Stupid question about exercise and weight loss

Wow, what a thread!

A helpful member of this forum once shared some personal exercise data on another thread.
They is “Trickydisco” IIRC.
The data clearly demonstrated they burnt more fat while undertaking low intensity exercise.

Carry on.

Excellent info here. Tagged for reference.

If people are actually reading this I better correct my error on the previous page.

Eat as little fat as possible,, eat less salt, eat 100/200g protein per day, carb up on unprocessed clean food, ride as much as you can, job done.

Its weight based but Protein RDA is more like 50/80g thats not a lot and you can get it from non meat stuff quite easily.

Get a tandem. Take a fat chick for a ride every morning before breakfast.

(or vice versa if you’re lady)

Use resistance exercise to increase your muscle mass too.

Nothing burns through calories like lean (muscle) tissue….even at rest muscle tissue needs an ungodly amount of calories to repair, maintain and grow.

Throw in a gym session when you perform some of the big exercises like squats or deadlifts and you’ll be great, it’ll probably help with cycling too.

Don’t worry about ‘getting too big’….this almost never happens, actually trying to gain muscle mass to the point your clothes don’t fit and you look like a body builder is a lifelong endeavour for most people who are into it….it doesn’t happen by accident when weights are used as supplementary exercise to something like cycling.

In answer to the original question, it will probably be over a period of time.

Initially your body will use glycogen. If you’ve eaten recently this will be replaced through your digestive system. If you’ve not I assume that your body responds (releases glucogon?) and starts to metabolize fat reserves. As someone pointed out, your body uses different fat at different times. A lot of it is stored around your organs for protection and you’ll use this last, compared to the wobbly bits you see. If you exercise slowly enough then this should continue to happen which I think is why fasted, slow rides are claimed to work. However, go to hard, your blood sugar drops and you bonk.

After exercise you will still need energy. You body will need to repair itself (the recovery part) as everything in the body is pretty much driven by the same energy reactions (ATP) you will continue to burn extra calories while this happens. Again, if you don’t eat this will probably come from fat but may be diminished and inefficient.

I’ve been trying to lose weight for the upcoming hill climb season. I’ll consider it a success if I get to about 72kg losing about 3kg. For me that is enough to make me look skinny and not really sustainable as I like cake too much. My approach has been to eat sensibly on days when I’m training and not cut back on calories. I have been weighing a few things and it surprised me how little I need to eat even hitting 3000+ calories in a day. I have cut back calories on rest days but have made sure my diet is still balanced so I am recovering and not losing strength.

Don’t cut out food while riding. Just be mindful of what you eat. You can become reliant on gels and drinks when in reality they are not needed for normal riding. I use them, but only in specific examples like racing or very (very) long rides where calorie counting is purely done to makes sure I’m in excess.

GI seems to have gone out of fashion recently but it is still worth considering. Complex carbs will help you feel full and regulate your blood sugar. Haribo and refined simple carbs cause spikes and dips which make it harder to control your appetite. Finally, eat lots of veg, you need to eat a hell of a lot of things like broccoli to get 2000 calories.

I have been weighing a few things and it surprised me how little I need to eat even hitting 3000+ calories in a day.

So true! I’ve recently taken to carrying a little Tupperware container of peanuts to college or on a long ride etc. It holds 200g, so I typed that into the Internet to see how many calories. 1,134!!!!

I am not sure about the relationship between calories used when cycling and weight loss – I don’t seem to lose much weight even if I do a long (100 mile or more) ride.

Whereas if I run the weight drops off much more quickly.

I am lazy enough to mostly run right in the ‘fat-burning’ zone, whereas I guess that I am not in that zone when cycling.

re portion size – just get used to feeling slightly hungry before each scheduled meal, if you are not then cut back on the previous portion.

Agree with a lot of what has been written here.

I’m training for the Chester marathon at the minute and find the long runs of 2-3.5 hours can easily be done on water plus a banana.

I put this down to the intensity of the exercise. Your body does not use glycogen then fat, in that order, but a mixture of the two. At lower intensity your energy requirements are lower and so the slower ‘fat metabolism’ can satisfy a larger proportion of the requirement. This means that your glycogen stores will last longer.

The vast majority of my runs are done at 75% of my maximum heart rate or less, which I could probably maintain until my feet were burger meat.

Matt

I am lazy enough to mostly run right in the ‘fat-burning’ zone, whereas I guess that I am not in that zone when cycling.

There was a study recently that called the “fat buring zone” stuff into question. It basically showed that whatever intensity you trained your burned the same amount of fat. At higher intensities you were also buring more glycognen.

The differences between your running and cycling may be the other way round, running will naturally burn many more cals per hour than cycling, so it’s simply the number of cals you are burning that causes you to lose weight from running. You may also be running in a more fasted state than you cycle as you subconciously fuel up for a long bike ride but are fasted when running.

I’ve found that to lose weight through cycling the best approach is fasted rides before/without breakfast. The intensity wasn’t really important and most rides would include a couple of efforts at least due to where I live being bloody hilly. But over time my body became more adjusted to using fat as a source of energy. They only time I would feel exhausted was if I went over threshold. The effort was fine but afterwards my body wanted fuel to recover from the effort.

There was a study recently that called the “fat buring zone” stuff into question. It basically showed that whatever intensity you trained your burned the same amount of fat. At higher intensities you were also buring more glycognen.

That sounds interesting I’d like to read that. Have you got a link? 🙂

If you want to lose weight then you have to be at calorific deficit.

You have a certain number of calories your body needs for essential functions to keep you alive. You then require a certain amount of energy for whatever you do on top of that (e.g: bike riding, gym etc.).

If your calorie requirements are not met by your intake, then your body will burn fat to make up the deficit. If you take in more than you need, your body will store it as fat. That’s all there is to weight loss and gain. Pretty much everything else is of negligible benefit to the general populace, and some of it is arguably harmful.

wobbliscott – Member
…we’ve evolved to eat fat not carbs…

I keep hearing that mentioned, but I wonder if it’s a proven fact or an assumption.

I can’t think of any of the apes that are particularly carnivorous. They will consume meat, but it’s mainly a plant based diet, and our dentition is that of an omnivore.

Especially when you consider how many health problems seem to involve a large % meat diet.

Re. adding muscle / weight training, i’ve read various places that the calorie burning is more about the calories the “extra” muscle requires to recover & repair after training than simply burning through layers of fat whilst you sit & watch tv. Apparently at rest, pound for pound, muscle & fat cells require a relatively low amount of calories just to maintain & it’s only when you start to really work the muscle it starts demanding considerably more.

Numbers i’ve seen floating around previously suggest that adding an extra 1lb of muscle will chew through 50cals per day just doing nothing, however other studies suggest it’s closer to a tenth of that – which sounds more believable as otherwise anyone who stuck on 20lbs of muscle through weight training would require an extra 1000 calories per day just to prevent their body from gradually eating itself.

Weight training is very good for burning calories & I find it helps on the bike, even doing stuff like kettlebells which is good for building core muscle strength a couple of times per week helps loads. I do 2 x 45 minute classes per week – started mostly using the 12/14kg weights & now mostly use the 24/28kg ones & feel much stronger on the bike for it – still no 6 pack & rippling biceps though, my weight & general appearance are pretty much the same… maybe a bit more muscle and a bit less fat but not so you’d notice 😕

It takes very dedicated training, or access to some excellent anabolics to build 20lbs of muscle.

I think the figure quoted for newbie gains is 0.5lbs a week. So 40 weeks’ worth of training for a man. The average giffer has probably quit the gym in 4 weeks to party with the lads, or because he HAS to have a bottle of red wine every Friday night, or because KFC night is a tradition with his housemate.

If you want to see your 6 pack, then lose fat by eating at a calorific deficit. Everyone has “abs” they’re just hidden under a layer of fat.

Going from 2×10 to ss has made a difference for me same rides. still the gears for social rides. But working harder, working body harder and there’s more bulk on the leg muscles

It’s a lot more complicated than pepole think. A lot depends on your physiological profile, how your body responds and the kind of riding you do when you are riding. Two people can do the same ride at the same pace and one can burn lots of fat, the other lots of glycogen.

Losing weight AND training to improve at the same time can be easy if you are an unfit biffer, but CAN rather difficult if you are already quite fit and want to get down to race weight.

I’ve observed that the most weight loss comes from the biggest change in habit. People who have always been fit and are trying to get down to single digits body fat – that’s hard. Couch potatoes who think crisps and pop constitutes lunch and then decided to clean up their act seem to be able to lose 30kg or so just by being sensible.

There was a study recently that called the “fat buring zone” stuff into question. It basically showed that whatever intensity you trained your burned the same amount of fat. At higher intensities you were also buring more glycognen.

That ties in with traditional thinking. The ‘fat burning’ zone isn’t where you burn the most fat, it’s where you burn the most fat for the least effort. So you need to stay in it for hours. Anything above that and you won’t be able to stay in it for as long.

Well as I started this I suppose I should report back in 🙂

I rode my usual xc 40 miler yesterday at my usual pace but this time without any additional food before, nothing except water during, and nothing excessive after. Felt great throughout and for some reason a lot less fatigued afterwards. Given that I’m limiting myself to around 1500 cals daily and that I hadn’t eaten since the evening before I expected to feel a bit shit on the ride particularly as most of 2800 ft of climbing is in the second half. Not at all though. Felt very comfortable, empty and kind of warm. I’m guessing that’s the fat burning zone. It appears to be the case according to my scales today although I’m sure there’s other factors like hydration in that also.

I think this approach combined with my 1500 cal daily limit and achingly wholesome diet should get me to where I’m going. Then I’ll work on getting fast 🙂

That ties in with traditional thinking. The ‘fat burning’ zone isn’t where you burn the most fat, it’s where you burn the most fat for the least effort. So you need to stay in it for hours. Anything above that and you won’t be able to stay in it for as long.

No, the traditional thinking was that out of the fat burning zone you switch from fat to gylcogen and don’t burn fat. So intense exercise wouldn’t help you lose fat.

That has been called into question. I think the study was reported on cycling weekly. I’ll try to dig it out.

I rode my usual xc 40 miler yesterday at my usual pace but this time without any additional food before, nothing except water during, and nothing excessive after. Felt great throughout and for some reason a lot less fatigued afterwards. Given that I’m limiting myself to around 1500 cals daily and that I hadn’t eaten since the evening before I expected to feel a bit shit on the ride particularly as most of 2800 ft of climbing is in the second half. Not at all though. Felt very comfortable, empty and kind of warm. I’m guessing that’s the fat burning zone. It appears to be the case according to my scales today although I’m sure there’s other factors like hydration in that also.
I think this approach combined with my 1500 cal daily limit and achingly wholesome diet should get me to where I’m going. Then I’ll work on getting fast

This is all good to hear. If you are able to pull off this kind of regime and still feel ok then it sounds to me like you are quids in! Let us know how it goes 🙂

No, the traditional thinking was that out of the fat burning zone you switch from fat to gylcogen and don’t burn fat

I’d never heard it explained like that, but I think a lot of people misunderstood it to be that.

Yossarian, that sounds like when I do fasted rides except it took me a lot of training to be able to do it, certainly was not able on my first try! You might find though that your fatigue builds up over a few rides.. But you might not!

So this fasted riding thing.

Normally before a ride I’d have something sensible like a bowl of porridge, and a cup of coffee. I then eat ‘as needed’ on the ride, so probably something every hour and that’s usually a gel, or half a cereal bar, or (mid ride stop) a croissant or similar. So eating relatively frequently but way less than the sports science folks would have you believe, which is 2-3 gels per hour or equiv for someone of my body mass, riding at a reasonable intensity (last sunday’s ride for example was 44 miles in 3:23 with 935m climbing; 28% at less than 70% intensity, 30% at 70-80% intensity, 31% at 80-90% intesnsity and 11% >90%, according to HRM. ie; not just a bimble)

I get the bit about necking an expresso and going for it, but then how long before starting to refuel? If i do the same ride as above (which i will tomorrow give or take) I know i can’t do that on water and air alone. Do i ride until I reach the point where I feel hungry, which’ll be quite quick, do i set an hour or 90 minutes and then start, or do i wait until I’m already thinking about the calorific content of grass and whether there are any discarded sandwiches in the bin at the bus stop before giving in?

[edit – and I understand longer rides at lower intensity being less bonk inducing, but i have a time window to stick to and in any case, with 900m in 40 miles and a few 20% gradients I’m going to be in Z4 or Z5 like it or not]

I’d never heard it explained like that,

Obviously it’s not that simple!

But the general concensus was that there is a “Fatmax” intensity where you burn the most fat per hour. It was thought to be about 60% of VO2max. Over that and the theory was you burn less fat per hour, not just less fat as a % of total energy but less fat for the same amount of time.

The German study tried to replicate this but actually found that fat burned per hour was constant and didn’t vary with intensity. So training at “Fatmax” had no benefit. If you had loads of time and wanted to minimise your training load the you could go lower than 60% of VO2max and still burn fat but if time is limited you will still burn as much fat if you train at 90% of VO2max vs 60%. Training at higher intensity is obviously better for us plebs who have to fit it in around the rest of life and therefore don’t have endless hours to plod around at low intensity hoping to burn fat.

It is also easier to create a callorie deficit at higher intesities which has the added benefit of not just burning fat but preventing the body from being able to store new fat.

So basically if you go to the gym for 2-3 hours a week training in the fat burning zone is potentially twaddle.

I found the link: http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/fitness/training/what-is-your-peak-fat-burn-intensity-22702

Ironically the new study is actually closer to your undertanding than the traditional views on the subject.

My experience of it is that fatmax and all this twaddle is bascially useless in an average person. What really makes the difference is diet combined with exercising while fasted. Your body can’t burn glycogen at any intensity if there isn’t any.

Yossarian, that sounds like when I do fasted rides except it took me a lot of training to be able to do it, certainly was not able on my first try! You might find though that your fatigue builds up over a few rides.. But you might not!

I was surprised at how good I felt. Kept waiting for the bonk which never came. I’m still carrying a couple of gels in case I get into trouble though!

I will be riding this loop 6 times in the next 12 days and every one of those is planned to be a fasted ride so we’ll see how I feel at the end of that! 🙂

45 minutes.

The theory is that eating food promotes insulin secretion, and that insulin suppressed lipolysis. So if you eat something your body tends not to burn fat. Then when you exercise you ate burning more carbs, which depletes glycogen which makes you hungry for carbs and you then eat them and so it continues.

The effect of insulin on lipolysis might last many hours so before breakfast is ideal. Of course carb rich foods promote lots of insulin but all foods do a bit.

After 45 mins or so your body should have warmed up on fat and used a bit of glycogen stores, so then when you eat carbs during the ride the insulin is helping the muscles take up the stuff you eat.

That’s what I was told anyway, seems to match my experiences. Be really fasted before you start, like 4 hours at least, then ride for 45 mins before your gel or jelly babies or whatever. I find that if I do this I end up consuming waaay less carbs throughout the ride, so it would seems to be working somehow or other. Also it’s really good endurance training in itself regardless of fat loss.

Fasted training is a pretty old idea – train low, race high. However make sure you eat carbs afterwards to recover.

Ta. Will give it a go tomorrow. If you see a man chewing his own leg off on barhatch lane, you’ll know I’ve waited too long.

I also find that I can ride very well on a fasted ride but only up to a certain intensity. If I sprint over a certain level that’s when I feel knackered.

Solo – Member
A helpful member of this forum once shared some personal exercise data on another thread…The data clearly demonstrated they burnt more fat while undertaking low intensity exercise.

Hardly an exhaustive sample group! Google “fat burning myth” there’s tonnes of info.

“The fat-burning zone is a concept that the body burns a greater amount of fat at lower-intensity aerobic exercise than it does at higher intensities. Actually, the body burns a greater percentage of fat at lower intensities than at higher intensities. At lower intensities the body may burn 50 percent of the calories from fat, while at higher intensities it may only burn 35 percent. But at higher intensities you burn way more total calories—and more fat calories overall—than you do at lower intensities.”

way less than the sports science folks would have you believe, which is 2-3 gels per hour

Do the sports science people work for the marketing department of people who sell gels?

I get the bit about necking an expresso and going for it, but then how long before starting to refuel? If i do the same ride as above (which i will tomorrow give or take) I know i can’t do that on water and air alone. Do i ride until I reach the point where I feel hungry, which’ll be quite quick, do i set an hour or 90 minutes and then start, or do i wait until I’m already thinking about the calorific content of grass and whether there are any discarded sandwiches in the bin at the bus stop before giving in?

[edit – and I understand longer rides at lower intensity being less bonk inducing, but i have a time window to stick to and in any case, with 900m in 40 miles and a few 20% gradients I’m going to be in Z4 or Z5 like it or not]

This was exactly the scenario I was in this time last year with a trip to the Alps pending. I needed to lose some weight to get up the road climbs. I managed to go from 90-95kgs down to 80kgs in about 7/8 months. My main technique was eating a lot less and fasted rides. All of my rides were in the peaks so hard to not be in Z4 all of the time!

The technique for a fasted ride depends on what presures you have on that ride, if you need to stay with a group or can ride at your own pace. I found at first I would eat about 90 mins to 120 mins into the ride to avoid a bonk and then only one gel or cerial bar, I did bonk a few times which hurts but doesn’t really matter if it’s just a training ride. After doing the fasted riding thing for a few months I could easily go for a 3 hour ride in the peaks without eating and put in a couple of 20 min threshold efforts during the ride.

You’ll be suprised how far you can go on water and air once your body is used to it.

The challenge is when you finish you feel lilke you could eat the contents of the fidge and the fridge its self. Obviously you need to eat to recover but I found that dring copious amounts of green tea gave me a way of staving of the hunger and was able to resist eating apart from regular means.

You can become reliant on gels and drinks when in reality they are not needed for normal riding.

+8 million

It always amazes me at how many people inhale what are essentially mini mars bars and cans of fanta dressed up as ‘sports nutrition’ on a ride.

way less than the sports science folks would have you believe, which is 2-3 gels per hour

That’s the maximum amount you can consume – doesn’t mean you should. Unless you are XC racing or something.

when in reality they are not needed for normal riding.

Depends what you mean by normal riding. Some people like a nice long spin, some get a kick out of smashing everything.

I started using energy drink because it made a massive difference to my energy and endurance on rides, which improved my enjoyment immensely. I was only about 20 at the time though, and pretty much a pure sprint athlete in those days.

That was excellent jfletch, thanks for posting that! Here’s the original study if anyone’s interested (I haven’t read it yet):

Link

Do the sports science people work for the marketing department of people who sell gels?

Noooo….. I’m sure it’s entirely independent research.

Don’t get me wrong. i can ride for hours on air and water, but only by managing my intensity at a level that is below a ‘normal’ ride for me. Which involves hills, and just the feeling of spinning along at a decent lick when i can, as opposed to endless hours at 12mph on boring flat roads.

Yeah I feel a marked difference between riding fully carbed up and fasted. I actually often feel worse carbed up, but when I put the hammers down I seem to have a huge reserve of power that lasts much longer that I just don’t have when fasted.

I did my Trans Cambrian way ride fasted, which ended up working out remarkably well except for a major wobble about 4 hours in when I thought I’d never make it. A caffeinated gel set me off like a rocket though which got me through the following 11 hours!

I don’t feel good until I’m running on an empty stomach and can pretty clearly tell when refuellings needed and if my goal is to loose weight thats not often, the point carbs are needed will be individual to you and you’ll only know it after you’ve blown a few times.

A flat out ride in group that I can’t control the pace has me eating every carb possible pretty quickly but that situation is rare and weight loss is not the goal.

We are concentrating on gels for carbs btw but I’ll take anything and would probably prefer banana and dates but gels or drink additives are just convenient.

Bananas would be great if they weren’t so fragile, and if they were a less awkward shape. Can we get some genetic engineers working on this?

Do the sports science people work for the marketing department of people who sell gels?

Yes, I always wonder about who’s supplying the funding. I kind of wish they stated it as part of the citation! 🙂