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!

Yes but weights build muscle and muscle uses more calories for basic metabolism so you use more in your ‘resting’ state.

Both cardio and weights are important .

Can I ask people who say that exercise makes no difference to weight loss why not? If you expend 250 cals swimming or at the gym, that is 250 cals that do not get stored as fat.

Can I ask people who say that exercise makes no difference to weight loss why not? If you expend 250 cals swimming or at the gym, that is 250 cals that do not get stored as fat

My interpretation is that people expend 250cals at the gym, think that exercise gives them room to eat more.

If you eat maintenance calories or less, and add in exercise, it will make a difference. If you up your calories to allow for the exercise, it won’t. And for many people exercise makes them hungry, so it’s easy to eat the calories burned if you aren’t monitoring food intake.

Can I ask people who say that exercise makes no difference to weight loss why not?

As alluded to earlier people vastly overestimate how many calories they burn. Every time I go to the gym half the people there are just flip flopping around not working up a sweat and thinking that their one hour of low activity allows them a food treat later.

Yes but weights build muscle and muscle uses more calories for basic metabolism so you use more in your ‘resting’ state.

Cardio builds muscle too, and the calories burnt with cardio far exceed those from weights. But yes both are important. I've just read 'Exercised' by Daniel Lieberman which is hugely informative and very interesting on all things exercise related (and quite a lot on diet and lifestyle too).

Can I ask people who say that exercise makes no difference to weight loss why not? If you expend 250 cals swimming or at the gym, that is 250 cals that do not get stored as fat
People (and their apps) tend to overestimate the calories burnt and then inadvertently overeat. I run 1 miles every day but rarely burn more than 600 calories in doing so, according to my Garmin, because I don't have a very high heart rate.

You might find doing something that's a lot less intensive works. Pilates for example is great for toning, strengthening and refining without the high impact of things like running. Many people doing high impact exercise end up ravenous so the cycle continues - burning calories but also putting in more calories. Everyone's bodies are different too - what works for one, doesn't work for someone else. I can maintain my weight/clothes size with pretty much no exercise and eating a balanced diet which includes some junk and treats but also the will power to say to myself if I have a I won't have b. It's worked for me for 25 years but the same approach wouldn't work for someone else. There are also a huge number of medical conditions which affect hormones and metabolism which people have no clue they suffer from so are at such a massive disadvantage to maintaining a healthy weight from the start.

Can I ask people who say that exercise makes no difference to weight loss why not? If you expend 250 cals swimming or at the gym, that is 250 cals that do not get stored as fat*

Various reasons. It takes a surprisingly large amount of exercise to burn off even the calories in a single banana. And people often overestimate how much exercise they do and underestimate how much they eat. Plus exercising makes you hungry.

Also your body/brain doesn't want you to use more calories than you're eating, because if we were still cavemen, that would be a bad thing! So your body metabolically compensates. There was an article about it in the Independent
here

Could anyone tell me if doing 3 x 45 minute Hiit classes, 2 x strength and 1 x 20km vigorous bike ride is actually a good exercise plan? I eat toast for breakfast, nuts and seeds for snacks, vegetables for lunch and then a 'normal' dinner and not shifting any weight particularly can't really work out what I'm doing wrong!

(all classes are 45 mins so prob 35 mins of exerciser if not counting warm up and cool down so maybe not long enough?)

@Chantelli

Could anyone tell me if doing 3 x 45 minute Hiit classes, 2 x strength and 1 x 20km vigorous bike ride is actually a good exercise plan? I eat toast for breakfast, nuts and seeds for snacks, vegetables for lunch and then a 'normal' dinner and not shifting any weight particularly can't really work out what I'm doing wrong!

Breakfast and snacks. Skip the toast, eat the seeds and nuts with lunch, nothing else until dinner.

You're not in calorie deficit. That's the simple answer. You need to work out your TDEE and eat fewer calories consistently.

Oh wow goodness 😮 I guess I thought I must be! Will work out tdee, off to Google

@Chantelli

Oh wow goodness 😮 I guess I thought I must be! Will work out tdee, off to Google

It really depends on how much you eat. Is it one toast or 3. Is it half a handful if nuts or handful and half. Is normal dinner cooked with 2 spoons of oil? It's the small things usually.

But wow! With your workouts😮 I would never imagine person eating sensibly would not lose few kilo.

Do you actually need to lose weight? You must be pretty fit and muscly compared to less active people.