Why is it all focussed on calories and not carbs?

[budgie smuggler]

mcelliott said:

This is PH so carbs are bad! Seriously though the amount of people that go on a low or zero carb diet then get very excited that they have lost a ton of weight then re introduce carbs and lose their st cos the scales are giving them a different reading, as mentioned it’s only water, I can do a week on low carbs look absolutely shredded, just one day of carbs and I look softer and weigh slightly more thanks to the increased amount of water but my bf % is exactly the same.

If you look softer, is that not measurable with the calipers? Or are you measuring a BF% different way?

[mcelliott]

budgie smuggler said:

mcelliott said:

This is PH so carbs are bad! Seriously though the amount of people that go on a low or zero carb diet then get very excited that they have lost a ton of weight then re introduce carbs and lose their st cos the scales are giving them a different reading, as mentioned it’s only water, I can do a week on low carbs look absolutely shredded, just one day of carbs and I look softer and weigh slightly more thanks to the increased amount of water but my bf % is exactly the same.

If you look softer, is that not measurable with the calipers? Or are you measuring a BF% different way?

I have a a smart scale at home that I use, connects to my phone so it’s quite a quick and easy way to keep track, calipers are good but unless it’s the same person using them the results can vary hugely

[Gecko1978]

I like to cut carbs as I feel less bloated and as others said chocolate tastes like st after a few weeks. But did a cut Jan and Feb and the strength loss was awful went from benching 45kg dumbells down to 35s and struggling currently I am back to the 40s but way off my peak at 50kg per hand. But hey 45 have an office job so take the small victories. Carbs tend to taste good but the instant hit just leaves you hungry later. Better to focus on healthy diet not a extreme one

[C5_Steve]

Misanthroper said:

After a period of being a lazy git and letting myself go a bit, I recently started the couch to 5k programme (until my calf went pop a couple weeks ago, but that’s another story) and while I’m recovering from the calf I’m doing a bit on an exercise bike to stay at least somewhat active.

I also got a garmin watch which is really good, but as with all of these things everything is focussed around calories burned. So last night I had pasta, so did half an hour on the bike with the intention of getting rid of some of the carbs given how high they are in pastas. Problem is there’s nothing that tracks carbs burned, only calories, and with my (limited) understanding carbs are actually worse to have in excess than calories, but I have no way of tracking what is burned off.

There seems to be a lot of focus on calories and nothing in carbs, and I was wondering whether it’s just too difficult to calculate them in the way we can calories, or it’s just not a stat that people bother tracking for some reason.

I’d love to see a summary of calories and carbs burned in a day or during exercise so I can adjust my diet, especially now I can’t run and need to maintain what I’ve lost mainly though what I eat.

Whilst I don't hold any qualifications in nutrition, I do have some first-hand experience of sustained weight loss and muscle gain over a long period of time so feel I can offer some decent opinion on the subject.

Trying to read up on nutrition and weight loss at the moment can be a bit of a rabbit hole that opens into a minefield, with many, many "influencers" trying to re-invent wheel every Tuesday so you buy or sign up to their plan/scheme/magic beans. Losing weight has always been really simple when looking at the science. You need to expend more energy than you intake, which means you need to burn more calories than you eat. That's it. If you want to put on weight (build muscle) you need to eat more calories than you burn. Simple.

Where those calories come from doesn't really make a huge difference when it comes to weight loss overall but will make a difference to how hungry you feel perhaps. I'll get into that in a second, but for now a calorie tracker of some sort is an essential start to losing weight. I know a few have moaned about having to enter things for a home-cooked meal but this is literally how you learn how many calories are in something so it's almost an education. You want to get to the stage where you can accurately assess the calories in something just by looking at the ingredients. So I would recommend one of the free ones, I've used My Fitness Pal and My Net Diary which is also pretty good. You don't need to know what your body is using as fuel, only that you are expending more than your intake.

So the first thing to do is to work out your calorie deficit. You can let the apps do it, they're not bad at that or look online. Once you know your calorie goal, you should look at the following. You should aim to get around 50-60g of protein a day. Once you've worked out your calories from that amount of protein, you can then get the rest of your calories from carbs or fats. It doesn't matter which, as long as you stay in a calorie deficit. Protein makes you feel fuller for longer and requires a bit more work for your body to digest (burning more calories, albeit tiny amounts) so it'll stop you getting hungry. But the carb/fat part really doesn't matter if you have the protein right.

Two big things to remember:

You cannot gain weight if you are in a calorie deficit. Doesn't matter what you're eating.
You burn most of your calories in your day just living, so any exercise you do is a nice little boost but it's your diet that affects your weightloss the most and is how you'll sustain the weight once.

Hope that's useful!

[PositronicRay]

Gecko1978 said:

I like to cut carbs as I feel less bloated and as others said chocolate tastes like st after a few weeks. But did a cut Jan and Feb and the strength loss was awful went from benching 45kg dumbells down to 35s and struggling currently I am back to the 40s but way off my peak at 50kg per hand. But hey 45 have an office job so take the small victories. Carbs tend to taste good but the instant hit just leaves you hungry later. Better to focus on healthy diet not a extreme one

Not all carbs are equal.

[Misanthroper]

Really good information, thanks, I noticed a significant improvement in my shape after running for 4 weeks, well, I say running, more running, walking, shuffling, walking, crawling, walking, but combined with a better diet it definitely works.

I’ll get my stats in order and track calories while also being conscious of the carbs and fats I’m taking (and the type), I’m going to try a short run tomorrow and see how the calf holds up, really looking forward to being in good shape again and have more enthusiasm for it than I have in ages, hence wanting to make sure I have myself the best shot by knowing how much I’m eating vs how much I’m burning.

[MB140]

heebeegeetee said:

JerseyRoyal said:

Discendo Discimus said:

Burrow01 said:

The heart rate zones will give you a guide on whether your exercise is using carbs or fat for energy. Lower heart rates use fat, higher uses stored carbs (although the pasta you had eaten would not have been absorbed by the time you did your exercise)

It does not really matter if the exercise itself uses fat or carbs, the energy will be replaced using what you have eaten, hence the focus on calories.

If you want to track your carb intake, the MyfitnessPal app will do this.

I really don't get how people can use MyfitnessPal if they have home cooked meals from scratch. Am I expected to enter every single ingredient that goes into my dinner for it to be accurate? I can see how it would be great for someone who has ready meals and can scan a barcode each time, but there's too many variables with home cooked meals for it to be accurate. Sorry for the thread hijack

My partner uses it. The app has ai that will scan recipes to work out your consumption. It’s pretty clever tbh.

Also, you can save home cooked meals and recipes, I imagine you would only have a problem if you were often cooking different, one-time meals. The app can be a faff to begin with, but becomes much easier to use after a week or so.

I’m pretty sure if you make a meal yourself at home you can I put all the data once, create a portion size by weight and store that meal.

Next time so long as you make it the same (as per the recipe), you can then just select it as a meal again. You don’t have to enter all the ingredients every time you make a meal (so long as you follow a recipe and make it the same obviously.

[popeyewhite]

PositronicRay said:

And remember, you can't outrun a poor diet.

Not this again!

I've run half marathons for years and almost all the other runners I know are a healthy weight and eat mostly what they want.

[mcelliott]

popeyewhite said:

PositronicRay said:

And remember, you can't outrun a poor diet.

Not this again!

I've run half marathons for years and almost all the other runners I know are a healthy weight and eat mostly what they want.

Depends what you call a poor diet, go on instagram these days and you’ll see lots of angry people screaming at foods in the aisles, but yeah you can out run a st diet if you train like an animal, I have a friend who’s 2hr 30 man for the marathon, his diet is appalling!
In fact I would go further than that and say you can actually lose weight eating pretty st foods, not the best way but perfectly doable.

Edited by mcelliott on Friday 26th April 21:30

[mooseracer]

mcelliott said:

This is PH so carbs are bad! Seriously though the amount of people that go on a low or zero carb diet then get very excited that they have lost a ton of weight then re introduce carbs and lose their st cos the scales are giving them a different reading, as mentioned it’s only water, I can do a week on low carbs look absolutely shredded, just one day of carbs and I look softer and weigh slightly more thanks to the increased amount of water but my bf % is exactly the same.

This is PH - we "cut out carbs" and we lost weight so carbs are bad. Whereas what they probably did was stop eating quite so much sugar/crap.

[oddman]

mcelliott said:

popeyewhite said:

PositronicRay said:

And remember, you can't outrun a poor diet.

Not this again!

I've run half marathons for years and almost all the other runners I know are a healthy weight and eat mostly what they want.

Depends what you call a poor diet, go on instagram these days and you’ll see lots of angry people screaming at foods in the aisles, but yeah you can out run a st diet if you train like an animal, I have a friend who’s 2hr 30 man for the marathon, his diet is appalling!
In fact I would go further than that and say you can actually lose weight eating pretty st foods, not the best way but perfectly doable.

I think 'you can't outrun a bad diet' pretty good advice and succenctly addresses the misconception that the OP has in re fuelling exercise and weight loss.

I'm assuming the OP isn't a marathon runner.

I think most people who train for and record good club runner times have probably always been athletic and have probably never had to lose more than a few pounds. By contrast people who have got out of shape would need to lose signifcant weight and get fit to do the mileage that a dedicated distance runner puts in. Your 2h30 mate could probably knock a few minutes off his time if he wanted to by taking his diet more seriously.

The maths of weight loss through exercise is inescapable. Most studies of overweight people trying to lose weight show that the contribution of exercise is limited and difficult to sustain for many people. Where exercise comes in and has been shown to have benefit is in maintaining weight loss.

If you want to lose a kilo of fat a week by exercise eating at your metabolic steady state you'd be looking at for instance 2500-3000 calories a day and 7000 calories a week in exercise. 700 calories an hour is pretty tough work out and could only be achieved by most people going well above aerobic threshold and for many it will be a lactate threshold effort. To be capable of 10 hours of aerobic training a week would be very challenging for most overweight/unfit people. Would probably take six months to work up to and at the beginning most of us would probably be nearer 500 calories/hour. On top of this 2500-3000 calories will probably feel quite restrictive for someone fuelling that level of exercise so would likely feel as restrictive as a 1000 cal deficit achieved through careful diet.

Even this simplistic analysis of the limits of exercise is further undermined by fairly recent findings that the body is very sneaky and will compensate for exercise calories by dialling down other energy systems, known as the exercise paradox and is fundamental to the success of homo sapiens as a hunter/gatherer. We are astonishingly efficient creatures.

From experience, using exercise as a counterbalance to poor dietary habits gets harder as the years go by as there's a limit to the training volume and intensity most people can tolerate.

Exercise, good diet and not being overweight obviously interrelate, but are best thought of individually in relation to health benefits. Where the magic happens is when someone comes across an activity that they love and sees dietary improvement as a route to better enjoyment and performance in their chosen sport.

Edited by oddman on Saturday 27th April 09:21

[g3org3y]

mcelliott said:

budgie smuggler said:

mcelliott said:

This is PH so carbs are bad! Seriously though the amount of people that go on a low or zero carb diet then get very excited that they have lost a ton of weight then re introduce carbs and lose their st cos the scales are giving them a different reading, as mentioned it’s only water, I can do a week on low carbs look absolutely shredded, just one day of carbs and I look softer and weigh slightly more thanks to the increased amount of water but my bf % is exactly the same.

If you look softer, is that not measurable with the calipers? Or are you measuring a BF% different way?

I have a a smart scale at home that I use, connects to my phone so it’s quite a quick and easy way to keep track, calipers are good but unless it’s the same person using them the results can vary hugely

Renpho?

I find they are very sensitive to hydration status. Dehydrated and all of a sudden the body fat drops a whole % in 24-48hrs!

[popeyewhite]

oddman said:

I think most people who train for and record good club runner times have probably always been athletic and have probably never had to lose more than a few pounds.

Who said anything about "good club runner times"?

I think your assumption fits the current narrative that we are all to be sympathetic to those who struggle with diets, and serious exercise is a matter of genetics for the elite, not the layperson. Which is complete nonsense.

[okgo]

PositronicRay said:

And remember, you can't outrun a poor diet.

You can. I did it for a decade.

But yes, it makes life easier if you eat well AND do exercise.

[oddman]

popeyewhite said:

oddman said:

I think most people who train for and record good club runner times have probably always been athletic and have probably never had to lose more than a few pounds.

Who said anything about "good club runner times"?

I think your assumption fits the current narrative that we are all to be sympathetic to those who struggle with diets, and serious exercise is a matter of genetics for the elite, not the layperson. Which is complete nonsense.

Of course it's an assumption but I was drawing a contrast between people who have kept in shape through exercise and those who have got out of shape and want to lose weight. They are completely different scenarios in relation to weight management.

Good club runner was a reference to a 2:30 marathon which is the mark of someone gifted and dedicated. That got conflated with your comment due to my multi quoting.

It doesn't take sympathy to understand that a body that evolved to survive in circumstances of food scarcity and unlike other primates is predisposed to laying down fat in times of plenty. A great survival strategy for pre agricultural times. Not so helpful when food is in unimaginable (to our forefathers) abundance, palatability, convenience and digestibility. Although it fits with the arithmetical understanding of energy intake and expenditure, the long held assumption that Western sedentary behaviour accounted for the caloric excess causing obesity is likely false. Our biology conspires to make it very difficult to lose weight. These aren't excuses, it's knowledge that might help those wanting to lose weight.

Current understanding regarding exercise is that it is an independent contributor to good cardiovascular health and also cuts risk of cancers and other degenerative diseases. If a pharma company could come up with a medicine with the same properties it would be offered to everybody. The benefits of exercise are independent of its effect on weight. Likewise a good diet - essentially mainly plant based peasant diet with some fish and meat and limited refined carbs and other processed food makes a contribution to health independent of weight. This evidence has been misused by some fat activists to sell the 'healthy at any size' message which is wrong because being overweight is unhealthy independent of exercise and diet.

[Bill]

IME most slim people who "eat what they want" don't actually want to eat that much.

[popeyewhite]

Bill said:

IME most slim people who "eat what they want" don't actually want to eat that much.

Sure, I think the majority of people who are slim have a grasp of what is healthy food/amount and what is not, and observance of this implies a little self-discipline.

[Bluevanman]

Bill said:

IME most slim people who "eat what they want" don't actually want to eat that much.

I dunno about that .I was always skinny but ate like a pig, never worrying about calories,carbs etc and never put weight on .On the flip side I worked 50 hours a week in a manual job.
Fast forward a decade I'm recently retired, exercise 3 to 4 times a week but am otherwise sedentary,watch what I eat closely and still put on weight to the extent I've never been so fat .
Move more,eat less is a mantra most overweight people should go by

[C4ME]

Here we go again, carbs are bad yada yada. Carbs are not bad, sh*tty carbs are bad which is what most people cut out by following a low carb diet. Cutting the crap out and then introducing good carbs would be a healthier way to live.

[mooseracer]

C4ME said:

Here we go again, carbs are bad yada yada. Carbs are not bad, sh*tty carbs are bad which is what most people cut out by following a low carb diet. Cutting the crap out and then introducing good carbs would be a healthier way to live.

Hallelujah