Niall's Weblog

Weightloss is an emotionally charged subject for dare I say the majority of people in the West. Asking someone’s weight is widely considered rude, suggesting someone could do with losing a few pounds similarly so. Huge amounts of money are spent on dangerous fad diets, pills and the Devil knows what else. Why is losing weight such a big deal, and why would we want to do it anyway? I can think of three good reasons to want to lose weight. Most obviously, health. Much greater risks of heart disease, diabetes, and many other illnesses follow from being overweight. Secondly, to look good. Nobody likes to be perceived as overweight – in our society being overweight carries all sorts of negative connotations, such as being lazy, lacking willpower, having low self-esteem, and so on. Finally, many sports are weight-sensitive. Personally, given my height and build, to box competitively I need to be in the 154lbs range. Weight loss is a big deal for fighters and there are many dangerous and unhealthy things professionals do to make weight.

In my experience, losing weight is a very simple thing (note simple things are not always easy!). People often get frustrated, and develop negative attitudes like “oh I’m overweight and thats just how it is”. These are excuses. Simply put, if you reduce input (eat less) and increase output (exercise more) you are going to lose weight. To burn off one pound, you need an approximate 1,000 calorie deficit. The recommended safe maximum for weight loss is 2lbs per week. How much weight you want to lose and how quickly are questions which will affect your weightloss strategy. Typically, people wish not only to lose weight but also to build muscle tone and mass, and achieve a “ripped” look. This is a good goal because it means you are necessarily including exercise in your regime. A “ripped” look is simply the result of having some muscle tone and a low body fat ratio. Very skinny people do not look ripped despite having a low body fat ratio, because they lack muscle tone and mass. Heavier people may be very strong and have large muscles, but do not look ripped because they have a high body fat ratio. Most people will want to lose some weight while building some muscle. An important point to make is that aerobic exercise burns more calories than anaerobic, but will burn muscle. This is why runners, while very fit indeed and with a very low body fat ratio, rarely look ripped. Anaerobic exercise does burn calories, but not as effectively as aerobic exercise. Furthermore one does not derive the same cardiovascular benefits from anaerobic exercise as from aerobic exercise. This is why weight lifters can develop huge muscles but still look overweight. Worth mentioning at this juncture is a common myth that weightloss is area specific. For example, the belief that abdominal exercises will reduce the fat around the belly first. In fact this is not true. Fat is lost all over the body – targeting a specific area is useful only in that it develops the muscle in that area. Some combination of aerobic exercise with anaerobic exercise is the best course in my opinion. If you like running, try doing forty pushups every day and build it up gradually. If you just like doing weights and hate running, try cycling, swimming, or even just walking. In fact, walking is very often overlooked as a way to lose weight. If you have the time, a long walk is actually more effective at burning calories than a short, vigorous run.

Getting back to the subject of weightloss, I think a two pronged approach of improved diet combined with much more exercise is the surest way. I have heard numerous complaints from friends who train very hard in the gym, yet don’t seem to lose weight. The problem they are having is that yes they are training hard, but they are still eating junk. Training hard will increase your fitness and strength, and you’ll lose some weight. But unless you improve your nutrition, you may find you’re not actually losing any more weight. This happened to me personally. Changing diet and training hard is the key in my opinion. Most people are very ignorant of the basics of nutrition. They hardly consider that a can of soda is 150 calories, or that a side of French fries can be up to 350. I find that simple rules to moderate eating work most effectively. In-depth calorie counting can be daunting. Rules such as, no fried food during the week. No potato chips. Avoid bread as much as possible. Get a salad with your burger instead of a side of fries. These things make a huge difference. Moderate alcohol consumption as much as possible, and replace beer with vodka. Avoid sweets and pastries. Treat soda as a dessert, not as a thirst quencher. My best suggestion is to adhere to a few simple rules like this, train hard and watch the pounds fall off.

If you have the interest, a very worthwhile site is www.nutritiondata.com. Get a feel for whats really in the food you are eating. One thing I found when working on my own diet was that I simply wouldn’t feel full if I stopped eating certain foods. This website has a very interesting metric, “fullness factor”, which allows you to compare how full a given food will make you feel vs another. Read more about it here. Generally the healthiest, most broadly beneficial foods, are also those which make you feel the most satiated. Broccoli, spinach, zucchini etc all have very high fullness factors. Highly processed foods such as pizza, white bread and french fries have very low fullness factors. Using this metric can be very helpful in creating healthy and satisfying meals. Finally, another useful site is World’s Healthiest Foods which is full of information and recipes on healthy foods, complete with good references to research papers on exactly what is thought to be beneficial about them. Highly recommended browsing.