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After a talk I gave at the Hotter ’n Hell Hundred, a 100-mile bike ride in Wichita
Falls, Texas, a worried-looking woman came up to me with a concern I’ve heard
countless times. “I've been riding for a year and want to lose ten pounds,” she
said. “But no matter what diet I try, I can't lose weight.”
That’s because merely dieting is not the best means to control your weight. To
maintain a healthy lifestyle and manage your weight, complement your diet with
regular exercise. Here’s the scoop:
“Diets” Don’t Work
If a friend says, “I've lost 5 pounds!” your first question should be, “Five pounds
of what?” It could be fat or muscle. Losing fat is good. Losing muscle is bad. Muscle
allows you to run, swim, walk, or ride faster. Also, muscle, unlike fat, burns
additional calories all day long so you avoid gaining more fat. If you diet without
exercising, you’ll lose both fat and muscle. Also, studies show that people who lose
weight by following restrictive diets almost always regain the weight. Often,
they gain more.
Exercise is Critical
The only way to truly lose weight and keep it off is to follow a sensible eating
plan (notice I didn’t say “diet”) complemented with regular exercise. Eating sensibly
and exercising regularly allows you to reduce body fat while preserving muscle.
Both aerobic and strength exercise is important. Running, walking, cycling, and other
aerobic activities burn calories and reduce fat. Strength training maintains and
builds muscle that burns additional calories. This double-edged sword cuts away
unwanted pounds.
Calories In, Calories Out
In spite of what popular magazines and TV shows might lead you to believe, weight
loss is simple. If you consume more calories than you burn, you’ll gain weight.
If you burn more calories during exercise and doing daily activities than you stuff
in your mouth, you'll lose weight. It’s simple. But dieting alone is a poor way
to create a negative calorie balance. Far more efficient, and a lot more fun, is to
burn additional calories with exercise.
Don’t Lose Weight Unnecessarily
Your weight is a poor indicator of your fatness. Many of the world’s best athletes
are technically overweight, as determined by standard tables that compare height and
weight, because so much of their body is muscle. What's important isn’t your weight
on the scale but the percent of your body that is fat. A healthy American male
is around 15–20% fat while healthy women, because of childbearing demands, usually are about
5% higher. Male endurance athletes, on the other hand, often have body fat levels
below 10%, and elite women competitors’ body fat is about 5% higher than similarly
fit men. You can get your body fat measured at health clubs or a local university’s
human performance lab for a nominal fee—an important first step if you're considering
any program of caloric reduction.
Cut the Fat
Monitoring the quality of what you eat is more important than obsessively monitoring
calories. A simple rule—go heavy on fruits, vegetables, and whole grains like cereal
and bread. These foods are high in the carbohydrates needed to fuel your endurance
sports workouts. Go easy on meats and saturated fats. Limiting fat is important
because our metabolism preferentially burns carbs over fats or protein during activity.
Limiting the fat is important because during activity our metabolism uses less fat and
protein for fuel than carbohydrate. Increased fat intake is deposited easily as body
fat. On the other hand, if you eat excessive carbs, your body tends to attempt to burn
them or store them as glycogen for later, before storing them as fat.
The Long (Thin) Haul
Successful weight loss is like investing in the stock market. Short–term gains or
losses aren’t important, it’s the long-term results that count. Don’t try to lose weight
too rapidly. Most experts suggest a maximum of one to two pounds per week. The keys:
eat a moderate diet, exercise regularly, and think long-term. Soon you’ll be lean and
mean—and you'll stay that way, for the rest of your life.
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