Does exercise really not help with weight loss?

[GorgeousLadyofWrestling]

Surely, it must?

I have always adhered to “you can’t out train a bad diet” but surely, lots of exercise must help a bit?

For context, I’m quite overweight, would like to lose about 20kg, and steadily losing about .5kg a week. Which is fine because I have lost it all quickly before and then immediately put it all back on. So I am focusing on low calories using MFP. I have around 1400 a day.

During the first lockdown and all last summer, I got into cycling. I bought a road bike and started cycling to work. It’s about a 30 mile round trip. So I can’t wait to be doing that two-three times a week when go back in the office, because for me - cycling is pure joy.

In December, I started c25k and now manage a 5k, three times a week. I am very slow and I find it quite gruelling and hard. But I don’t plan on stopping because this is a huge achievement - I never ever ever ran before and I don’t plan on losing the gains I’ve made.

In addition I also use weights at least 3 times a week. I don’t “eat back” any calories burnt - I just try to stick to my limit, with or without exercise because I think it’s easy to over estimate calories burned and easy to under estimate calories consumed.

But surely...surely doing something every day that whilst not extremely strenuous but still, moderately strenuous would contribute to weight loss??

If I'm exercising I can't eat at the same time 😁.

If I do a combat or attack class I can burn about 450-500 calories

Of course it can help but it's much easier to cut out the calories in food than to try to work them off. Eg you could easily take in 1000 calories in junk food but it would take a lot of exercise to work that odd.

off, not odd.

@Awarsewolf I have a Polar chest strap.

There’s a website that tells you how many calories burned by weight, length of time or distance and speed. At my weight and speed cycling, it reckons 600. My polar has it similar. But who knows

Nope my bread and butter is coming out nearer 500.
2 x 40g bread is 200
40g butter is about 280.

Ok I know someone will come back saying 40g is loads but it's not as much as you think. Weigh bread, spread normally, reweigh.

I find having fitness targets encourages me to eat better, it seems to be easier to avoid junk food if I'm in a good exercise regime.

If I've done a good workout I quite fancy a mackeral salad or some scrambled eggs on wholemeal toast after. If I've been slobbing around on the sofa I'm more likely to have something less worthy!

My running is 300 cals per hour.

It definitely helps, but as others have said exercise doesn't burn anywhere near as many calories as most people think, so you need to reduce intake too.
I find that regular exercise makes me look better because I'm more toned, even if I haven't lost significant weight. I think it contributes quite a lot to inch loss for me, but not that much to weight loss. I've lost a lot of weight through diet over the last year or so, but still had a waist measurement that was too big, until I started doing regular core exercises. And of course exercise has a multitude of other benefits too. So its a good thing to do for lots of reasons, but it wont be very effective as a weight loss technique unless uou also modify your diet.

I don't really agree with the 80% / 20% and think that exercise has had far more importance for me in losing 3 stones. I started with 5:2, then moved onto 16:8 and have now just moved to a later breakfast after I've exercised. I haven't counted calories at all or weighed portions, so have eaten normal family meals, cake, chocolate etc.. Obviously, there is some calorie reduction associated with intermittent fasting, but I haven't had to think about it and have genuinely eaten freely. The biggest difference, I think, is that I've found maintaining my weight to be easy (have kept it off for a year now) and can more or less eat whatever I want. I'm a runner, but also cycle and lift weights/do some general strength type stuff. I know it's anecdotal, but I have to say that the only people I know who have lost weight and kept it off are those that have got quite heavily into exercise.

As well as eating the calories back there's quite a well known effect where people reduce their non formal exercise (NEAT) when they've done a hard cardio session eg you go for a long run but then sit on the sofa the rest of the day and don't do housework or walk to the shops. It's not a conscious thing so people don't realise they are doing it.

NEAT is a big contributor to weight maintenance and I think that's why lockdown has been so bad for people. They've lost all those little bits of exercise. I have a job where I walk around on site a fair bit. Not strenuous manual labour by any means but I just get up and down a fair bit. It shocked me when we went to wfh some days how I could literally be rooted to a chair all day and how shit it makes me feel. DH has a job like that all the time and it's definitely harder for him to keep weight off than me.

Since I've known about the importance of this effect I make a conscious effort eg to always take the stairs rather than the lift, never drive if I could walk or cycle. I say to myself when forcing myself to take the stairs 'this is free exercise. Think how much you pay for the gym so don't pass this up!' If you make sure to add those little things on to your formal exercise it definitely makes a difference.

Exercise definitely helps. I started doing 4 bootcamps a week a few months ago. I've lost 12lb with zero change to my diet. I know I eat too much. I have no willpower to diet. I love wine and crisps and have them every day. The only solution for me was to radically up the challenging exercise, as I enjoy exercising but hate dieting. I know I'd lose loads more if I also dieted. And it's possible my weight might now stabilise at the new lower but still too-fat weight. but it's better than sitting on the sofa all day.

I think it depends on your body type. If I exercise regularly I stay a size 8 and pretty toned no matter how much I eat. I have a 5 month old DS so only manage to run two or three times a week but we walk 10km+ a day and the wine and chocolate isn't sticking to me.

@Zig4zag

Ok I know someone will come back saying 40g is loads but it's not as much as you think. Weigh bread, spread normally, reweigh.

I’m going to be that someone I do that weighing/reweighing thing - and I use about 9g of butter per slice of bread. 40g is loads.

@TheHoundsofLove you started with 5:2, that's a big calorie deficit which will have been the reason for your weight loss. It honestly helps more than everyone things.

Ok I do like quite a lot on when having bread and butter. But I honestly reckon that most people would be nearer 20g per slice than 10g per slice (Unless as part of a sandwich)

AyyMacarena It obviously did help. But, I honestly don't think I'd have lost weight if I hadn't have got into running. I'm 41 with an underactive thyroid, so 5:2 wouldn't really have given me a huge calorie deficit without exercise, especially as I didn't count calories at all on the non fasting days.

2 x 40g bread is 200
40g butter is about 280

My bread is 160 for 2 slices.

The spread I use is 700/100g, so 10g is 70 cals. I leave it out of the fridge and use a thin spread.

40g is a load of butter. When you look at the 25g markings on a butter block it’s a big chunk- a 6th of a pack.

No way would I use a 250g pack of butter in six days just on two slices of toast every day.

I believe it's over simplified to count exact calories from exercise, but the secondary benefits to metabolism, wellbeing, stress etc must help the overall effort, especially for people who don't already exercise.

Exercise is great for physical health and mental health. For weight loss the benefits are usually overestimated.

Exercise will certainly burn calories. But many people overestimate the amount of calories burned. There’s also the double-hit of exercise making you hungry.

Sadly, although many won’t accept it, weight loss is a simple calories in/calories burned calculation for most people. The easiest way to reduce calorie intake is by eating less.

My bread is 117 per slice.
Butter is 9 cals per gram and I have 10g per slice which is quite thick. I have been known to have more but I do try to keep it down.
So that's 207 per slice.
I try very hard not to add honey too!

It helps weight loss in combination with a healthy diet, but most of the consistently slim people I know are active on a daily basis, even if it’s just walking lots.

And of course exercise is very good for almost every aspect of your health: reduces cancer risk, improves cardiovascular health, reduces risk of high blood pressure and diabetes, great for mental health.

I love how we're all eating bread and butter though. For me it's because it's the only snack left in the house (apart from dark chocolate which is obviously medicinal) 🤔

Exercise definitely helps to control weight. You are literally burning off calories. I enjoy my food, wine & beer and I try to eat healthily most of the time, but I only have so much self-discipline so if I didn’t do plenty of exercise I would find it impossible to maintain a healthy weight. In my experience, the same is true of most people over 30.

It definitely is calories in vs calories out but in practice that's surprisingly hard to work out.

You need to count very accurately as it's easy to underestimate and that is so boring and time consuming measuring and weighing everything that lots of people just won't be able to stick to it. Hence the popularity of IF which means you reduce calories without the faff of counting. Most diets are basically a way of tricking you into eating less calories overall and the one that works best for you is the one you can stick to.

Your body has all kinds of mechanisms to keep the status quo and will subtly try to stop you losing weight because through most of human history losing weight was a bad thing. Hence the NEAT reduction when dieting.

If it was so easy to do then more people would succeed.

The easiest way to reduce calorie intake is by eating less.

But the easiest way to burn calories is exercise. Some of the forms of exercise I'd happily do all day. And have to remind myself to eat something as I genuinely don't get hungry.
In general I've tried to get out of the habit of eating high calorie low value snacks - crisps, doughnuts etc - so that when I am hungry I'm not undoing all the good work in 5 seconds. Bread and butter is the last bastion to defeat!