These factors shout in favour of exercise not leading to weight loss, in fact the opposite, they suggest that exercise will produce weight gain. But this is not the whole picture. There are many people that exercise on a regular basis and do lose weight, and keep it off. So why do some people lose weight after exercise and some not?

It has to do with 3 simple principles that, when combined to create a negative energy balance, lead to weight loss – duration, intensity and frequency. When I coach my clients on their weight loss journey, it is vital that they embrace and fully understand these principles, because as their body becomes lighter as they move towards their target weight, it is increasingly harder to create a negative energy balance.

The duration of exercise is pretty simple to comprehend. How long do you exercise for? Is it a 30-minute walk around the block, or 60 minutes in the gym? Duration is all about increasing the time that you are exercising. By simply increasing exercise sessions by 5 minutes each week will compensate for a lighter body that is expending less calories.

Exercise intensity is all about how hard you are exercising. Do you choose a gentle breaststroke with your head permanently above the water, or do you choose a spin class where you are pushing yourself to the limits? As we get fitter during a weight loss programme, it is a natural progression to increase exercise intensity – it certainly means we are making a smart use of our time. Using heart rate monitors whilst running or timing yourself to reach a certain distance on the rowing machine are great measures of exercise intensity.

Frequency simply means doing exercise more frequently. Instead of walking to work once a week, it become 3 times a week Or perhaps a gym workout once week becomes 4 times a week. Exercising more often will help us make our metabolisms soar.

So despite both physiological and behavioural compensatory changes to exercise that can occur in any of us, if we master the principles of exercise duration, intensity and frequency, we can overcome the threats of weight gain by creating a negative energy balance and sustainable weight loss.

Individual variability comes screaming out at me again. Some of us find the discipline to maximise these 3 principles, while others fall at the first hurdle. The psychological skills required to conquer them is tomorrow’s story.

Think about your next workout – what will you do differently?

James

You can also get Compensatory Responses to Exercise, which are Behavioural. Changes in behaviour, which arise as a result of exercise, may be automatic, resulting from physical changes such as metabolic adaptations and changes to the appetite system.

For example if metabolism slows down a person may go to sleep earlier, be more tired and less likely to move around when they are not exercising. A decrease in normal lifestyle activity resulting from fatigue or metabolic slowdown can deprive the system of a valuable source of energy expenditure.

When there are changes to the appetite system, this can lead to eating that is faster, more frequent or high in energy dense food.
Other behavioural changes, which result from exercise, are volitional and purposeful.

Some people reward themselves for exercising by having a glass of wine and a pub lunch after a walk, or a coffee and a cereal bar after a swim. Misjudgement here means people eat more calories than they have expended. It may take an hour to expend only 200 calories with the most vigorous activity, while they can eat 600 calories in a slice of cake in a mater of minutes. So people who reward themselves for exercise are likely to gain weight.

A final behavioural response to activity is compliance, with the amount and intensity of activity reducing over time as a result of many complex motivational factors. We all start off with good intentions, but stuff just gets in the way.

So once again there are various behavioural reasons why research data will give mixed or sometimes inconclusive results. We are all different and will react to different life factors in different ways. Our lifestyle, physiology and psychology all collude to either help us maintain weight, gain weight or lose weight. How are your life factors balancing at the moment?

In the New Year, starting 1st January 2010, I will be starting a daily video blog of my attempt to lose weight leading to my 40th birthday on May 12th 2010. I want to share my personal experiences; feelings and insights into a diary to share with my readers, and at the same time combine it with the education that I give my clients here at the WeightMatters Clinic. Stay tuned and spread the word – it will be an interesting experiment!

James

Fact: Exercise combined with healthy eating does lead to successful weight loss and weight maintenance – let me explain.

The NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) 2006 Obesity Guidelines recommend Diet and Lifestyle Interventions combined with Behavioural Therapy as the ‘best’ way to help people lose weight and maintain it. There is a wealth of studies that show, on average, high levels of activity predict successful weight loss.

Roberts uses the Queensland data to start his argument. He focuses on the fact that half of the research participants did not reach their predicted weight loss – he fails to highlight that half of them did! Surely this proves that regular exercise can help SOME people lose weight. Why not others? Well if he bothered to ask an Eating Therapist he would know that this variability in results could be down to Compliance – this is where people say they have followed the instructions, but really they have fallen short along the way. Supervised exercise for 12 weeks is great, but no change to their diet – does this mean that people could eat whatever they wanted. Exercise can affect our physiology in various ways.

Our bodies also have Compensatory Responses to Exercise, which undermine the calorie deficit of exercise within the energy systems of the body. This comes down to individual variability, which is one reason why half the people lost weight in the Queensland research and half did not.

Some people may experience Metabolic Adaptations to energy loss, which means their metabolic rate slows down. When people go on a diet and exercise, this would be a natural phenomenon as people are producing a calorie deficit, with poor eating quality and timing and exercise induced calorie burn. The body will slow its metabolism for protection and will be unwilling to give up its fat stores, with fear that it may be starving.

There are also changes to the appetite system that lead to changes in energy intake. Some people will experience increases in appetite, which will affect eating frequency and portion size. Other people will change their food (macronutrient) preference in favour of high energy density foods such as fats and sugars, which are automatic and unconscious.

The study also fails to mention the degree of Obesity each participant was classified at (there are Obesity levels 1-3) and whether they had full blood screens to determine whether they suffer from Insulin Resistance, which can also be described as being pre-diabetic. These individuals are unable to metabolise carbohydrate very well, and actually require exercise to change the ‘shimmer’ of the muscle cells to allow efficient glucose transport. The research does not seem to consider this as a reason for the data split.

My point here is to make sense of weigh loss research that is taken out of context and sensationalised by headline grabbing articles.

Exercise can and will lead to weight loss, but everyone is different, so one prescription will not be right for everyone. Effective weight loss will come from experts who are trained in understanding the ‘big picture’ of metabolism, the psychology of eating, healthy nutrition and the correct balance of exercise.

I got the balance right for Gary Barlow, and well, he’s looking great!

Over the next few days I will explain the Behavioural Change Compensatory Responses to Exercise, as well as describing the ideal exercise regime and optimal diet for Weight Loss. So please stay tuned and tell me what you think to my argument.

James

JAMES LAMPER
FOUNDER & MANAGING DIRECTOR
WEIGHTMATTERS HEALTH CLINIC
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