Will exercise help me loose weight even if I am not dieting?

[polealltheway]

So two weeks ago I calorie counter all week and stayed around 1400 cals per day.

Last week I started exercising and didn't do too well with calorie counting, this weekend I have eaten lots and had wine, I enjoy eating what I want on the weekend and find it hard not to.

Anyway my question is if I was to exercise 4 times per week and still have some biscuits or chocolate etc will I still loose some weight or talents get in better shape?

I Just find it so hard to do both at the same time ð???ð???ð???

You lose weight by creating a calorie deficit, which can be by eating less, moving more, or a bit of both. The problem is exercise burns fewer calories than most of us would like, and chocolate contains more, and the temptation is to 'reward' yourself for exercising and undo any benefit (on the calorie front at least, you still get the other benefits of exercising)
How about trying 5:2 then you can still eat what you like at the weekend?

YES!
I lost 8kg through C25K, without consciously changing what I ate. It took about a year.
I have slimmed down more than the weight loss suggests - ie the fat turned to muscle which weighed the same, but took up less space.

What is c25k?

Yes. And you will feel more energized.

C25K is a program to get anyone running for 30mins.
I think it started as a NHS program, but there are now lots of apps. Takes you from nothing to being able to run (I never was one for running).
Summer, I try to run 3 times a week. This winter it seems to have dropped to 1/week, and the weight is creeping back on.

Baking - i did 5'2 last year and lost a stone then stopped loosing so stopped doing it and put on more than the stone I lost

Addicted - really? Wow well done I hate running but did day one of c25k on Thursday last week, did you do anything else?

I am thinking about trying protein shakes again as I am quite greedy when it comes to chocolate and cakes etc!

But you can't stop doing a diet and go back to scoffing chocolate (or whatever made you overweight in the first place) and expect not to put the weight back on when you plateaued that would have been a great time to add in some exercise.

30 min jogging = 300-350 cals = 3/4 of a blueberry muffin

Unless you are an elite athlete training for hours every day you can't exercise enough to have license to eat whatever you like, you need to both exercise and reduce your food intake. If you eat your maintenance calories and then exercise without rewarding yourself with additional food, you would lose about 1/3 of a lb of fat by jogging 4 times a week. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, there are lots of benefits to exercising, just that it's less of a magic wand to weight loss than you'd like to think.

That stacks up with my experience, Bakingtins - 1/3lb/week, over a year would be just under 8kg!

Nope,nothing else! I have two small kids to run round after, and work FT. It was plenty to fit in.

I guess if you could do C25K, and cut out one sweet cake / biscuit / chocolate a day, you'd be well on you way.

I'm not knocking it sugar well done on persevering! I just got the impression op was not the patient type.

As I understand it, a lb is the equivalent of 3,500 calories.

So that's more like 300 minutes jogging for a lb a week. Is that sustainable for you?

The problem with exercise as a weight loss tool is that it makes you more hungry and people (and mfp!) tend to overestimate the calories burned when exercising, so mistakenly believe they can eat more than they should.

Having said that, exercise combined with small dietary changes can lead to very good results, and any increase in activity is a positive thing. Rather than being on a diet, can you 'half' your biscuit/chocolate intake? Make a few healthy swaps?

You'd have to burn 500 extra calories a day in exercise in order to lose weight. That's a fuck lot.

Running a Mile is about 100 calories. So 5 miles a day is 500 calories.

Id love it if exercise was such a great way to lose weight as I love exercising (I do something 5 days a week), but love cake also. Exercising is good for maintaining weight or helping speeding up weight loss, but I dont believe that exercising alone is good enough to lose weight.

Get fit in the gym, lose weight in the kitchen.