Im a huge fan of tracking calories so that lose weight.
This process is quite powerful…with one exception.
Heres an eerie case where merelythinkingabout calories may nullify your progress.
Our results show that isolated aerobic exercise is not an effective weight loss therapy in these patients.
Okay, so exercise without diet probably isnt effective, but why?
This study wasnt an anomaly.
They all found that not only did exercise fail to increase hunger…it helpedcurbhunger in certain cases.
This leads to some obvious questions.
Where can I sign up for one of these buffet studies (the control group kindly)?
But more importantly: what the hell is going on?
There are two studies that provide a compelling explanation to this Scooby Doo-level mystery.
They ended up eatingtwo to three timesthe actual amount.
The experimenters then translated the food journals into calorie equivalents.
On paper, it appeared that there was an overall caloric deficit throughout the group.
However, when participants final weights were measured, there was no evidence of weight loss.
In this ledger, calories act as a currency that affords additional food choices.
For example, one may translate thirty minutes on the treadmill into one Krispy Kreme.
The problem here is that people tend to simultaneously overestimate calories burned from exercise while underestimating calories consumed.
And in fitness, when physiology and psychology go head-to-head, psychology almost always wins.
They simply picked up a new sport or activity and started losing weight, almost by accident.
Conversely, frequent exercisers who claim that the scale never moves tend to obsess over calories.
Again, tracking caloric intake is a powerful method that we encourage.
This might work for advanced dieters, but itsa recipe that fails most.
As we mentioned in ourExercise vs.
Diet article, remember that weight is lost in the kitchen, not the gym.
Exercise should be done for your overall health and longer term (i.e.
not daily) weight loss goals.
The second that exercise becomes a number on your daily calorie ledger, its lost its meaning.
Images byKiril Yankov,Guttorm Flatabo, andPeter Mooney.
