Diet and exercise as a way to lose weight
Update 7/11/15 In addition to what I wrote below: I just made a web page where you can estimate approximate calories burned with a few common type of exercise.
Update 7/18.2015 I bought a Marcy Stationary Fan exercise bicycle last week. I must say, getting it out of the box and assembling it, was a fair amount of exercise itself. It seems to be well made, and it does indeed let me burn some calories, and not in an unpleasant way. I like that it is easy to use, and keeps count of things, like calories burned. I also like the idea, that it gets rid of some excuses. Many times I do not ride my real bicycle, because it it too hot, too cold, too windy, too dark (lol), or too rainy. Now I can exercise in the air conditioned or heated, dry, windless, well lit comfort of home, any time of day or night, and feel less guilty about watching a DVD or something (as opposed to sitting in an easy chair). I like that you can do upper body, lower body, or both.
The down side: My knees are sore - need to get some glucosamine/chondroitin in me I guess. That is not a medical recommendation, it is controversial, but it has worked well for me in the past.
Also, I mentioned about, that I mad a page with some basic calculators. However, today I created (signed up) for a personalized fitness/diet planner at WebMD. It is a little bit of wrok to set up initially, there is a learning curve to it, but it seems very sophisticated, and I think it will be effective, and makes recommendations that are more moderated (and sensible) that I would typically set for myself. You can see a video overview on there website, or on youtube if you do not mind going there. We'll see how dedicated I am, but I am already encouraged by what I am seeing.
ORIGINAL CONTENT of this BLOG ENTRY:
From time to time the topic of weight loss and diet and exercise come up in chat.
I often make the point, that it is very difficult to lose weight through exercise, as compared with diet. The idea meets a lot of resistance, not sure if that is just becuase people want to continue their bad eating habits, or if they are just misinformed.
I decided to do the actual calculations to see how exercise and diet compare in terms of acomplishing weight loss in my case, and recorded the results to I could illustrate how dismal it is.
These numbers are for me, as a 63 year old, 6'4", 252 pound male, with a sedendary lifestyle. Your numbers would be different of course, but this should serve to demonstrate the difference between losing weight by diet, versus losing weight by exercise.
First off, the basic information. A person of my gender, age, size, weight, and lyfstyle, needs about 2588 calories per day to maintain his current weight of 252 pounds.
A person has to burn about 3500 calories more that they take in (in diet) to lose a single pound.
I would like to be at 225 pounds, in other words, I want to lose 27 pounds. What if I started on this path tomorrow, Jan 24th, 2015. Lets say I wanted to be at 225 pounds by Memorial Day of this year.
I take that 27 pounds, and multiply it by 3500 calories per pound and find that I need to take in 94,500 calories less than the 2588 calories per day than I need to maintain weight.
Memorial day is on May 25th, which is 121 days after the 24th of January.
That means that to lose those 27 pounds in that time frame, I need to take in 94,500 calories divided by 121 days, to find that on average, I must take in 781 calories per day less that the daily calories I need to maintain the same weight. That means I need to have a daily calorie intake of 2588-781, or a daily intake of 1807 calories. An 1800 calorie a day diet, is not that hard, very doable with a little self discipline. Self control, by the way, is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, so all I need do, it to take a look at my diet as it is, and plan one with less sweets, less carbs, and less fats, and stick with it.
Now, let's suppose, that I like my sweets, my carbs, and my fats, and I don't want to diet, I would rather increase my activity and exercise those calories away instead.
As I already noted, I lead a sedentary lifestyle, so let's say I add some walking to my activity. If I left my diet alone, how much walking would I have to add to my daily activity, to get to my target weight by Memorial Day?
For someone of my specifics, one has to walk for 420 minutes to lose a pound. To lose 27 pounds then, I need to walk for 27 pounds times 420 minutes, or 11,340 minutes. Divide by sixty and I find that is 189 hours. So, if I walk 189 hours in 121 days, that means I nead to walk 189 hours, divided by 121 days, or 1 hour and 34 minutes per day, or just under 4 3/4 miles per day.
Of course I could run, and save time, but to tell you the truth, I am not in good enough shape to run as long as I would need to. How about bicycling?
If I rode my bicycle, at 15 miles per hour (a bit faster than is comfortable), I could lose the weight riding 2 hours and 53 minutes per day. Whoops! That is worse! That is becuase, when you ride a bicycle, you are sitting down, using less muscles, and generally rolling on wheels just makes things more efficient.
Suppose I don't have the time to devote to such things. Is there something I could do for only 30 minutes a day to lose that weight?
If I could run at 8 miles per hour (I probably can't for long enough), I could lose this weight by running for 30 minutes and 21 seconds per day.
For an out of shape old man such as myself, exercise is not a practical solution to weight loss, compared to just eating sensibly. Of course, a combination of diet and exercise is practical and sensible, but diet takes no physical effort and no time, just self control that God has already given me as a believer.
Do you have any thoughts on this?
11 Comments
Recommended Comments