Originally Posted by
terrymorse
This "common wisdom" doesn't hold water.
With no changes to my eating habits, I started cycling each day on June 25th, About 12 hours per week of cycling on average (~5000 Calories per week).
I've been tracking my weight and body fat on a Health Mate scale. As of July 16th (21 days later), my:
• weight decreased by 3.4 lbs
• body fat went from 22 lbs to 17 lbs
A better statement of the "common wisdom":
You can lose weight by exercise alone, but only if you are willing to exercise enough to make a difference.
Originally Posted by
Iride01
I can't disagree with that.
Though I have had issues with short hard rides leaving me feeling hungrier later that evening or next day though. So if one doesn't track their food intake they might just replace or over replace the amount of Calories they just spent riding and not realize it. Medium to low effort rides don't leave me wanting so much to eat no matter what length of ride.
If I might add - to become really relevant, along with what Terrymorse and Iride01 have postulated, I would add WHAT you eat and WHEN are important in the process.
Quality of the nutrition and amounts relative to what the body can properly use, are also important. We all know the heavy Fats and Sugar are not just poor nutrition, but also huge contributors to over-weight.
WHEN: I think there have been studies that eating late in the day and then keeping a regular breakfast/mid-day and again late evening meals/food, make losing weight very difficult and often not possible. The body very eagerly will process extra calories, which don't go directly into metabolic functions, into more stored fat. And on the other end, the body very reluctantly releases stored fat to be used for needs later on.
I'll pull out the EURO hat and note that in many European areas , breakfasts are light, MidDay is the heavy meal and then again a moderate supper...
That is somewhat COUNTERED in the warm climate countries, like Spain, Portugal and Mid to southern Italy. In Spain especially, it's common to have a heavy/meaty dinner meal very late, like 10:30/11 PM... I always had a difficult time when having to spend time in Spain and needing to follow their customs... But, they do eat very light in the AM... and not so much at Mid-Day.
Anyway, it's not just total calories IN/OUT, What and When are also important. Not new info, but easy to forget when a snack urge strikes... (I plead 'guilty', more often than I'd prefer...)
Ride On
Yuri