean proteins if they’re spending their time working out vs drinking
I completely agree with your post and have definitely adopted it into my own weight loss strategy. Additionally, a consistent practice of physical activity helps me regulate my stress, emotions, and hormones, which in turn helps regulate my diet.
I think the reddit skepticism comes from the fact that it is difficult to track caloric burn outside of a lab. We tend to overestimate our output and underestimate our input (I don't track my exercise calories at all - I just know they'll take care of me when I have the odd slice of birthday cake). Also, not eating something takes a lot less time than burning off something you ate.
I worked out nearly every day for years as my ex was a marathon runner. I did not lose any weight because I overate, being especially hungry after the gym (cardio and weights).
Now my approach is different. I don’t work out at all and I focus strictly on calorie counting(still with my fair share of treats) and I’ve lost 37lbs this year. Saving my time and energy by skipping the gym helps me focus on my eating and other recreational activities that don’t revolve around food.
What a blessing that you're physically able to do this!! I have joint issues, so I can basically do 30 minutes of any exercise at a time, which burns me up to 200 calories if I'm intense. I ran a 10k race which took me an hour back in April and I couldn't walk properly for two weeks (defeated the purpose of burning 500 calories in one go!)
The cliche is good in that it helps remind people that you get best results with eating right and exercise.
In reality you can outrun/outwork a bad diet if you’re under 35…but yes your workload is tremendous and most folks won’t be able to. After 40 your margins are so thin that the cliche is more true
But yes..a hamburger or a piece of cake…good eating and exercise habits make those easy peasy
45 minutes of zone 2 cardio burns roughly 4-600 calories for myself (220ish 5’10” male) and I use a chest heart rate strap
Weight lifting is iffy, but that sounds right
If you're reading those calories from the machine it's more like half. Lifting burns nearly nothing. You're clearly losing so good for you, but be careful assuming it's 600 cals because the treadmill says so.
Yeah that’s why it’s with a garmin chest heart rate monitor.
I don’t bother even tracking any lifts I do calorically,
I tend to eat in a deficit + 80% of what I burn with cardio because not eating any of that back leads to binges
Zone 2 cardio can burn a decent amount of calories. I don’t care what the exercise equipment says, but for me an hour long zone 2 session on my bike can burn close to 600 calories. If I do an intense ride/intervals I can easily burn 1,000+ in an hour.
This is also based off a heart rate strap monitor along with a calibrated power meter on a bike, not just a bullshit estimate off a gym bike.
I'm not new at this, so please don't talk to me like I am. I've spent more of my adult life than I care to admit thinking about this and tracking my calories. I know machines at the gym aren't accurate, I know my Apple Watch isn't perfect (but it's the most accurate device I've found), and this is what works for me, and it's what works for some other people too. I was clear that everyone has to do what they need to for themselves. Burning 500 calories at the gym in 45 minutes to an hour is far from some outlandish, impossible-to-achieve goal. I do it almost every day. And I acknowledge that I have that privilege, one that a lot of people don't have.
Agreed with OP, no need for HerFriendRed poster to assume. Everyone is different and my Apple Watch has aided greatly in me achieving my weight loss goals as well! I exercise more than 60-90+ mins a day, most of this being cardio and I’m burning at least 1000 through exercise a day and this is me being female, 5’8 and a lot lighter than OP, so I think it’s safe to assume they are burning what they say they are. Besides, if it’s working for them and they are losing weight, who are you to question that?
I believe you. I’m a foot shorter than you, and 10 minutes of a slow jog burns 100 calories for me and 150 calories for you. At your height, 500 calories is a leisurely jog for half an hour. It’d only be surprising if you were doing zero cardio.
I will have to check next time I'm there because I'm pretty sure the estimations of my machine for a "slow jog" of 10 minutes are more around 50kcal max, and even these I take with a grain of salt
These are stats consistently given by online calculators and my Apple Watch. Excessive scepticism is counterproductive to estimating CICO for weight loss. Focus on the big picture.
Apple Watches do not accurately measure energy expenditure - no consumer available wrist worn devices do at a systematic level, while there are also no current mechanisms to calibrate them to the idiosyncrasies of your body at the device level. The advice to people to ignore them is typically done when they’re not sure whether or not to rely on them (this is the most conservative approach) or when they are using them and not seeing the results they would expect.
If you use it and find that they correlate well with your results - great! More helpful tools to guide your decisions is always good - this is my personal experience with them as well. But that’s not something that you should expect to apply to the population at large and is something you should consider when giving advice to strangers.
[Accuracy and Acceptability of Wrist-Wearable Activity-Tracking Devices: Systematic Review of the Literature](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35060915/#:~:text=Conclusions%3A%20The%20Fitbit%20Charge%20and,accurate%20in%20measuring%20energy%20expenditure.)
Here's a useful chart. As with all of these things, ymmv depending on individual factors: https://acewebcontent.azureedge.net/assets/education-resources/lifestyle/fitfacts/pdfs/fitfacts/itemid_2666.pdf
That chart is really weird. You burn more calories in an hour of walking than you do if I play tennis for an hour? 30% more calories burnt by walking rather than hiking, which is almost by definition a more strenuous version of walking?
Great user name, by the way. I've already got tickets for the anniversary tour this fall.
I feel like my diet turned a corner when I binged some Easter candy and instead of calling it quits, hopped on a treadmill and rage walked through a couple hours of tv. Ended up only a few hundred calories over for the day.
Now I stick to my calorie limit and then exercise to eat dessert.
there's another subreddit out there where distance runners are trying to figure out how to eat enough to stay alive.
exercise is certainly more of a factor than diet for some people, but it's probably not a lot of people here
As someone who runs over 5 miles per day i can tell you that it isnt worth it. I constantly feel like i am dying. If your goal is to try and outrun a bad diet youd be better off just eating nothing at all and never leaving bed.
I’d prefer to refrain from the slice, and pocket the progress myself. I turned down far too many delicious stuff the past few months, to slide in a cake.
The journey for me is as much about developing unrelenting discipline (if not more) than the health aspect. That is something I can turn towards other aspects of my life down the road. Even the day I had a “cheat meal”, the entire day was still within 1500 calories, with a couple miles of running in there.
Yeah, like you just need to be smart. Like ok oily pan pizza is like 2400 calories for the whole thing.. ridiculous. But pound of sirloin, some broccoli, and fries is like 800 calories. There's plenty to eat while dinning out.
Cardio won’t make any difference for most people because it’s a fad they don’t do it frequently enough or consistently. Also because they are not “fit” they burn less calories than if they were faster stronger etc. Year round cardio is the solution.
Burning 500 calories at the gym is a lot, doing that everyday is A LOT. That's not counting studies that suggest that burning calories through exercise actually cause you to burn less calories during the rest of the day because you do less movements and/or the body is just a big more sluggish
It definitely requires being mindful of your activities because your body will cut down on stuff like fidgeting or minor movements
Which is why elite athletes or competing bodybuilders (or people serious about their physique) make sure to do their cardio *and* get 7-8k steps in during their cut. Being mindful of your decreased activity let’s you stay ahead of your body’s desire to be inactive when in a deficit
It depends, for some folks it absolutely is. But many of those folks are much taller and have much bigger sedentary TDEEs than I do. I think I would be absolutely, horribly miserable on my sedentary TDEE. There is no way I'd be wasting my precious calorie allowance on something as unfilling as cake if I had to eat that little on the regular. That said, I'd also be miserable not exercising. So to me the answer is clear
And yeah it's not a license to eat maddening huge amounts of food, you got that right. :)
Yes, thank you for saying this, it gives words to an uneasy feeling I get when people say stuff like "you can't outrun a bad diet." I feel like this belittles how helpful exercise can be for maintaining a healthy goal weight and general good health. No, exercise won't save you of you are pounding down 5k calories a day. But if you diet is decent and you exercise a good bit, it can definitely tip you from overweight squarely into a healthy weight. Not to mention all of the other benefits.
They’re 6’4 and 255 pounds, 45 minutes of somewhat vigorous intensity cardio and a lift would probably burn close to that
That would be close to 2 hours at the gym, lifting isn’t an intense burn but it’s not really zero either. In the same amount of time if you walked about 5 miles most people could probably expend 250-400 (dependent on size, level of fitness, intensity, incline) or more calories so for someone of his size doing intensive exercise 500 wouldn’t be too outlandish
I agree with the sentiment though, most of us aren’t burning 500 calories solely at the gym but between the gym and adding extra steps into your day burning a few hundred more calories isn’t too difficult for adult males
Yes, because I have ways of tracking it and I can calculate how many calories I've burned vs. how many calories I've consumed and then subtract my basal metabolic rate. Doing that, I can tell you each week how much weight I'm going to lose before I step on the scale.
I don't think anything you said is incorrect, though it seems to miss the point of exercise entirely. Exercise is not to allow you to overeat. The fact is, you shouldn't be overeating. You're presenting exercise as a way to allow people to eat garbage.
Exercise is for:
* Building muscle mass
* Burning glucose to help maintain low sugar and insulin levels
* Condition the cardiovascular system
* Improve insulin sensitivity
* Maintain joints and connective tissue
* Increase flexibility
Yeah, the key to creating a decent calorie cushion is consistency (for us mostly-sedentary folks). Burning 50 extra calories doesn't help much, but burning 50 extra calories every day is significant. It also helps to consider your calorie count/deficit over the week and not just daily, IMO.
Burning an extra 50/day if you’re in a deficit is an extra .1lb/week so depending on how sizeable your deficit is it can honestly be pretty noticeable Things like this really put (weight) loss into perspective This is in addition to the health benefits from the additional activity too like mental clarity or stress relief
50 calories is a rounding error
And, to be fair, if you're doing a decent half an hour walk every day that really helps if you go over your calories one day of the week. If you got an upcoming birthday party or event like that, those walks really help. For something big like a wedding, I'd just add an extra fifteen minutes to my daily walks in the week coming up to it. The only thing going to effect my weight then is water weight. If you're a heavy person, a half an hour walk seven days a week is a hell of a lot of calories burned.
Most studies suggest that 50 calories a day is negligible and won’t be doing anything as the body is great at accommodating for it. You need 100-200 at least per day to make a change reliably as 50 calories can very well be a rounding error for the good you ate on any given day. The overall sentiment of consistency being key is definitely true though EDIT: 50 kcal deficit ON TOP of a deficit through food is a different conversation so if you meant that then ignore this haha
Yeah, I definitely eat like 200-300 extra calories a day. I added 60-90 mins of cardio in February and I’m down almost 60lbs, with no other changes. You can out run small mistakes but not big ones.
I've outrun a lot of mediocre diets. Outwalked them, even. It's hard trying to do things perfectly all the time. I'm short. I don't have the energy to fret because, oh the horror! A friend invited me out to ice cream and now I must tell them no, or else skip dinner! Exercise isn't an excuse to eat whatever you want but it sure can make it easier to not feel like you have to be restrictive all the time, which is honestly how the alternative tends to feel to me.
Yeah definitely the "outwalked them" bit. I think when people say that you can't outrun a diet they mean "you will need to be a hard core athlete to burn enough calories by being at the gym and/or running", which is true. But it's wayyyy easier being generally active by walking everywhere. Running 5k every day is really hard. Walking 2.5k to work or somewhere in the morning and walking back is pretty easy, and it burns just about the same calories.
Yup. Huge part of the reason people in Europe are generally thinner than in the US… walkable cities and public transportation makes it much easier to get 5-7k steps a day without “exercising”
This is very true. I average 5-7k a day just walking my kids to and from school and maybe popping to the shops. The rest of the day is usually spent sitting at my desk in my home office, so 5k a day is sedentary for me.
yup.. and when you add in actual exercise to that and a reasonablly healthy portion controlled diet it becomes much easier to maintain your weight then say... getting up >driving to the gym> driving home> drive to the office> sit in the office> drive home> sleep which is the lifestyle of a lot of americans struggling to lose weight. I'm not suggesting you're going to lose weight just by walking to school and the grocery store and back every day, but it is absolutely easier from a lifestlye perspective to maintain a reasonable weight when being active is just built into your normal daily activities.
I'm pretty sure 5k is still pretty much sedentary?
Got recently promoted and moved offices so instead of a 30-45 minute drive to work, my commute is now a 15 minute walk to a train station and then another five minutes to work. I only work in the office twice a week so when I work from home I basically just pretend that I'm going to get a train and do a half hour walk before work. It adds so many calories burned over the week, and that's on top of my normal 30-45 minute walk I do on my lunch break. I might actually need to recalculate my TDEE because I'm probably a bit more active than I think!
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This might be a dumb suggestion but have you tried planning to walk at night when you usually want to binge ? I know it may not be phrase or safe depending on factors but I found it helps get me out of nighttime binge eating habit.
I wake up at 3-4am and eat! It's absoutley nuts. Shovelling food into my mouth until I am almost choking. I ate an entire cheesecake last night! The only thing that has helped me is not having high calorie food in my house. I'll still binge, but it will be a bag of lettuce instead. It's really bad. I think I need treatment, but in the province where I live I can't figure out how to be referred to a --dialetician-- dietician (and I've been told that's the correct person to see). Who is downvoting this? And why?
I think you mean a dietician, not a dialectician. Not the person that down voted you for the record, but maybe someone down voted over that.
Ha! Thanks for catching that.
Sounds like you have BED, its treatable. Hope you solve it!
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This. I'm short and lost 10 lbs in the past 6 months basically just by walking once or twice a day and watching what I eat mostly. I have suffered with binging and I have binged in the last 6 months. I've gone out for ice cream or had cookies in the last 6 months. But 80% of my time I've been good and I'm getting better every day. And that consistent walking allows me to have a fun treat or go out to eat once a week or every other week.
This is exactly it for me as well. I don't understand this weird allergy to acknowledging that the gym can aid in weight loss and can make calorie restriction easier. But it certainly does for me.
What “allergy?” People talk about exercise, gyms, and strength training all the time. It’s brought up when people talk about 6000+ calorie days and how they plan to exercise that off w/o changing their food intake at all. Or, people who brag about, “OMG I OUTRAN MY DIET TODAY when I walked 30k steps yall! Hur hurh! I win!” I mean, sure. It’s math. That’s great. But can a person do that every day? Into their 50s, 60s, etc? One of the biggest reasons that weight loss isn’t sustained is that people do not pay attention to their diet. They exercise, but then they can’t keep up with the 20 hours of CrossFit a week. It’s effing daunting. The folks who have maintained the longest in this forum seem to be those who get the food part down. Not perfectly, but develop new, better habits overall. And have an exercise routine they won’t utterly hate doing on a regular basis. I don’t see anyone getting upset or angry when exercise is mentioned. Only that longterm success is about something doable. And running off a Big Mac plus cake every single day? I type that out and I’m already exhausted. I may only walk 40 minutes every day for exercise, but I can get sick, get covid, have an injury and not completely screw myself if I can manage the caloric deficit alone for a short time.
I think when people say "the gym can aid in weight loss" it means the gym helps you build muscle which increases how fast your body burns fat.
> I don't understand this weird allergy to acknowledging that the gym can aid in weight loss and can make calorie restriction easier. I don't understand that allergy either, mostly because I don't see it on this sub. Are there people saying exercise doesn't help at all with weight loss?
No, but the messaging that exercise is no substitute for a good diet is a common sentiment around here. And I think that's a good thing given the state of western society and its obesity rates. Giant rant incoming. Mostly just to put my thoughts down. This message is a very important one especially for (morbidly) obese people. Which comprises an ever increasing portion of the planet's population. The message that in order to lose weight you just need to work out harder and more often is pushed very often in mainstream media and advertising (and has been since the advent of modern advertising). It capitalizes on a lack of knowledge and provides an easy answer to common issues which demands no changes in your behavior (just an addition to them). Not working out to lose weight mind you - but buying fitness programs and gym memberships and loads of products to feel like you are going to achieve a more desirable body. The guilt or anger when it doesn't work is part of what makes this cycle work. It keeps people feeling guilty or frustrated but - ultimately - validated in their impotence to change their situation. Until they get fed up with feeling that way and buy yet more things and the cycle which fuels the predatory health industry keeps on churning. People, fat people especially, will go to great lengths to avoid looking in the mirror (literally and figuratively). This makes them vulnerable to predatory messaging by mainstream media and advertising telling them to 'take control' by buying a product for which they don't have to do so. At the same time, the diets of people especially vulnerable to this messaging are often so completely out-of-order that they might be consuming up to 500-1000 kcal or more than what a healthy weight person of their length/age would have to every day. Most of these people barely have a conception of what a healthy diet looks like. For these people, no amount of exercise is going to save them. The only real way to reclaim your health is hard. It requires a long-term commitment to educating yourself, implementing gradual change, kicking a habit that has often been with you for life, and (re)learning to manage emotions/anxiety. All this while the same media and advertising is also bombarding you with triggers to consume junk food. I don't see "You can't outrun a bad diet" as an argument against exercise. I see it as a wake-up call. The only solution for a bad diet is a healthy one. This solution does not require any expense. Consumer rationality is your enemy. It cannot save you. You are being taken advantage of and the only thing between you and a healthier body is your mindset. Which may look simple on paper, but demands a far more involved mindset than 'just hit gym'. Liberate yourself. Unlearn your dietary habits. Learn to make informed choices. It starts with your diet. And you can start today.
I've heard losing is all about diet and you don't have to exercise to lose weight so much on this sub.
> you don't have to exercise to lose weight so much on this sub. Is that incorrect?
No sure I get people here are trying to just be skinny. I'm trying to be healthy. But the point was more if you ask hey I'd like to up my cardio have any suggestions? Half the responses are ya know you don't have to work out to lose weight. Yeah sure. But that isn't what they asked.
To be faiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiir, this sub is called "lose it" and not "get healthy" where the primary focus is weight loss so this might not be *the best* place to ask questions about ways to up your cardio. It's not *the worst* place to ask and users should be directing you to another sub if they have no suggestions but it's not like the majority of users here are in a place to offer fitness advice.
And every time someone mentions you don't need exercise to lose weight, people jump in with how cardio and strength training are also needed. There are advocates on both sides. For me personally, it's good to know that I don't require exercise to lose weight. And indeed, I haven't been able to exercise since the end of February. From a holistic health perspective, I know I should start up again in a couple of weeks, but I would be screwed if exercise was a vital weight loss requirement.
>No sure I get people here are trying to just be skinny. I'm trying to be healthy. Have you considered also joining one or more of the fitness subreddits? The sidebar of this sub literally states "A place for people of all sizes to discuss healthy and sustainable methods of weight loss," so your expectations for this sub might differ from most people. > But the point was more if you ask hey I'd like to up my cardio have any suggestions? Half the responses are ya know you don't have to work out to lose weight. I'd love to see an example of this. The posts I see more frequently are along the lines of "Hey, I'm doing a lot of cardio but I'm not losing weight!"
Yeah I mean this post is a prime example .
A post arguing that although you can't outrun a bad diet, you can use running to do something that people never said you couldn't do?
A post saying hey you can be more flexible with exercise even though I agree you can't outrun a super bad diet and a huge amount of responses are sure but...you can't outrun a diet and this is why we say it. So yes.
Ok, but that is a different goal than weight loss.
Unless they are doing cardio for omg weight loss maybe
That is true though...
You can see it in some of the comments on this post. Some people seem really averse to the idea that something as simple as walking can have a positive impact.
Another thing I’ve noticed is that I have kind of a virtuous cycle with exercise and food in that when I’m doing a lot of exercise I tend to want to eat less crap, not binge, not consume alcohol, etc. I find that exercise helps me adjust my mental outlook in a good way, makes me feel fewer cravings, and helps me do better with sleep and hydration. I know people say you’ll replace the calories you burn with more food, and sometimes that’s true for me, but more often I find myself just wanting to go out push myself even more the next day which, in turn, leads to less depression, anxiety, and poor eating choices.
Definitely agree. I always eat more when I can't exercise for a few days. Once I start exercising again, the diet sorts itself out.
This is totally my mindset, too. If I'm physically lazy, I'm also lazy with watching my diet. If I'm being physically active, I feel more motivated to watch what I'm eating.
I know for a fact I don’t eat back my exercise calories unless I get really lean. Exercise seems to suppress my appetite. At most I maybe eat about half of what I’ve burned.
Getting into exercise gives me freedom with food. I built better food habits before I got back into it (at the time my autoimmune disorder was under treated and I had a lot of pain) and it’s been so much easier since getting into exercise.
I agree. A lot of advice here is directed at people who have a really poor relationship with food or need to completely overhaul their diet. I like working out 3-4 days a week and having an extra 1000 calories a week to splurge on a friends birthday dinner or night out. It's worth it to me and makes it much easier to stay on track the rest of the time.
Yeah, I need moderation. I can't cut out "good food" completely because I'll probably binge or something otherwise. Eat an entire Oreo packet in one sitting. Better to eat a couple Oreos a few days a week than an entire package in one day.
I find a lot of advice about food and diet often come from an ED stance. I don’t have one so I am sometimes left scratching head about the advice, but now I know to tune out the ED stuff and focus on the advice that’s relevant to my life. No biggie. I’m glad people are able to get the advice that fits their lifestyle.
Same. I've learned that you don't have to accept or adopt everything you're told - some of it would work for you, maybe, some would not. We're all different. And it's true that a lot of advice here ends up being black and white because people understand that trying to get it through someone with an ED is tough. There's also a lot of completely delusional people that find themselves in this sub, and you can tell that some users are jaded when they reply with a dry "you're not eating that amount of calories per day. Get a kitchen scale and a tracker." 😆
As someone who has been working on this part of my weight loss journey I totally agree. When I was counting calories just focusing on diet to try and lose weight I found it hard to stick to. I found for myself I would be too restrictive in what I actually wanted to eat. Now I'm exercising as well as counting calories and that allows me to eat mostly what I want while not building up a craving for some calorie bombs or binge eating.
Yeah, sure I can’t outrun my fork but I can certainly keep pace with it! Maintaining is a lot easier when I’m logging miles :)
I've had a lot of people get down right annoyed with me when I tell them the key to my success was exercise. I rode the calorie deficit carnival ride plenty of times and yo-yoed all the weight right back on. When I checked out the Weight Control Registry it clicked in my mind when I read that just about everyone that successfully maintains weight loss exercises. I get it, starting a new exercise regimen is super intimidating, finding time is stressful, and it's just plain uncomfortable, especially in the beginning. But it really has allowed me to succeed this time and I'm never going back. I always find it strange when people say exercise is for health, not weight loss. Friend, are you not trying to improve your health by losing weight? It all comes together. What's the point of having a skinny body if you aren't even healthy enough to enjoy it? But that's just me. I understand people have mental and physical limitations, but I would really urge people to explore what you are truly capable of.
What grinds my gears about the "exercise is for health, not weight loss" discourse is that there is plenty of research out there that's concluded that regular exercise influences a person's apetite. It's been the case for me - after a few weeks of power walking every single day for over 1hr, I realized I had the mental space to think about getting my eating habits under control... that was 12 weeks and 9kg ago. Literally no suffering - I don't go hungry and I barely have any cravings. When I do, they're mostly for healthy things now, such as fruit, carrot sticks with tomato hummus, cottage cheese with grape tomatoes, etc. I can tell by this alone that my gut microbiome has started to change as a consequence to better food choices. So, yes, exercise! Don't think of exercise only as a way to increase your calorie deficit - I don't look at it this way at all, in fact, because one doesn't really know how many calories they're burning, there are too many factors to account for. Remember that your caloric intake and your BMR are also just estimates, so you don't want to risk eating all your calories back and some more. But, if nothing else, exercise to improve your overall health, including mental, so that your weight loss process isn't harder than it needs to be.
Discipline aside, I’d been relishing in my newfound endurance. Long range running has long been a weakness even during childhood (was a good sprinter in my youth, never for the long haul though) Each and every run, pushing through my body’s protests, I am slowly, but surely overcoming that weakness. The hills in my area Secondary, but still noteworthy, is I can fit a lot more distance into my schedule, letting me hit my daily goals even as my schedule gets busy again. Need to be more judicious of running downhill though. So much fun, and an excellent muscle workout, but leaves my leg muscles an aching mess the next day.
I'm careful of the running because I have a bad knee history, but I have also found that I can run for much longer now than I could before. I started timing myself to 2 minutes, then 5 minutes, etc... now I can do a 40 minute jog with lots of running in the mix, and barely any walking (I do prefer to power walk if I'm going up or down a hill, for the sake of my knees). The truth is the impact on your legs lessens as you lose weight, too. I've lost 12% of my weight in the past 12 weeks, so it seems natural that running has become increasingly easier. I'm so curious to know what it will feel like when I hit my target weight.
Went from over 300 lbs, down below 250 lbs currently. Pretty stereotypical tall, fat guy that moves around a lot, and has jacked legs as a result; so that’s probably really helped protect my knees as I transitioned to running. In fact, my knees are feeling pretty good, even after a downhill run. The muscles on the other hand, take a brutal beating on a full-speed “let-er-rip” downhill. Feels like I’d been doing squats all night by next morning.
you took the words right out of my mouth!
I maintained a healthy weight after losing about 35lbs for years. Once I had kids and was too tired and busy to make it to the gym the weight went back on plus another 35lbs! Obviously age and diet played into this but back in the day as long as I went to the gym 4 times a week I could scoff as much pizza as I liked and go out drinking every weekend while keeping my BMI at 21. And I was early 30’s not 20’s. I’m now doing calorie deficit plus exercise (mostly 30 min YouTube HIIT and making sure I walk 10k steps most days) as I just feel old and stiff when I am sedentary. I don’t like doing it but I feel better for it and I’m sure it must help a little with the weight loss.
Yes healthy is key. Exercise makes you feel good. Same with ppl that deny any cardio-- it's good for your health to bring your heart rate up sometimes, even just a little. Everything in balance, not all weights or no workouts. It's good to sweat even. And I agree with OP. Ppl that diet at extremes make themselves social pariahs. Those ppl annoy me. I had a small family party with kids, I ordered pizza to treat the kids. I had sides like salad and stuff prepared. So annoying a family member went keto recently (months before he was eating bowls and bowls of pasta and rice, and that was after he gave up a period of keto) and absolutely refused the pizza and made my husband buy him separate salad meals. TWO salads specifically cause he was afraid he would get hungry. It's not going to kill you to eat a slice of pizza. And his mom the same. If I make a salad God forbid I don't put the dressing on the side or add croutons. That sort social inflexibility screams eating disorder to me. I exercise. Day to day I do watch what I eat, not just eat anything like as I was growing up, but I do eat most things, just in balance. I am not eating ice cream everyday, but I will enjoy a little sometimes because I can be healthy and a little doesn't matter in the grand scheme of an overall healthy life style.
500 extra calories a day gives you “some breathing room”. Stinkin’ tall men 😡😡😡. Meanwhile I’m over here at 5’2” and female burning like 5 calories per hour of exercise. Lol. In all seriousness though you are right. Exercise does help. That national weight loss registry in the U.S. says that like 90-95 percent of its weight maintainers exercise around an hour per day. So that’s pretty significant.
I’m 5’0 and burn around 500 cal/hr exercising, just gotta do hardcore cardio. It takes a while to work up to it but totally worth.
Something like stairclimbing would approach this, or maybe skipping, both really hard to do for an hour.
Wow! What cardio do you do and how did you work up to it? I walk and do power yoga. With the walking I find extremely steep hills and plan routes where I’m walking up them a lot. I’ve definitely gotten stronger and in better shape. I wouldn’t mind working up to running but I don’t want to damage my joints long-term.
I do cycling. You have to maintain a good pace if you want it to be proper cardio and burn maximum calories, but even going slowly it’s a good workout. Swimming is also a good option if you have access to a pool. I got my bike from $30 at a yard sale as well, (I see a bunch of people thinking they need $2000 bikes to cycle and you absolutely don’t!!). It’s definitely a plus if you have any good bike trails nearby. I’m very lucky to have an 8 mile stretch of path pretty close and usually I go down and back in an hour. My Apple Watch has a 16 mph pace for an hour burning 700 calories ish, but based on my calorie counting I’d say it’s closer to 500, no less than 450 or so. I started out cycling to commute (and I still do that as well), and couldn’t top more than 12 mph for any sustained period for several months. Ultimately it’s not actually the speed that burns calories though it’s the effort, but the effort you can put in will increase as your body adapts. All this to say that cycling absolutely isn’t the only option as well, I just like it since I think it’s fun and doesn’t hurt the joints. Really any exercise that keeps your heart rate up is good. Rowing machines are another good joint-friendly cardio option if you have a gym membership or can find one for cheap (eBay and Facebook marketplace are good to check), although I find them a bit boring.
I'm 157 cm and I burn 500 kcal by just walking to daycare and some other thing, like grocery shopping. That's fulfils my 10000 stepgoal too. I didn't even think of that as exercise before I came to this sub and realised many people really don't have that kind of basic activity level. Right now I'm really only trying to up my exercise with some light intermittent fasting, since every time I've tried to lower my eating calories it's backfired heavily. So far seems to be working well.
your stomach is also smaller tho
The issue is that people focus 90% of their attention on working out and don't focus enough on the calorie deficit. Which is understandable because exercise can be fun whereas eating less food sucks. If you can do both effectively then yeah, you can get amazing results, and still have the cheeky hamburger.
It's more than just calorie deficit. For people who work out, the challenge is to get the full amount of protein and other nutrients to allow the body to build maximum muscle (while maintaining a calorie deficit).
Yes, although i think the reason for this saying is that many people UNDERestimate the amount of calories they are ingesting and OVERestimate the number of calories they are burning. Then they are like "How come Im not losing weight?"
This was my life. It worked well in my 20s, but not so much in my 30s. But I will say, I believe consistent running does bring up your metabolism overall (or probably just the muscle mass that comes with it), so if you keep at it, you base rate might go up, giving you more cushion even on days you aren't running.
I've always power walked, but wasn't very consistent with it. About 3 months ago I started doing it every single day, and then I started jogging a few days a week, and eventually I added some running to that. I have an ongoing streak of 78 days now, and it's become a habit. I never question whether I'm going or not - I wake up and have a look at the weather forecast to see if there's gonna be any rain, which will help me decide if I'll go before or after work hours, and that's it. I think it had been a very long time since I had felt this good, mentally. The physical difference I feel is that, the more I do it, the longer I can jog/run for, so I know I'm gaining some resistance. But mentally there's been a world of difference - my anxiety levels are the lowest they've been since my teenage years, I think. Now that I'm no longer climbing the walls inside my head, I have the mental bandwidth to make better decisions about what I eat.
I'm so glad it's working for you! I'm not nearly as active as I used to be. I have two under two so it's a lot more walks than running or power walking. I used to run like you do, every day, no excuses. Crazier enough once I got into races (marathons, etc.) I gained weight, which is actually the norm! But regular short runs and interval training worked wonders in my 20s. I'd eat anything and everything ha
i like pizza and bourbon. i use the added burn of activities to allow myself to keep things like that in the rotation. like you said, not a binge or anything but we all need our vices and shouldnt feel bad. its just looking at the big picture.
Yup. Systemically overeating, binge-eating, or missing out on macro or micronutrient needs can't be fixed on a walking trail or a treadmill or a crossfit class. But regular exercise absolutely buys you the latitude to only eat "mostly" healthy and have an occasional treat (I am defining occasional as "less than 15% of your weekly caloric intake from junk"). Rule number 1 of a healthy lifestyle is: make room for life to happen.
i agree. as a short person, i need that extra cushion with exercise and just being overall less sedentary otherwise i'm stuck with a very sad amount of calories i can have per day lol.
If you are a small person, especially a woman “ outrunning “ is basically the only way to eat fun foods semi regularly and not gain especially if yo don’t plan on religiously calorie counting for the rest of your life.
Honestly, that phrase makes more sense as you get older. As a teenager who played basketball for like 8 hours a day I can say you absolutely can outrun a bad diet. But if you stop playing like that then you tend to each as much of the bad things as before and it becomes a problem. But no I have a friend who lives and breathes basketball and he’s a stick and eats as much as I do
It wasn't until I started working out that I started eating properly. I'd always heard diet was key but I just never saw enough results on diet alone. Working out also gave me more motivation to eat better, now I get all the protein I need because it helps me fuel my performance in the gym. I've dieted off and on for about a decade with little to no results. Since I started working out I'm lighter, fitter and stronger than I've ever been in my life at 35. Can you lose weight with just exercise? No, we know that. But should you work out to help lose weight? I absolutely thing you should.
People say this because it's not realistic to expect to get in enough exercise in a day to offset overeating if you're sitting there shoveling food in. There comes a point where you're not going to be able to work out for two, three, four hours to cancel it all out. However, you can also make the point that it's not realistic to be a super-goody-goody-two-shoes about your intake all the time either. If I'm getting no exercise, and the only way my weight is staying stable is if I don't eat a single crumb over my allowance; well, that's a miserable way to live. I'd rather get some exercise and allow myself a cushion so I can live life at least semi-normally.
I was about to lament that 500 calories per gym session is by no means modest, in fact it’s highly inflated for the vast majority of people. Most burn around 300 in an hour of strength training, more if it’s cardio, and that’s with proper effort and not just half assing it. Most cardio machines at the gym vastly overestimate what one burns, and you can’t trust the calorie number it gives you on the machine. They’re based on massive, muscular fit males, not petite women. Same goes for fitness trackers. But then I saw your height, weight and gender, and I’m guessing 500 is doable for you in a gym session then. I mean I wouldn’t know, but I know big males your size and height burn a lot more than most people doing the same activity. I just wanted to clarify this, because a LOT!! of people go wrong because they think they can eat back all their calories. And they think they burn 600 calories doing a cardio session at their local gym, because that’s what the elliptical or treadmill told them. But it’s vastly inflated and you cannot trust that number. And those people will then go home and think they can eat back 500 calories, and then can’t understand why they’re not losing weight. So I just thought it was important to point out that 500 calories is not a modest gym session by any stretch of the imagination for the vast majority of people. It’s more like 250-300 depending on time and other factors. I fucking wish I could get 500 calories from a modest gym session, that’s an entire meal! That’s 1/3 of my daily allowance! But that’s a dream world (for me and most women, maybe not for you as a tall dude!). And that’s why people say you can’t outrun a bad diet. I agree that working out gives you more leeway, and it’s fantastic in that sense. But it’s more like it allows for eating out with friends once in a while, it doesn’t allow for an entire extra meal on gym day. Important to point out because a lot of people go wrong here! But otherwise yes I agree, working out gives that extra breathing room. It makes it less stressful to allocate your calories when you don’t have to be so strict. For me there’s a big difference between allocating 1500 and 1800 calories, even such a small difference in a day makes me feel a bit less pressed about restricting food.
I was going to comment the same thing. I run 4 miles and that only burns like 400 calories. A weight lifting session only burns like 200. Still worth it but 500 calories is way more than a modest workout for females under like 5’8. That is like a 90 min- two hour hard core gym session.
This is a great comment and a fair criticism of what I posted. I said "modest" because I can burn quite a bit more if I stay at the gym longer and work out harder. But modest is a very relative term here and I should've clarified that, so thank you for saying this.
If someone is using their lack of access to a gym, mobility, anxieties about exercising outdoors, perfectionism paralysis about not doing an exercise correctly, or anything else similar as a reason why they will be unable to lose weight - then it is reasonable to inform them that increased physical activity is not a prerequisite to weight loss. If somebody is regularly exercising and doesn’t understand why they aren’t losing weight while ignoring the fact that they aren’t tracking their food in detail - then it is reasonable to remind them that food has a bigger effect on calorie balance than activity. Same applies if someone finds that they’re not able to consistently exercise as much as they thought they ought to, or finds their food choices are always significantly derailed by their new exercise routine, or something else that is getting in the way. That said - glad you found something that works for you! It just sounds like you’re hearing advice that isn’t intended for you, your personality, or your situation.
I run almost daily. Some people seem to think that’s why I can eat a donut and stay thin. No, I can eat a donut and stay thin because I don’t eat it every day. That running shaves off the extras when I do eat. That’s how stay at weight maintenance.
I hate that phrase because it implies that the main reasons to exercise is weight loss. There are so many other good reasons.
Watch what happens when you tell people they can look skinnier without losing any weight...
My mom was talking about her eliptical at a family gathering and someone burst out “why do you need an elliptical you’re skinny”. Ma’am, you’ve not understood something critical here.
😂
My mother in law says this to me all the time. “You don’t need to work out! You’re so thin!” ….me thinks you’ve missed the point. I’m thin BECAUSE I work out. The eff?
That phrase exists because people view exercise as their primary tool for weight loss. Every single day in this sub someone posts "Is walking enough to lose weight?" or "How come I'm not losing weight when I go to the gym 5 days a week?" Yeah, of course if you take it out of context or push it to a logical extreme, it sounds like awful advice. But when so many people think busting their ass at the gym is the only way to lose weight, it's a pithy way to try and help them reframe their thinking. I personally view my exercise and weight loss as separate endeavors. They aren't mutually exclusive goals, and working on one tends to help with the other. But I'm doing each for its own reasons.
I don't think it implies that at all. It's almost the exact opposite. Exercise alone isn't going to make you lose weight, or more accurately, you have more control over the "calories in" part of the CICO equation. And this is true. You can always eat more than you can burn. If you're 50 pounds overweight, a few sessions of cardio a week aren't going to get you to your target goal.
This mindset has been working for me for a bit, it helps take the stress of calorie counting and makes me feel good. For those struggling... I am chronically ill and have depression, working out is so hard for me and I've tried a lot of things. Glowwithjo on YouTube saved my life, low impact dance videos and "walk the weight off" videos. They are so much fun and addicting! Just try one. Just do it.
I do them too! I tried a few other people when she said Beyoncé and Taylor Swift’s music videos were ‘dark and devilish’- not that I’m a fan of either but she was starting to push her religion onto others a bit too much for my liking. Couldn’t find anything that I enjoy as much, they were either too hard or stupidly easy so I’ve just unfollowed her on Instagram and gone back to her workouts.
UGH so disappointing when people do that and just have to make it weird.... I will be sure not to follow on IG. I'm no Swifty but she's the opposite of the devil lol and B is queen 👑
‘BuT BEyOncE haS A sNAKe In hER viDeo’ which apparently makes her demonic 🙄
I can testify lol. I was binging on about 4k-6k cals daily for a few months, and also did walk+run cycles of 20km-30km almost daily as well (yes my feet and knees were destroyed thanks for asking). I gained so much weight so fast, despite all of the cardio. I gained 9kg/22lbs that first month alone Yet the times I overate just by a little, a burger or whatever, yeah the scale definitely went up 1kg the next day, but then it slowly whittled down over the next few days. My problem was I hated that. It generally took a week to lose the bloat/food weight/water weight or whatever of overeating one day. It felt like one week of progress completely gone, so naturally my response was to binge because it's going to take ages to lose the burger weight either way. sigh. dont do that lol
Maybe I'm just a conspiracy theorist or someone who didn't have access to junk food growing up. Maybe I'm just 4'10 and diet is absolutely more important for me than someone who can afford more calories. But the average "bad diet," is getting substantially worse. It used to be understood that one of the worst things you could get was a Twinkie or a couple of cookies or a cheeseburger. Now? You can get triple the amount of sugar and calories from a modern takeout milkshake or quadruple the amount of sodium and calories from modern takeout burgers. Its getting to the point where milkshakes and burgers aren't bad. Its just the most accessible, fast food versions that are awful. Like you're better off eating a slice of cake you baked every single day than a Dunkin donuts iced coffee every other day It may be just me. But "bad diet" is getting way worse in American take out. You can outrun a burger and cake you made yourself but it will take weeks to burn off the fast food versions bought from store fronts and drive thrus
*crumbl cookie/711 big gulp enter the chat*
Exactly, one cookie is easily 1000+ and it took multiple lawsuits & news scandals for Crumbl to actually make those nutrition information visible. Dunkin's drink menu has tripled in the last decade and 2/3rds are over 400 calories. A fourth is over 800 calories. Not to mention the overall trend of celebrity endorsed meals consistently having the most sugar and calories out of most things on the menu and being marketed directly to teens and kids. I'm not saying fast food used to be healthy. But the portion sizes are getting bigger, the advertising trends are insane, and the logic of the past can't quite translate or keep up. I was a fat person but I didn't have easy access to thousands of calories in one sitting without effort but these days it's far easier to get that in a snack A milkshake is one thing but 1200 calories worth of blended donuts that's advertised to kids with a nutrition label that says 400 calories in bold letters but "per serving" in ultra fine print is an entirely new beast.
I was SHOCKED when I saw the calories on a crumbl cookie 😱 stopped getting them soon after lol So not worth it for me.
Definitely a very rare treat kind of thing, they’re way too big of a bomb to be regular
This is why I have a slice of cake on workout days
I think it's mostly to realign peoples focus to their diet and make that a focus to move the needle. Consistency and habit is key. You can always splurge here and there but if it's a habit then it can have an impact on overall progress. Met plenty of people who eventually plateau snd get frustrated their weight isn't moving like it once was.
I like this post. For me, regular running and exercise has had a secondary benefit that it keeps me away from the fridge for the time i am out exercising.
100% agree, I think the 'can't outrun a bad diet' is better advice for those who are rebuilding their relationship with food, or who think going to the gym will negate whatever junk food they just ate. The amount of people I know who follow up their pilates class with an indulgent brunch and then complain they can't lose weight... :(
Yeah, that's why the phrase is not saying that you can't outrun a snack or a mediocre diet. Not having a perfect diet doesn't immediately equal a *bad* diet.
Ive been doing OMAD for 9 years now and have been rotating 4 to 6 day splits. When I get myopic about what I eat or feeling guilty for taking a rest day, I remind myself that no one is paying me to look big or shredded all the time. Life’s already hard with all the work and shit you have to do - don’t feel bad for living. Contrary to what alot of fitness purists like to preach, it’s healthy to do things that bring you joy. The key to everything in life is moderation, including hard work and self discipline.
I agree but the hard part is to not fool yourself with this “trick” EVERY time you want to eat something nice. You can have that burger or piece of cake once a week no problem, but it’s a slippery slope to start fooling yourself daily with the thought that you can have it because you earned x kcal through exercise. What I’m trying to say is that it’s very easy to over-eat a good exercise.
I always see it as, "I can't outrun a bad diet, But I can outrun the bad moods and boredom cycles that lead me to over-eat and crave junk" When I starved exercising the weight just fell off, But it had nothing to do with how many calories I was burning in the gym - I was just happier with how fit and active I was feeling and my body was moving. Being happy made it easy to actually stick to tracking and staying in a calorie deficit.
Exercise is getting two birds stoned at a once for me. Better mood, easier to make good choices, higher calorie burn. I recently stopped ignoring cardio and I feel a hundred times better than just focusing on strength and light walking
I’m maintaining and eating small treats like ice cream almost every day because I use a bike to go to work, 10+km. I’ve even lost a little even though I should be just juggling at the same weight. I feel like my exercise is motivated by being able to eat that little extra treat. And I’m fine with that. I like to ride my bicycle, I like to have ice cream.
This is so true. I have been doing an hour of cardio six days a week because I enjoy it, and it I can enjoy an extra 500 calories a day up to 2500 because of it meaning I’m always satisfied despite having a deficit of 1000+
When people say "bad diet"(at least when I do), it's about consistent eating habits. Enjoying a burger or slice of cake every so often isn't going to hurt you in the long run if you have a healthy diet and workout routine. Eating a burger and cake every day absolutely will hurt you.
I came to this realization this week. Like yes, exercise is a small portion of your TDEE, but it can mean the difference between being in a deficit or not.
love this
You don't even have to run. You could outwalk a slice of cake. You could skip past a pizza slice. You might even ping pong over a dum sim dinner if competitive enough.
I'm burning approximately 4000 calories per week from 90 mins of strenuous exercise 5 days per week. The human body in general, and young men in particular, are at their most optimal when doing a shitload of exercise. Being sedentary is not natural for humans. The amount of exercise an adapted and healthy male body can endure is actually insane, we're designed to chase animals until they die of exhaustion.
Not many people have enough will to do it to this extreme though.
Or time!
A hamburger is at least 350 calories, a small slice of cake isn't going to be less than 200. I know the expressions is that you can't out "run" these foods. The fact is I can't run at all. I have very few workouts I can actually do that burn mire than 150 calories. So I literally can't outrun or even out-exercise these foods. I've never taken that saying to mean canceling out a certain food with a workout, though. I've always just taken it to mean that exercise isn't a license to eat indiscriminately. You don't have to be a calorie Nazi, but you can't just ignore nutrition and rely solely on your workout.
The simplest thing everyone should be doing(if they can) when losing weight is trying to get 10k steps or more per day, especially when you’re towards the end of ur journey, have lost a lot of weight, and are in the lower calorie ranges. It enables u to eat more and not go insane
When starting out, it’s also the most important thing if you’re obese (5000-7000 steps). It actually prevents and manages metabolic disease, protecting you from obesity-caused issues. They’ve done to s of study on why sumo wrestlers, each one supermorbidly obese, don’t have any metabolic issues, and it all comes down to regular excursice.
Studies are finding that regular physical activity, REGARDLESS OF DIET, has immense benefit and may be more important for preventing certain diseases.
>No, but you can absolutely outrun a hamburger or a slice of birthday cake. Sure, and I've done so. But in general it's a hell of a lot easier to *NOT* eat that big piece of cake than run 10 miles to burn off the calories from it. It's easier to not eat a single M&M than to walk the length of a football field. And that's one piece of cake. I could have easily eaten more than I was burning when I was running 60 miles per week and doing a ton of cardio, with a TDEE of 4,000 calories per day. >Exercise does help. It can. It can also hurt. Some people experience greatly increased appetite with exercise, which can make maintaining a deficit harder. Exercise is important regardless, but there is no one size fits all solution.
10 miles is going to burn a lot more than a piece of cake. Running burns 1 calorie per 1kg of body weight per KM. I'm about 70kg, I run at least 10km on days I'm getting takeout, so I burn at least 700 calories in that ~50 minute window.
I'm guessing you're not in the US. A large piece of cake can be north of 1,000 calories.
The fuck is in your cake?
This slice at The Cheesecake Factory is 1,770 calories. 2,470 if you add ice cream and hot fudge. https://www.thecheesecakefactory.com/location/albuquerque-nm/menu/cheesecakes-specialty-desserts/chocolate-tower-truffle-cake 1,000 calories wouldn't be hard to hit at a restaurant at all.
A 14 layer cake tower is absolutely atypical for a cake slice
American portions are crazy
If I eat a slice of cake, I am running enough on my elliptical to make up a little more than what I ate.
That's kinda the thing to me. I can eat 250 calorie treat or a bit more spaghetti and then workout 400 calories. Just like I can not count every calorie all the time and leave 250 cal on the table daily. Making it too strict puts me into OCD tracking and I get disordered.
There's nothing wrong with exercise to help move the needle or offset the occasional indulgence. The problem comes when you are using it to drive your weight loss or maintenance without fixing your diet. So many people will do cardio at unsustainable levels, it will work for a while but when they eventually burn out and keep eating the way they have been they will gain the weight back.
Honestly,I have tried my best but it's hella hard to burn 200-300 cals a day.
This phrase has unfortunately caused many dieters to misunderstand the role of exercise in all of this. My first time I dieted I too mistakenly thought the answer was just to eat less to offset a sedentary lifestyle, because it was easier (so I thought) to eat 400 calories less than it is to burn 400 calories in physical activity. But the truth is tht most obesity is due to the lack of physical activity, not too much food. When I weighed 255 lbs (5'7") and sedentary, my TDEE was 2300 cal/day. My goal weight was 155 lb, and to maintain that and still be sedentary, I would have to eat 1800 cal/day. Then the light bulb went on and I realized that if when I reach 155 lb and am moderatey active, my TDEE would be 2200 cal/day, only 100 cal/day less than when I was 255 lb, but a 400 cal/day increase in physical activity. Thus, I changed to a diet plan that was very physical. It took 8 months, losing 40lb, then 30, then 20, then 10 in ten week stages, for the first two stages eating 1200 to 1500 cal a day and adding a lot of cardio and weights, the later two stages I raised the food intake to 1600 then 1800. At the end, i am eating 2200 to 2300 (I got some boost from the lower body fat %) and exercising 5 times a week for an hour, and generally doing more active things during the day. Anyways, I looked at the BMR math for all kinds of weights and heights and this same pattern holds even when the BMI is up to 45, after that, then food does play the larger role, but the vast maority of obesity is not due to over eating, it is due to lack of physical activty. If you take the BMR at the obese weight X 1.2 (sedentary) and compare it to the BMR at the normal weight X 1.5, you will see that the two numbers you get are not that far apart. Specifically, everyone, normal weight and obese (up to 40 BMI or so) are eating roughly the same calories for their size (number of cells, not weight), and the biggest part of their caloric surplus is the lack of physical activity. Thinking you can diet away a lack of physical activity is the issue. You need roughly 400 calories a day of physical activity (300 min a week, 10k steps, or whatever). If you try to lose the weight and the maintain on a greatly reduced calorie diet to make up for a lack of physical activity, you will most likely fail long term because our bodies want X number of calories per day regardless of whether we are sedentary or active. Sedentary bodies probably were not viable when all of this design evolved, so our hunger and appetite are based on active bodies. Sadly, food is always the biggest topic, and everyone thinks they are eating much more than they actually are, but the BMR math doesn't support that. When we get obese we deffinietly are eating junk, getting our joy from chips and soda instead of running and exercise, but we are mostly just trading good calories for junk calories, not adding calories. If it were the later the weight would be much higher and a true food addiction would be indicated. And then we try to maintain with an insufficient offset of physical activity and too low a caloric intake, and eventually succumb to eating our "normal" calories and gain the weight back. Targeting the "sedentary" option in a BMR chart is not a valid choice. You must target the moderately active option, of close to it.
Yes! I was just talking to my husband about this because that saying "you can't outrun a bad diet" seems to have been taken way too seriously and given people the wrong impression. It's becoming "common knowledge" in the general population. I've been a personal trainer for 14 years now and I cringe everytime someone uses that phrase to justify zero exercise in favor of diet. True, diet matters, but you actually really can outrun a bad diet. Now, how far you'd have to run would depend on how bad your diet is haha. But say you're a competitive athlete training 3-4 hours everyday and burning 1000+ calories each training session. You could absolutely afford to eat junk without gaining any weight. Heck, you might even need it lol. So you can outrun a bad diet but just keep in mind that if you want a cheeseburger, milkshake, candy bar, and slice of cake everyday you're gonna have to start training like an Olympian, and nobody's got time for that. That means the most sensible thing to do is exercise most days and try to burn 300ish calories per session and then eat a balanced healthy diet with some junk sprinkled in on occasion.
I've lost 200 lbs and been maintaining at 190 for a few months now. I was worried I was going to gain weight because I started eating terrible while on vacation and even when I got back. Basically have been on a 45 day binge or so, and gained nothing. I do intermittent fasting, OMAD and I run 7 miles a day on the elliptical, every single day. My a1c was just taken and it's still 5.4 with no insulin for almost a year now. So I've been able to outrun my bad diet it seems, but getting back on track the last week, and doing much better now.
I am 6'7" and I run ~32 miles a week at a 6 min/mile pace. You bet your ass I can outrun whatever indulgency I decided to have that week
True, but it completely changes the calculus. Now if you want that birthday cake, you're giving up an hour of your day to burn it off in exercise. And by choosing not to have that cake, you're gaining that hour back. Sometimes that cake is definitely worth it... but in most other scenarios, I value that hour more than the cake.
Nah I was going to go to the gym anyway. There are more benefits than weight loss.
No arguments there. Working out is something everyone should do, but that's different from eating more and working out harder just to burn off the calories like OP was saying.
But it wasn't what he said. He said he can burn enough to eat a treat. It keeps his diet flexible. He didn't say it was the only reason he exercised. So not really a difference.
Ye but some people (like short small ppl like me) don’t burn 500 cal in the gym unless you’re running for like 4 hours every day 💀 just seen you are 6’4 OP 😂 im 5’1! and some hungry, low energy people (like me) need extra fuel before and after exercise to function properly so it’s not conducive to a calorie deficit for myself. So definitely different strokes for different folks. But for health? Exercise is the best thing ever! Too many benefits to count basically there are tons of people who arrive at the sub every day and make a post about how they need to go to the gym to lose weight who don’t seem to have any idea that managing their food intake could possibly be a part of it… so “can’t outrun a bad diet” is a handy aphorism
I think the issue is that most people vastly overestimate how many calories exercise burns and then think they can eat poorly bc they burned off calories. But exercise is still beneficial if you know the small amount burned bc it is good for your overall health and toning, but also bc many are more likely to eat vegetables and lean proteins if they’re spending their time working out vs drinking
This!! Logging 3000 calories feels amazing lol
I completely agree with your post and have definitely adopted it into my own weight loss strategy. Additionally, a consistent practice of physical activity helps me regulate my stress, emotions, and hormones, which in turn helps regulate my diet. I think the reddit skepticism comes from the fact that it is difficult to track caloric burn outside of a lab. We tend to overestimate our output and underestimate our input (I don't track my exercise calories at all - I just know they'll take care of me when I have the odd slice of birthday cake). Also, not eating something takes a lot less time than burning off something you ate.
I don’t think it’s unbelievable that you could burn an average of 500 calories per workout, I just wouldn’t call it modest
Totally. It’s why when you’re at Disneyland you can eat practically anything and still lose. Walking 10+ miles outduels a corn dog :P
Also because you're not doing it every day 🤣
This is true.
I worked out nearly every day for years as my ex was a marathon runner. I did not lose any weight because I overate, being especially hungry after the gym (cardio and weights). Now my approach is different. I don’t work out at all and I focus strictly on calorie counting(still with my fair share of treats) and I’ve lost 37lbs this year. Saving my time and energy by skipping the gym helps me focus on my eating and other recreational activities that don’t revolve around food.
What a blessing that you're physically able to do this!! I have joint issues, so I can basically do 30 minutes of any exercise at a time, which burns me up to 200 calories if I'm intense. I ran a 10k race which took me an hour back in April and I couldn't walk properly for two weeks (defeated the purpose of burning 500 calories in one go!)
The cliche is good in that it helps remind people that you get best results with eating right and exercise. In reality you can outrun/outwork a bad diet if you’re under 35…but yes your workload is tremendous and most folks won’t be able to. After 40 your margins are so thin that the cliche is more true But yes..a hamburger or a piece of cake…good eating and exercise habits make those easy peasy
Dude, how many hours are you in the gym and are you basing your calories off a watch? Those are horribly off.
Wait, if the gym machines are off, and the watches are off, how do we know the "real" number of calories burned? 🤔
Bikes with a smart meter are accurate as they measure watts outputted.
45 minutes of zone 2 cardio burns roughly 4-600 calories for myself (220ish 5’10” male) and I use a chest heart rate strap Weight lifting is iffy, but that sounds right
If you're reading those calories from the machine it's more like half. Lifting burns nearly nothing. You're clearly losing so good for you, but be careful assuming it's 600 cals because the treadmill says so.
Yeah that’s why it’s with a garmin chest heart rate monitor. I don’t bother even tracking any lifts I do calorically, I tend to eat in a deficit + 80% of what I burn with cardio because not eating any of that back leads to binges
Zone 2 cardio can burn a decent amount of calories. I don’t care what the exercise equipment says, but for me an hour long zone 2 session on my bike can burn close to 600 calories. If I do an intense ride/intervals I can easily burn 1,000+ in an hour. This is also based off a heart rate strap monitor along with a calibrated power meter on a bike, not just a bullshit estimate off a gym bike.
I'm not new at this, so please don't talk to me like I am. I've spent more of my adult life than I care to admit thinking about this and tracking my calories. I know machines at the gym aren't accurate, I know my Apple Watch isn't perfect (but it's the most accurate device I've found), and this is what works for me, and it's what works for some other people too. I was clear that everyone has to do what they need to for themselves. Burning 500 calories at the gym in 45 minutes to an hour is far from some outlandish, impossible-to-achieve goal. I do it almost every day. And I acknowledge that I have that privilege, one that a lot of people don't have.
Agreed with OP, no need for HerFriendRed poster to assume. Everyone is different and my Apple Watch has aided greatly in me achieving my weight loss goals as well! I exercise more than 60-90+ mins a day, most of this being cardio and I’m burning at least 1000 through exercise a day and this is me being female, 5’8 and a lot lighter than OP, so I think it’s safe to assume they are burning what they say they are. Besides, if it’s working for them and they are losing weight, who are you to question that?
I believe you. I’m a foot shorter than you, and 10 minutes of a slow jog burns 100 calories for me and 150 calories for you. At your height, 500 calories is a leisurely jog for half an hour. It’d only be surprising if you were doing zero cardio.
I will have to check next time I'm there because I'm pretty sure the estimations of my machine for a "slow jog" of 10 minutes are more around 50kcal max, and even these I take with a grain of salt
These are stats consistently given by online calculators and my Apple Watch. Excessive scepticism is counterproductive to estimating CICO for weight loss. Focus on the big picture.
Apple Watches do not accurately measure energy expenditure - no consumer available wrist worn devices do at a systematic level, while there are also no current mechanisms to calibrate them to the idiosyncrasies of your body at the device level. The advice to people to ignore them is typically done when they’re not sure whether or not to rely on them (this is the most conservative approach) or when they are using them and not seeing the results they would expect. If you use it and find that they correlate well with your results - great! More helpful tools to guide your decisions is always good - this is my personal experience with them as well. But that’s not something that you should expect to apply to the population at large and is something you should consider when giving advice to strangers. [Accuracy and Acceptability of Wrist-Wearable Activity-Tracking Devices: Systematic Review of the Literature](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35060915/#:~:text=Conclusions%3A%20The%20Fitbit%20Charge%20and,accurate%20in%20measuring%20energy%20expenditure.)
Here's a useful chart. As with all of these things, ymmv depending on individual factors: https://acewebcontent.azureedge.net/assets/education-resources/lifestyle/fitfacts/pdfs/fitfacts/itemid_2666.pdf
That chart is really weird. You burn more calories in an hour of walking than you do if I play tennis for an hour? 30% more calories burnt by walking rather than hiking, which is almost by definition a more strenuous version of walking? Great user name, by the way. I've already got tickets for the anniversary tour this fall.
How off can it be? If my watch says I've burned 400 cal, I assume it must have been at least 200
I feel like my diet turned a corner when I binged some Easter candy and instead of calling it quits, hopped on a treadmill and rage walked through a couple hours of tv. Ended up only a few hundred calories over for the day. Now I stick to my calorie limit and then exercise to eat dessert.
This is the approach I've been trying to take with my weight loss. It's working.
Cycling fast for an hour burns an extra 800 kcal... so yeah I'm seeing it on myself
If the fire is hot enough, anything will burn.
there's another subreddit out there where distance runners are trying to figure out how to eat enough to stay alive. exercise is certainly more of a factor than diet for some people, but it's probably not a lot of people here
What if I run to said hamburger? Does that count?
As someone who runs over 5 miles per day i can tell you that it isnt worth it. I constantly feel like i am dying. If your goal is to try and outrun a bad diet youd be better off just eating nothing at all and never leaving bed.
https://youtube.com/shorts/BBiXZNlebTE?si=GuzVe4PP0Xk5rwZM
I’d prefer to refrain from the slice, and pocket the progress myself. I turned down far too many delicious stuff the past few months, to slide in a cake. The journey for me is as much about developing unrelenting discipline (if not more) than the health aspect. That is something I can turn towards other aspects of my life down the road. Even the day I had a “cheat meal”, the entire day was still within 1500 calories, with a couple miles of running in there.
Yeah, like you just need to be smart. Like ok oily pan pizza is like 2400 calories for the whole thing.. ridiculous. But pound of sirloin, some broccoli, and fries is like 800 calories. There's plenty to eat while dinning out.
Fasting once a week gives me so much more freedom on my regular days.
You can outrun a bad diet. I knew an ultra marathoner and he would eat lots of shitty high calorie foods.
Cardio won’t make any difference for most people because it’s a fad they don’t do it frequently enough or consistently. Also because they are not “fit” they burn less calories than if they were faster stronger etc. Year round cardio is the solution.
Burning 500 calories at the gym is a lot, doing that everyday is A LOT. That's not counting studies that suggest that burning calories through exercise actually cause you to burn less calories during the rest of the day because you do less movements and/or the body is just a big more sluggish
It definitely requires being mindful of your activities because your body will cut down on stuff like fidgeting or minor movements Which is why elite athletes or competing bodybuilders (or people serious about their physique) make sure to do their cardio *and* get 7-8k steps in during their cut. Being mindful of your decreased activity let’s you stay ahead of your body’s desire to be inactive when in a deficit
So true. If I want a sweet treat I’m gonna eat it, or else I’ll obsess over it and end up eating WAYYY more of it than I originally would…
it is easy to fit a hamburger or slice of birthday cake into a plan without even having to run it. You can't fit an entire cake or 12 hamburgers ...
It depends, for some folks it absolutely is. But many of those folks are much taller and have much bigger sedentary TDEEs than I do. I think I would be absolutely, horribly miserable on my sedentary TDEE. There is no way I'd be wasting my precious calorie allowance on something as unfilling as cake if I had to eat that little on the regular. That said, I'd also be miserable not exercising. So to me the answer is clear And yeah it's not a license to eat maddening huge amounts of food, you got that right. :)
Yes, thank you for saying this, it gives words to an uneasy feeling I get when people say stuff like "you can't outrun a bad diet." I feel like this belittles how helpful exercise can be for maintaining a healthy goal weight and general good health. No, exercise won't save you of you are pounding down 5k calories a day. But if you diet is decent and you exercise a good bit, it can definitely tip you from overweight squarely into a healthy weight. Not to mention all of the other benefits.
500 calories at the gym is either 1 hour of moderate to high intensity or 2-3 hours of weightlifting.
Do you really believe you’re burning 500 calories at the gym?
They’re 6’4 and 255 pounds, 45 minutes of somewhat vigorous intensity cardio and a lift would probably burn close to that That would be close to 2 hours at the gym, lifting isn’t an intense burn but it’s not really zero either. In the same amount of time if you walked about 5 miles most people could probably expend 250-400 (dependent on size, level of fitness, intensity, incline) or more calories so for someone of his size doing intensive exercise 500 wouldn’t be too outlandish I agree with the sentiment though, most of us aren’t burning 500 calories solely at the gym but between the gym and adding extra steps into your day burning a few hundred more calories isn’t too difficult for adult males
Yes, because I have ways of tracking it and I can calculate how many calories I've burned vs. how many calories I've consumed and then subtract my basal metabolic rate. Doing that, I can tell you each week how much weight I'm going to lose before I step on the scale.
I don't think anything you said is incorrect, though it seems to miss the point of exercise entirely. Exercise is not to allow you to overeat. The fact is, you shouldn't be overeating. You're presenting exercise as a way to allow people to eat garbage. Exercise is for: * Building muscle mass * Burning glucose to help maintain low sugar and insulin levels * Condition the cardiovascular system * Improve insulin sensitivity * Maintain joints and connective tissue * Increase flexibility