Exaggeration

In an attempt to remain motivated i like to read as much on nutrition, exercise and fat lose as i can as well as following blogs and listening to pod casts. I also subscribe to many discussion groups on this subject and have a great interest in the responses to the various topics.

I am astounded with the amount of BS and misinformation as well as the incredible contradictions of 'studies' and common knowledge. I've been wondering for a while what this all means and how it came to be that we could know so little about such an important subject. As we decode the genome and CERN's LHC seeks the boson how is it that we have an obesity pandemic that we don't seem to know the slightest thing about?

I've come to the conclusion that it's all a matter of exaggeration. This happens for a range of reasons, firstly that it is human nature to overstate things, secondly that it is human nature to look for the easy option and thirdly that marketing nutrition relies on the first two reasons to a large degree in the fight for a piece of this multi-billion dollar industry.

If all the methods of weight lose being touted had the results claimed then combining them would make the international concern 'underweight' rather than obesity. Plus we'd get there with no effort and everyone would be happy. As this isn't the case let's look at some of these elements and what i feel about them.

• Multiple meals per day - often we hear we need to eat six small meals, sometimes more, to burn fat and gain muscle etc. Doing this will increase our BMR while not allowing us to get hungry. Sounds logical as the body always has something to burn it should keep burning and easy as the glutton in us likes to eat more often and the lazy person in us does not want to be hungry. But really, how do you lose weight if you always have food to burn and how do you restrict how much you eat at each session if you don't want to be hungry and like to eat so much. This approach might help but only a little and it takes more discipline, not less.
• Interval training - old steady state cardio sucks and interval training is the new thing, it is apparently 9 times more effective. Really? if it's that effective there should be 9 times as many slim people as before, or something seriously visible as a result. If i lost 10kg in two months before using a steady state approach then now with intervals i should have lost more than 90kgs (wouldn't that be nice). Personally i do believe that intervals are better than steady state for me but my reasons would be different and you cannot say that steady state is bad either. For me personally i like intervals because i can burn more (because i work harder) in a shorter period of time, i really get the feeling of making progress by pushing as hard as i can an increasing that each week and it is not boring like steady state cardio. I like it but 9 times more effective is just plain BS.
• BMR - we often hear that if your intake of calories is less than your BMR you will lose muscle rather than fat. Every one will like this because if sounds like you shouldn't go hungry (remember that hungry is only a state of mind, you can be hungry while eating many times you BMR). This 'fact' makes no sense. If you eat at your BMR and then exercise then your caloric deficit would be less that BMR - what makes this number magic? It is relevant only to when you are doing nothing.
• Keytogenic - Dr. Atkins popularised the no carb revolution which we see resurging time and time again. He didn't invent it, nor did he study it and outside of this element he was a total quake. But it does work, he based the whole diet on studies done by two other doctors who proved that it does work. The principle is simple - burn fat as the only kind of energy (keytones) and when you run out of what you've eaten the body doesn't need to switch formats it just continues with the stored fat. Many don't like it because it is high in fat, many say that it's just water loss (but that's just the first five days) but really this is not healthy because it is so low in fibre and other nutrients one would get from other vegetables and fruits. Low carb is good but has clear down sides as well, plus you just can't do it for long periods of time.
• Carb Cycling - this one i find funny. it's trying to be a keytogenic diet but gives back carbs on "refeed days". The theory is that by having re-carb days you will not get the completely lethargic feeling of a full Keytogenic diet. BUT the lethargic feeling is only on the first few days of such a diet and by not hitting total keytone fuel this completely misses the point. In fact it is proven that when running on keytones the body is more energetic and has better endurance. The US army is looking to develop Keytone MRE's to exploit this fact.
• Diet is a dirty word - we must think lifestyle and not diet because a diet will not last in the future. The problem with this is that diet just means 'what you eat' and therefore saying that diet will not help weight loss is like saying that food will not help life. This is great marketing though as diet implies negative and hungry situations that people don't like. However there is no weight loss without a restrictive diet.
• Protein Shakes - after a workout get liquid protein into your system quickly to maximise the recovery and build muscle. Sounds logical but how much protein does the body need for this, how quickly can it really break it down and build it up and do we really want more calories after we've just burned some? This is not only a waste of money but it might just have a negative effect. Maybe if you are a serious body builder it might be worth looking at but never if you want to lose weight.
• Starvation mode - this theory is in line with many above that if you eat too little you will stop losing weight. Wow, how did we get sucked into this one. If you ate nothing then you lose weight, people who do actually starve because of reasons outside their control do not end up in a (holding pattern) - they lose weight. People that fast for religious purposes and then eat at night do not put all that nutrition to their hips because they have put themselves in starvation mode (actually they lose weight in most cases). This is again the lazy option, i am feeling hungry so i MUST eat otherwise I'll go into starvation mode - what a joke.

It's not hard to see why we are all getting so fat. We are kidding ourselves into the easy ways and then eating like pigs.

We also suffer from short memories. As a boy my father working in a gym (mid seventies i guess) and i remember that the main thing he was doing was circuit training. Funny how this is now what we are told we need to do to lose weight and that 'science shows' that this is the break through we've all been looking for. Maybe it's just a case of 'it used to work and what we are doing clearly doesn't work so let's do that again'

Dad was also a runner, the main technique used at the time to train was Fartlek (spelling) which is very simply interval training - have we really come so far or just full circle.

Personally i like circuits - it just feels right. I like lifting weights and the heavier the better because it make me feel like I'm working out rather than just cheating the system. I also like intervals for the same reason - i work really hard and it feels good without getting bored.

But i do not believe that i will drop massive amounts of weight in a short period of time.

What do you think?