Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
mileage or speed to loose weight
The materials in this website are in no way intended to replace the professional medical care, advice, diagnosis or treatment of a doctor, qualified personal trainer, therapist, dietitian or nutritionist Runners's World, Part of the Hearst UK well-being network © Copyright 2017
Comments
Thanks for the english lesson!
So recommended plan is keep to same mileage but do couple of weekly runs at faster pace - will give it a go with maybe faster bursts during some runs - Thanks
Thanks for the link to the thread. It wasn't too long and i've read it.
I am sure that there is quite a lot of variation in different people's response to exercise. Indeed, I'm sure i've seen a paper demonstrating that.
For myself, in practice, I've always found that when marathon training, doing lots of long slow running, I tend to gain weight, and the times I've lost weight are when I've been doing walking and weight training.
I believe this is simply because running makes me hungry: I automatically compensate for the calories burned. I might hypothesise (but have no evidence) that this is because more of the calories come from glycogen when running, compared to walking.
As someone on the previous thread said : " did you hear of the controversial Time mag article claiming that exercising didn't help you lose weight? At its heart was the premise that most people who exercise just eat more to compensate so there is no net effect. Perhaps the effect on appetite is different between the two types of training."
I think there is an intensity threshold for that happening, and for me, walking gets in "under the radar".
On the other hand, many (like Nam, I think) find that intervals help them lose weight better. I have no idea why that might be. Any measured numbers I've seen for EPOC always look pretty small. It may basically be a hormonal effect.
To put it crudely, if you demonstrate to your body that what it needs to do is long slow runs, then it may say "right then, I need to learn to burn fat better, and I need to carry some" whereas if you show it that what it needs to do is short very intense sprints, it may say "then I need to get as light as possible".
Ectomorph - the body wants to be thin and sheds weight easily and gains muscle with difficulty
Mesomorph - gains muscle with ease and hangs on the fat but will let it go with the right inducement
Endomorph - gain muscle - will hang on the fat for grim death.
I find that long slow runs of a certain length leave me glycogen depleted and so make me hungry in the same way that a high intensity session would. Walking I can totally get away with and it would appear (so far) that I can get away with cycling too. Perhaps I haven't been trying hard enough on my bike
I don't agree with your last paragraph MF, I have not read a single thing (and I have read widely on this subject) to suggest for a second that the body reacts in this way.
There are plenty of studies to show how interval training burns lots of calories - if Nam is of sufficient fitness to not be left annihilated afterwards then she may well not get the appetite trigger that you and I get. We are all different after all.
High intensity training will burn calories at a higher rate over a shorter time. for example if walking a mile takes about 20 mins and running it takes about 10 u will burn the same amount of calories doing both, but the walking takes longer.
your training should consist of a mixture of medium - long runs, higher intensity training such as hills and intervals, and also cross training which includes resistance, cardio, and also things like Pilates and Yoga and other core strength exercise.
I am a fitness instructor and sports scientist too. I hope this makes sense.
I understand that, Hazel. The calories IN and OUT are both equally important.
Typically, the way weight loss attempts fail, is that people find they can't stick to the prescribed calories in that they've set themselves.
What I am interested in is which types of exercise make that least or most likely to occur.
The crux of the argument with regards to the type of training you do and weight loss is whether you believe the total number (sorry, pedants are fair game) of calories burnt is all important or whether the source from which the calories are burnt is important.
If you only do hard intervals it's highly unlikely that any of your actual workout is fuelled by calories derived from fat. Does that matter? What are the implications of the type of calorie burnt on fat loss in a diet?
There will be some that manage it (and I am thinking here of competitive body builders)
The evidence I have read leads me to believe that the total number of calories is what counts in terms of calorie balance in the diet.
BUT the type of exercise that you do affects how you feel/how hungry you are which affects your calorie intake and therefore has a bearing on how easy it is to lose weight.
I am not going to do it here - but I have in the past calculated the grammes of fat you will work off during a typical session of approx an hour. It was not significant and would be dwarfed by the recommended daily fat intake for a man or woman. Even one on a diet.
Don't forget that the bodies energy systems are always in flux.
Funny how there is no definitive answer to this question and there is a great deal of room for debate, even within the sports science community. I think there are a few facts that you can't get around:
fact (1) If you burn more calories than you consume, you will lose weight
fact (2) distance covered determines how many cals you burn on any run, not how fast you do it, within reasonable limits. (I believe if you walk, you are doing less work as you do not propel yourself into the air as much and burn fewer cals per mile, but running is more or less the same action regardless of speed.)
fact (3) muscle burns calories when you are not doing exercise
So, you need to eat fewer calories than you burn. Doing exercise helps but can make you very hungry. Building muscle will put weight on but burn fat. Regardless of (3) you need to find the balance between (1) and (2) plus the right diet that allows you to have a daily calorie deficit and not feel hungry.
Personally, I find not feeling hungry is the secret. Can the exercise type help here? LSRs do seem to make me starving, so perhaps I should try shorter slow runs or even shorter fast runs. I once lost a stone in a couple of months simply by walking to work (3 miles each way) and didn't even think about diet, so maybe this is relevant.
Obviously diet choices help in terms of feeling fuller for longer on fewer calories, but this requires as much, if not more, discipline as introducing exercise into your routine, especially if you have a family and eat together.
My view is slightly different I suppose. Whether you are hungry or not is irrelevant. Your statement reads as though "dietary non compliance" means the dieter has no choice in the matter.
The bottom line is that in any situation where the dieter eats more than they should to compensate for the workouts it's not the type of workout to blame it's the dieter's lack of discipline. Which is often the reason for being overweight in the first place. And so it goes.....
I used to have a theory about the reason why I am not at all hungry after very intense interval training on treadmill: I felt very nauseous for about an hour afterwards, and that's not from lack of food/carb after the exercise, as I would force myself to eat a banana. So, the feeling is very comparable to being drunk, i.e. a stress on the liver, and both of these physical feelings put my off my food completely. My theory therefore is that high intensity training would be better for weight loss, although it would mean that alcohol should be avoided completely for the duration of training weeks. Any thoughts?
The bottom line is if you eat to much,you get fat, I should know
and with any diet, weight loss does slow down after a while.
So be happy with your weight loss so far and keep doing what your doing and you'll get there in the end.
Posh x
It is difficult to resolve the battle between a number on the scale and the fitness gains that building muscle brings. Been there - got the t-shirt. I have definitely experienced what you describe - watching your diet like hawk, exercising like a crazy thing and putting on weight.
I just stopped weighing myself. I use a tape measure or go by my clothes. Much less stressful
Thanks Posh I think you have summed it up nicely -
my weight loss has slowed down maybe I am becoming too impatient - i will just have to keep on doing what I am doing and I will get there in the end (after all its worked so far!)
Thanks x
Just come across this thread yesterday and have found it very interesting - especially the scientific aspect of it all. I find it a bit difficult to get my head around it all and have no idea what body type I am.
However I would absolutely go with what GymAddict says about stopping weighing yourself. I threw my bathroom scales out when my daughter became a teenager as I didn't want a contraption on the bathroom floor determining her mood for the day.
According to my doctor I have lost almost 6 stone in the past two years by exercising and eating healthily (not dieting). In those two years I have only been weighed 4 times - when I visit the doctor - and never get stressed about my weight. I might put the odd pound or two on, but I never notice it, and then it probably goes off again. Like GA I just go by my clothes.
Three or four runs a week along with circuit classes and pilates a couple of times a week works for me. Oh, and by the way, all my running is slow. Just started working on my speed.
Christie, it sounds from your last post as if you want to increase your speed. This would mean that it is worth chucking in a tempo run every week to see how it goes. I took up running again recently, and was struggling with 11-12 minute miles. I started on speedwork 5 weeks ago and now am running 10 min miles on my slow runs.
Unfortunately the only way to run faster is to run faster - it's hard work, but it works!