Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Lose Weight And Get Healthy Without Exercise??


Is this possible?



I guess that losing fat would be part of the picture of health. But can you truly be healthy and lose weight without exercise? I was reading a health blog recently that said exercise was not necessary for weight loss. Kim Klaver says, "
Yes, I used to think exercise should be on the list to lose weight also. Only then I learned it may not be necessary for weight loss. Healthy, yes, to move around for circulation and energy...but for weight loss?"
What do the rest of you think?

There was a six month study that was published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism that examined the effects of diet alone (25 percent fewer calories consumed) versus diet plus exercise (12.5 percent fewer calories consumed and 12.5 percent more calories burned) in overweight but otherwise healthy adults. Researchers hypothesized that the diet plus exercise group would lose more body fat, but results showed equal amounts of weight and fat lost in both groups.
Most diets are based on calorie restriction or deprivation. The theory is that eating fewer calories than one uses, will equal weight loss. When you do this without any exercise, you could lose more than fat. You might be losing bone and muscle as well.

It is kind of funny that they only reported the results of fat loss over a six month period. 95% of all people who take a diet pill or go on a calorie restricted diet will gain all of their weight back in a year or two. Where are these same people today? I wonder if any of them experienced some of the other results of a calorie restricted diet? These would be things like:

* Weight gain.


* Depression.* Food cravings.* Feeling tired and listless.* Constant hunger.* Reduced interest in sex.* Chronic fatigue.* Hypothyroidism.* Hormone imbalance.* Scaly skin or eczema.* Premature wrinkling of the skin.* Dandruff or dull, lifeless hair.* Mood swings.


* Chronic yeast infections.* Poor immune system- frequent colds or respiratory illnesses.* Digestive problems.


That certainly is not a way to get your health back.
On the other hand, another study reported in the Journal of The American Medical Association showed that women who exercised around three hours per week (without dieting) lost 6.9% of their body fat around their middle.
Here are a few other articles that talk about weight loss and the effects of exercise vs. diet.

Older People Who Diet Without Exercising Lose Valuable Muscle Mass

Weighing Benefits Of Exercise, Diets: Both Work For Weight Loss, But Dieters Also Lose Muscle

Exercise and weight-loss

It is a fact. You can lose weight with diet alone. People do it all the time. It might surprise you to learn what that weight consists of. It is not just fat. Bone and muscle can be a part of this equation as well. Here is an article that talks about that:
What if you are you are spending 5 or more hours a week on the treadmill or exercise bike, you are restricting calories through diet and you find yourself getting poor results. You might even be GAINING weight! That's what happened to me. Read my story by going to my post on "Is Your Scale Broken?"
The definition of "insanity" is:
Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results
If you have been yo-yo dieting and can't seem to keep the weight off, you need to do something else.

If you have taken diet pills, weakened your immune system, spent hours on the toilet and gained all your weight back, you need to do get a new plan.

If you have spent hour after hour sweating on a treadmill or bike and have little or nothing to show for it (weightloss), why would you want to continue doing something that is evidently not working?
Here are a few suggestions for effective weight loss:

1. Change the way you eat. Learning how to eat is preferable to learning how to diet. Forget counting calories and carbohydrates. Go low-glycemic.
  • The High-Glycemic Trap. Eating high-glycemic foods can sabotage even the best of diet plans because the resulting spike and subsequent drop in blood sugar leads to a more rapid return to feelings of hunger.
  • Solution: For optimal nutrition, our bodies need a balanced variety of nutrients, including the right types of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats.
Carbohydrates such as white bread, white flour, pasta, white rice, and potatoes release their sugars rapidly (high-glycemic foods) and increase the blood sugars faster than if you were slapping table sugar on your tongue. Foods such as green beans, rye bread, whole apples, and cauliflower release their sugars slowly (low-glycemic foods). This rapid rise in blood sugar after a high glycemic meal stimulates the release of insulin from the pancreas, which is needed to control the blood sugar level. The blood sugar drops and our body’s crave more calories and more high-glycemic foods.We simply keep repeating this pattern over and over—day after day. Medical studies are now showing us that this type of diet causes us to become less and less sensitive to our own insulin (insulin resistance). It is a lot like crying "wolf" all of the time—we are simply stimulating the release of insulin time after time.

An estimated 24% of the adults in the U.S. have insulin resistance, also known as Syndrome X or more recently the Metabolic Syndrome.

When Is A Calorie No Longer A Calorie?
When insulin resistance is involved, a calorie is not merely a calorie any more. You can exercise and starve yourself all you want. The fact is, your fat cells start acting like a sponge and soak up all the glucose and efficiently change it into fat no matter how many calories you try to burn. The concept of "a calorie in and a calorie out" that has been the mainstay of weight loss therapy throughout the past century needs to change. When you begin to recognize the effect that insulin resistance throws into this equation, a calorie is no longer just a calorie.
Insulin resistance leads to Metabolic Syndrome (Syndrome X) and can finally lead to full blown diabetes. Unless you can find a way to "reverse the tracks" on insulin resistance and get back to normal, you simply will not be able to lose weight even with the most aggressive diets. In this state, the body is resistant to almost any weight loss program being advocated today. Only a program designed to reverse insulin resistance will successfully "flip the switch back again."


2. Change your exercise routine - If you are losing weight with your current exercise routine and are satisfied with your progress, stop here. Don't read any further.
How many miles have you logged on the treadmill, eliptical or stationary bike, only to discover that your weight loss efforts are just not paying off like you want them too. Listen, too much aerobics burns muscle! Take a look at the vast majority of women who take aerobics classes after work: do they ever transform their physiques? Rarely.
Interval Training - Interval training has been shown to be the most effective cardiovascular training method for improving cardiovascular endurance, sport-specific performance, boosting metabolic rate, and burning fat! You might already be doing this but are you doing it in a way that will bring optimal results?? Click here to read an article called,
The interval training mistake virtually everyone makes when they're trying to burn fat..

Some of the summary points of this article


Two groups of women burned 300 calories per workout session. The ones who did interval training increased fitness levels by 13 %. The women who did steady boring cardio increased fitness levels by 0%

Changes in body fat were also greater in subjects using interval training.
According to the research team, "... even if caloric expenditure during exercise is equal, higher intensity exercise may further aid weight loss due to an acute increase in energy expenditure up to 24 hours following exercise."
These findings have been confirmed by researchers from the University of Alabama, who showed that 24-hour energy expenditure was 160 calories greater in subjects performing high-intensity interval training rather than continuous exercise. In other words, the interval training group of women continued to burn 160 more calories in the 24 hour period following their initial workout. Amazing!

Which is better for fat loss? Long or short intervals? Shorter is better. Two groups worked out at different intervals. The first one worked out for 6 seconds @100% effort, followed by 9 second rest periods. The second group worked out for 24 seconds @100% effort, followed
with 36-second rest periods.
3 x more fat calories were burned during short intervals.

If you are out riding your bike or on the stationary bike, here is a good workout for you. Warm up by easy riding for 10 minutes before you start:
INTERVAL TRAINING PROGRAM

Cardio equipment: stationary or spinning bike

Purpose: burning fat

Interval training protocol: 10 sec @ 100% : 30 sec @ 60% x 18 = 12 minutes

Ensure that you use a flywheel resistance that prevents you from bouncing up and down on the seat. Thus, you should feel a good amount of resistance during the 10-second work period. You can lower the resistance if you like during the 30-second recovery. This only takes 12 minutes!

2.
Resistance Training -
Aerobic exercise may burn a few hundred extra calories for dinner, but for every additional pound of muscle you gain, your body burns around 50 extra calories every day of the week. 7 days x 50 calories= 350 calories. Most of that happens while you sleep!
Research has shown that regular resistance training can increase your Basal Metabolic Rate by up to 15%. So for someone burning 2000 calories per day, that's a potential 300 extra calories, more than a Mars bar, burned every single day.

Resistance exercise can reduce bone deterioration and build bone mass, preventing osteoporosis.
Working your muscles can also inhibit the affects of sarcopenia, the age related loss of muscle mass, strength and function. After the age of thirty there is a loss of 3-5% of muscle mass per decade, making day to day tasks gradually harder to perform and slowing down metabolism - increasing the risk of weight gain.

Weight training has been proven to have a positive affect on insulin resistance, resting metabolism, blood pressure, body fat and gastrointestinal transit time, factors that are linked to illnesses such as diabetes, heart disease and cancer.

Always make your workout about quality over quantity to get effective weight loss results. Resistance training, when done correctly, allows you to lose inches fast, see results almost immediately and boost your metabolism to burn more fat and calories every day.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Exercise is on top of list to overcome all health and fitness problems. There are many fitness and health programs that can give more fun along with all body fitness requirements. Apart from these there are fitness equipments to give individual workouts. You can get more information about Fitness Equipment which I browsed on internet can fetch you help.

LJP said...

Great article - there are so many things to consider and your information on interval training has given me some inspiration.

Ish said...

nice post to read

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