Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Weight Loss: How Much Exercise Do I Need To Do?

To loss weight you need to burn more calories then you ingest. It is actually that easy. You also need to exercise to prevent diabetes and to improve your heart health. If you burn the same amount as you ingest, you keep a stable weight. If you ingest more then you burn, you gain weight. However any amount of exercise can help your health.
If you follow the headlines it is very confusing. In the last year I have seen something similar to all of the following headlines:
  • Science proves you only need 15 minutes three times a week to prevent diabetes.
  • 300 minutes of exercise required weekly.
  • Stay healthy with 30 minutes strolling walk per week.
All of these headlines are true. How can that be? Popular press reporting of these stories usually leave out two very important points. One is what group of subjects are you starting with and two is what are the end goals you are hoping to obtain.

You need to first decide what is your goal for exercise. It may be one of the following or a combination:
  • Weight Loss
  • Weight maintenance
  • Heart health (discussed in a later post)
  • Diabetes control (discussed in a later post)
  • Reversing pre-diabetes (discussed in a later post)
Let me first say that you can loss weight without exercising. However, there are three facts that you should realize. One, without exercise your weight loss will be much slower if you are successful at all. This is because you loss weight based upon your calorie deficit and without exercise you loss weight (for example I've consistently lost 0.4-0.5 pounds everyday, if I had not exercised with the same calorie restriction I would have at most lost 0.25 pounds per day or less.) Second, studies of large numbers of people on diets show that only 50% or less of those who do not exercise loss weight and if they loss weight it is much less then those that do exercise. Finally, multiple studies have shown that zero percent, yes none, of those that diet and loss weight and did not exercise during weight loss and continue exercising after weight loss maintained it. Actually 100% were back to their pre-dieting weight or usually above it within 1 year unless they did an exercise program post weight loss.

So lets look at your goal. Remember that you can always modify these suggestions. So first for weight loss. You need to burn about 700-100 calories. Here is a calculator http://www.neversaydiet.com/tools/calories-burned-calculator?ivNPA=1&sky=ggl|hco|ns|calories|PPCA7FBa|c which you can use to see how many calories you burn for a given activity. You will see that your weight effects how much you loss. Also an important point is that walking on a level treadmill vs walking the same distance for real you burn much fewer calories as much as only 40% of walking for real. The same is true of stair climbing and stationary bicycles. This is simple physics If you are not moving yourself through space you do not use as much energy. You can compensate by inclining the treadmill or increasing the resistance on the stationary bicycle. The amount recommended to exercise is about 40 minutes to one hour daily to have a sustained steady weight loss. You may need to start slowly. When I first began, I was only able to walk 20 minutes before I pooped out. At the end of two weeks I was up to 40 minutes and then by 4 weeks I was walking a full hour. Walk till you feel like your significantly winded. Tomorrow you will walk more. (In a later post I will talk about exercises for those who cannot walk.) (I will also blog later on stepping it up as you get into condition.)

Next, how much exercise do you need to do to maintain your weight after a weight loss program? This is much more tricky. It depends upon lots of variables. How much are you eating? What is your metabolic rate? How active are you? There is no one right answer. However, I can say with out reservation that you need to keep exercising to maintain your weight loss. I recommend based upon my reading that you do at least 30 minutes fives days a week. This can be a rapid walk (about 3.5 miles per hour rate). You can increase of decrease this based upon your weight. The important thing is that you continue to exercise. Some experts recommend after you do you hour a day to lose weight you then continue an hour a day but alternate cardio with strength training. This is up to you. Please do the 30 minutes five days per week.

Please post your exercise stories. I want to hear both successes and failures. Please be frank. I also would like to hear if you went against this advice and were successful.


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