To think I can lose weight exercising 5 x per week?

[SwimmingOnEggshells]

I fucking hate to diet. I'm short (5'0) so any of those apps tell me I need to eat 1200 a day which leaves me starving and I end up bingeing.

So I've started spinning at home 5 times a week for 35-45 minutes, high intensity and I'm a sweaty mess after.

Please tell me that by eating a normal, healthy diet with no major blips/binges AND exercising at this level of intensity will make me lose weight??

I want to hear your stories!

Exercise alone rarely results in much weight loss for various reasons. Exercise makes you hungry and people often unconsciously eat a little more. They also tend to rest after exercising and are a bit less active than they otherwise would have been. These things alone can easily undo the calories burnt. Your body doesn't actually want you to lose weight and is very clever at trying to prevent that from happening. You need to restrict calories too, especially at your (our) age. You can't lose a few lbs by thinking about it like you can at 21.

I think you can try it and see what happens but if it doesn’t work you need to see what you’re eating and just cut your carbs down. That will probably be enough alongside rigorous exercise to see some weight loss. Add in resistance training for extra credits.

I'm doing two hours four times a week at the moment and I've put on two kilos of muscle

I could have written this question. I'm one year younger, one inch taller and have same bmi.

I started exercising last week but no change to diet. Probably too early to say as weight fluctuates but I think I've lost 1lb.

You can't outrun your fork (unfortunately)

Good luck OP! Exercise will. Make you feel amazing regardless of weight loss

For me exercise and eating quite a lot of carbs keep me a steady weight of bmi 23

I have no interest to be thinner than that.

2 years into getting very active, I have lost fat and gained muscle (quite noticeably on my legs)

For me, diets, low carb, whatever makes me feel low on energy. So I eat the carbs (bread or porridge for breakfast + fruit, pasta or baked pot or sandwich for lunch, carbs+protein+ veg) yet I am not fat

Carbs are fine, as long as you burn lots of them in my (obviously personal and thus very limited) experience

I've been running 3 times a week and home exercising on the days I don't run. (15000 steps on average per day) I manage to maintain my weight whilst eating too much rubbish.

If you eat 1600 calories every day and comfortable stick to that then that is so much better than 1200 calories for 5 days and binge at the weekend. Your diet sounds OK.

I’m sorry but no - as the saying goes you can’t outrun a bad diet. I’m also short and to lose weight went on 1200 diet - I didn’t find it that bad. You need to make sensible food choices. Fill up on veg, swap rice for bulgar wheat etc, swap normal sausages to Heck chicken sausages. These small changes will save you calories. Exercise is amazing and will improve metabolism so when you get to target weight you will be able to increase calories a bit / have treats and you’ll still maintain. Also like others have said you need to do strength/ weight training not just spinning

It's all about what you eat. Always has been and always will be.

Just look at cutting 500 calories a day.

Sorry, you can’t lose weight through exercise only. You’ll feel better and probably look more toned but you won’t lose weight.

If you dislike diets, try looking at it as a lifelong adjustment of your eating habits to something sustainable and healthy.

I've never dieted in my life, it's always exercise that determines my weight. I eat pretty healthy food but I also eat like a horse and I never deny myself things (no willpower at all in that area). But I think I'm lucky, I'm tall and muscular and seem to have a high metabolism. I think it's a very individual thing.

My 1200 diet was 2 heck chicken sausages with eggs (1 full eggs and 3 egg whites) and spinach, post workout protein shake) made with water, lunch was chicken, walnuts and salad, dinner was fish, new potatoes and green veg. Snacks rice cakes with Greek yogurt and jam. Lots of protein, reduced carbs. Once I lost the weight I increased my calories to 1800 and added toast at breakfast and sweet potato at lunch. I lost 1 pound a week and have kept it off for over a year. I weight train now which has changed my body shape completely- I worked with a trainer for workout and diet advice. Would highly recommend even in short term to get you started. I am 5,2 and went from 10 to 9 stone - size 12 to an 8/10

Fwiw I'm nearly 6' and have been a lean size 10 when I was exercising loads (bigger than that now).

Exercise will get you fitter and improve mental health, so good for you!

But like others have said it will make little difference to weight loss and actually will increase your appetite, especially if you're doing cardio.

I recently got my BMI from 25 to 21 and I have to consistantly eat 1000 or less per day as well as exercising to steadily lose 0.5lbs a week. I do it a couple of weeks at a time to lose 1lb, then eat more to maintain, then eat less again for a bit etc.

They say it takes a deficit of 3500 kcals to lose 1lb but there's evidence now this actually differs from person to person, from my food diary App and tracking my weight, it looks like I need a deficit of more like 4300 to lose 1lb.

I'm a shorty as well and even marathon training (running up to 50 miles a week) doesnt help!

When I exercised once a week I weighed about 78kg. Now i exercise most days I weigh around 72kg. My BMI is 25 so I am technically overweight but I think I look ok (and do a lot of weights) so don't worry about it too much. If I wanted to lose weight I'd need to cut out biscuits!

Yes exercise will make a difference as long as you don’t eat extra because it gives you an appetite.

But if you have the discipline to do your spin (which is great by the way- well done!) you probably have the strength of mind to leave out one snack or dessert or slice if bread a day too.

I can’t be doing with ‘dieting’ either but I have lost 7Kg since June by simply eating sensible healthy meals, not having second helpings or random bits of toast and either walking or swimming most days I’m a moderate way. I.e not hiking up mountains or thrashing up and down the pool for an hour at speed.

You don’t need to take up a drastic diet, a small adjustment to complement your excercise efforts will work wonders .
Good luck!

I've lost a stone and a half through a gym weightloss programme and three weights workouts a week this year. My body shape has definitely changed - I'm slimmer than I was when I weighed about a stone less. I watch my macros and count calories. Workouts are about 45 mins including warm up and stretching afterwards. You do not need to spend hours in the gym. The only time I have ever felt hungry has been when I've been on a long walk, i.e. over seven miles.

God I hate sounding like one of those proper fitness people, but lifting weights changed my fitness/fatness journey completely. I lost my pregnancy weight and toned up so much over Lockdown by following some Darebee workouts (would advise a PT or someone knowledgeable to get you started and check your form, and then a mirror if you do home workouts). I honestly didn’t set out to change my diet much, but once I started seeing results (after just a couple of weeks I could see the beginnings of abs!) I found myself being more focused on healthy eating and honestly didn’t want to snack as much. Plus I tend to workout around 7pm, which used to be my prime snacking time. I still have take outs every few weeks, and I definitely have chocolate or a biscuit or something everyday.

I’m probably doing 45mins of strength training 4 times a week, with some cardio thrown in a couple of times a week (EMKFit on YouTube is my go to). I mix up heavy weights and low reps, with some lighter weights at much higher reps.
(I also walk a lot pushing a heavy pram, but I tend not to count that as a workout!)

I’m back in my teenage Levi’s, have a lot more muscle definition and actually enjoy it (and this comes from someone who skived every PE lesson and always found sport dull). And I’ve lost at least a stone in about a month, but I’m honestly less focused on the numbers because I like how I look in the mirror.
So- long story short. Get into lifting if you can!

And of course exercise leads to weight loss if the sums add up; calories expended need to be more than calories consumed. Exercise increases calories used up.

However if you build muscle and lose fat you will be toned and smaller but muscle is heavier than fat so the effect on weight isn’t as dramatic as the effect in your size and shape.

But for the long term muscle uses more calories than fat so your metabolism is raised and you are less likely to pile it in again while you maintain exercise.

I was really fit, lean and muscley. Then stopped exercise due to work and childcare and went to fat and out on weight, eating the same. Now back to moderate exercise and sensible eating and it has made a slow, steady But noticeable difference.

@SwimmingOnEggshells it’s all about the hormones, insulin especially. Balance blood sugars (this will reduce cravings), don’t have heavily processed carbs, stick to a wide variety of veggies, fish, chicken, meats (if not veggie) beans & pulses, good fats etc. Hit alcohol & sugar on the head. To lose weight it’s not just about calorie deficit it’s about content. See the Obesity Code by Dr Jason Fung. It’ll all make sense then. Good luck!

5'1 here and I've managed to get down from a BMI of 26 to 24 over 3-4 months which I'd estimate was probably 60% exercise and 40% eating healthily. I started couch25k in June. Prior to that I'd been trying to eat healthily but not really losing weight - drinking more water and fewer milky coffees, eating plenty of fruit and veg, having filling meals like porridge. I carried on with this while running, and planned to make sure I had small high protein snacks after running to help with muscle repair and avoid the temptation to scoff biscuits and undo all the benefits of the running.

For the first two months I didn't lose weight at all, though having one of those sensor scales I could see my muscle percentage going up and fat going down while my overall weight was stable. But towards the end of the programme, as my weekly mileage and time increased, overall weight gradually started to decrease. I think one hugely important factor is the impact of exercise, particularly outdoor exercise, on mood, which I found decreases the urge to comfort eat. Plus I'm now a bit addicted to running and have taken up a virtual Lands End to John O Groats challenge which is encouraging me to keep increasing my weekly mileage.

So while exercise isn't the be all and end all, from my experience I'd say as long as your diet isn't too unhealthy, it's possible for exercise to tip the balance between gradual weight gain and gradual weight loss, and at whatever weight you are it is likely to make you both healthier and happier.

Michael Mosley is a god in our house. I went from bmi 27 to 21 was a size 14 45 year old mum just measured my waist and googled result and I have the same waist measurement as Gwyneth! Do spin cardio most days and use dh old weights. Don’t eat anything until lunch so 16 hour fast but weirdly don’t get hungry before then realise now my being starving before lunch was a carb crash 🙄

Wow, thank you everyone for your replies. Hearing people's different experiences is great. I'm going to slog on for now and continue to eat healthy, nourishing food, no snacks, no cake and limited alcohol on the weekend and see how I get on.

If I don't get any results after a few weeks I might add in some weights.

@neverenoughchelseaboots I might set up a thread on the weight-loss section if you fancy joining me?

One thing that exercise really helps with is I think you do tend to eat less crap. Or at least I do. If I spent 45 mins doing cardio, I am a lot less likely to reach for chocolate 1) cause I feel good and 2) I don't want to undo my work...So you're definitely on the right track and wish you good luck!