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Exercise and Fitness: bro science debunked


Iskaral Pust

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33 minutes ago, Scott_N said:

You'd use your goal weight. 

Idk if it’s that cut and dried. I can see the argument if you’re trying to bulk up, but not necessarily if you’re trying to drop a decent amount of weight.  

4 hours ago, maarsen said:

First use flat rather than round laces. They don't slip as much. If slippage is still a problem, then try a double knot. 

I always double lace when working out, whether it’s lifting, running or going for a casual bike ride.   

16 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

I weigh myself most mornings but I could feel the difference before I set foot on the scale.  That much sodium leaves me feeling bloated.  I can feel that my wedding ring is tighter on my finger, and I have to wear my belt one notch looser for a couple of days until I've flushed out the sodium.

I can typically see a 2lb difference in the mirror too.

I’m pretty sure that it’s recommended that you don’t weigh yourself on a daily basis. I’ve always been instructed to do it once a week, at the exact same time and day. There’s too much variance doing it every day.

That said, I don’t think I could ever notice that small of a shift, even when I was looking like Brad Pitt in Fight Club.   

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29 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Idk if it’s that cut and dried. I can see the argument if you’re trying to bulk up, but not necessarily if you’re trying to drop a decent amount of weight.  

I would imagine it depends on what your goals are. If you are just trying to lose 30lbs of weight, maybe entering a calorie deficit is more important than specifically tracking your macro-nutrient consumption, such as protein, within that calorie deficit. 

If you are a physique competitor, for instance, who has gained a lot of weight, but wants cut weight and body fat to compete, entering a calorie deficit and tracking your macro-nutrient consumption would be vital. When in a deficit, you want to preserve as much muscle as possible. In order to do that, you'd have to keep your protein consumption high, and enter the calorie deficit by lowering calories consumed through carbohydrates and fats. 

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1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

Idk if it’s that cut and dried. I can see the argument if you’re trying to bulk up, but not necessarily if you’re trying to drop a decent amount of weight.  

I always double lace when working out, whether it’s lifting, running or going for a casual bike ride.   

I’m pretty sure that it’s recommended that you don’t weigh yourself on a daily basis. I’ve always been instructed to do it once a week, at the exact same time and day. There’s too much variance doing it every day.

That said, I don’t think I could ever notice that small of a shift, even when I was looking like Brad Pitt in Fight Club.   

“Don’t weigh yourself daily” is advice from skinny diet journalists who have always been skinny independent of diet and exercise and thus to them a daily weight fluctuation is a purely mental exercise, and since their weight is and always has been homeostatic, long averages is a better measure than daily fluctuations.

for heavy people trying to lose weight or maintain lost weight, research has shown that the daily accountability of weighing oneself is crucial to positive outcomes. Taking away the accountability, merely gives the genetic victims (whose weight has never been homeostatic) too much room. Weighing yourself once a week, if you are non homeostatic is like telling an smoker they only have to give up cigarettes one day a week and it is the same as quitting.

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2 hours ago, Scott_N said:

My understanding is that range is likely sufficient for a non-athlete in maintenance mode (basically the old 'half your body weight in grams of protein'). 

If you are trying to build or maintain a strong physique I'd look at the 0.8-1.3 range. I don't think that is a controversial statement. In my own experience, I note a significant, positive difference in my performance when I'm at the higher end of that but I wouldn't dispute there's a case of diminishing returns. But some return is still OK even if it's diminished... Saying that, going way beyond the upper range probably serves no purpose unless you are on gear. 

That’s exactly what the protein sellers want you to think. But you are just spilling the excess in your urine or breaking the excess protein down to glycerol molecules that can be stored in adipocytes as triglycerides.

but if you’re experiencing a strong placebo effect as described, probably fine to lean into it.

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4 hours ago, lokisnow said:

“Don’t weigh yourself daily” is advice from skinny diet journalists who have always been skinny independent of diet and exercise and thus to them a daily weight fluctuation is a purely mental exercise, and since their weight is and always has been homeostatic, long averages is a better measure than daily fluctuations.

This is hogwash. 

Quote

for heavy people trying to lose weight or maintain lost weight, research has shown that the daily accountability of weighing oneself is crucial to positive outcomes. Taking away the accountability, merely gives the genetic victims (whose weight has never been homeostatic) too much room. Weighing yourself once a week, if you are non homeostatic is like telling an smoker they only have to give up cigarettes one day a week and it is the same as quitting.

I've never seen any research, but this is counter-intuitive IMO. I would think that if you're trying to lose a lot of weight, it would be demoralizing to check every day. You might not see the progress you're shooting for, and if you get a result that you actually gained weight, you might be more likely to quit. There's just too much variance in checking it day to day. If you check once a week, you might see that you've lost a pound or two which could have a positive effect. 

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38 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

This is hogwash. 

I've never seen any research, but this is counter-intuitive IMO. I would think that if you're trying to lose a lot of weight, it would be demoralizing to check every day. You might not see the progress you're shooting for, and if you get a result that you actually gained weight, you might be more likely to quit. There's just too much variance in checking it day to day. If you check once a week, you might see that you've lost a pound or two which could have a positive effect. 

Iirc, The research im recalling found that success correlated the most with people who weighed themselves the most often, most successful were people who weighed themselves twice a day, morning and evening. Success declined proportionally with frequency of weigh in. Once a month least successful, once a week significantly less successful than a few times a week which was less successful than every day.

however, people weighing themselves once or twice a day may well correlate with people who are the best informed about how weight varies and therefore the caveats of frequent weighing. If the downside risk of frequent weighing (too much variability in weight leading to discouragement and disengagement) is ameliorated with greater information, education or ability to track more granularly, then that’s a bridge that can be built. There’s also the suggestion that frequent (twice a day or daily) weigh ins cause people doing it to build neurologically stronger connections between their behavior and their weight which makes behavioral adjustments much more likely to occur, for example: “oh shit! that salty lunch made my weight go up! I’m not eating that again!” Or “fuck, I gained three pounds overnight? It was just two glassss of wine at dinner!”  Or “i had salad and fish for lunch and dinner and didn’t gain any weight for the day! ” or “my diet was perfect  yesterday and today I dropped half a pound!”

So if variability is comprehended before hand, more frequent weigh ins can create much stronger associations between dietary choices and outcomes on the scale but it may be limited to how well informed the person in question is though the people most likely to weigh in most frequently are often the most well informed 

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18 hours ago, maarsen said:

First use flat rather than round laces. They don't slip as much. If slippage is still a problem, then try a double knot. 

Yeah, the laces are partially rounded so that may be the cause. I prefer blaming that to my tying technique anyway. I always tie double knots and I always untie and retie the laces when I put them on but sometimes they just fall out and other times they don't. 

I don't have flat laces on hand now so I'll just give the elastic laces a try first. I'd look into getting flat laces if I can't get used to the elastic laces. Thanks.

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17 hours ago, lokisnow said:

That’s exactly what the protein sellers want you to think. But you are just spilling the excess in your urine or breaking the excess protein down to glycerol molecules that can be stored in adipocytes as triglycerides.

but if you’re experiencing a strong placebo effect as described, probably fine to lean into it.

I sense you are not a layman so you undoubtedly have much more technical knowledge than someone like me. I'm surprised you are so categorical, though. 

IAAF guidelines has 1.6 gram per kg for track and field athletes if they want to increase mass. 1.6-2.4 grams per kg when on a calorie restricted diet (so as to minimize lean muscle loss). I suppose, I don't claim to know with certainty, that if you are lifter or footballer or something else where muscle mass is key, you'd want to be at least within that range, maybe higher. 

Anyway, the minimum value in this range seems to equate to the max value in your suggested range so unless I have gotten this entirely wrong - always a distinct possibility - I'll err on the side of caution and continue loading with plenty of protein.

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Regarding frequency of weigh-ins: I think I also saw the study that pointed to improved weight management from frequent weighing.  I thought a major inferred causation was that greater frequency kept the issue at front of mind, leading to greater discipline every day, and because it identified any negative (increasing weight trend) sooner.  Moreso than dietary responses to short term variations.

I think the counter-argument that people will be flummoxed by natural short-term variation in their weight is rubbish.  Even if people are entirely ignorant of this phenomenon beforehand, once they are weighing daily they will quickly notice that small variations occur, and they will start to recognize signal versus noise for their own particular weight.  Human brains are incredibly good at spotting patterns (even where none exist), so I’m pretty confident that once they have a month or two of daily weighings that they will have a sensible interpretation of their own pattern. 

The real reason that people want less frequent weighing is that overweight people dislike being confronted by their weight.  Asking them to do it daily is difficult.  It’s easier to ask them to do something they find unpleasant less frequently, say monthly.  But once the frequency is low it won’t become a habit (and probably happen even less frequently) and you lose the benefit of constant reinforcement.  As with most things connected to weight loss: the people who build it consciously into their daily lifestyle will be more successful than those who try to avoid that because they don’t like it and wish it would just get better in the background without them having to incorporate it into their daily life.  It’s much easier to deceive yourself than your scale.

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Workout yesterday morning was ok but with no breakfast beforehand for fuel, I ran out of energy after an hour, so I lost a rep on my last two sets of shoulder press and pull-ups.

And, a frequent refrain for me, I need to stabilize my sleep pattern.  I really need to just be more disciplined about going to bed earlier. 

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So I've been training for a 10k at the end of the month, using a simple 8 week training plan. I've been battling some pretty severe fatigue lately, but still have not missed a day of scheduled training. Went to the doctor to try to get at the cause of this fatigue, and discovered I contracted mono at some point (very bizarre as I had mono fifteen years ago). The doctor said I should take at least 2 weeks off from any athletics or working out. Normally, I wouldn't mind a 2 week rest, but I'm 3 weeks away from my race! So I'm feeling very frustrated. It's not like the working out was making the fatigue any worse (or better), and the biggest concern is just avoiding any abdominal injuries as mono can stress your spleen/liver/etc. But I will be good and follow the doctor's orders. At least I'll still be in the clear to run my (paid for) race, but seeing as the longest run I've done this year is 4 miles, it's questionable if I'll even be able to finish without walking. Oh well. Taking care of my health is the most important.

Also, re: weighing oneself every day, yes this has absolutely been shown to correlate with lower weight: https://www.heart.org/en/news/2019/01/02/the-pros-and-cons-of-weighing-yourself-every-day I like to weigh myself every day, but I do have tendencies to obsess over it. So what I've been doing is weighing myself every day and taking a photo of the result without looking at it, and then entering it in my spreadsheet at the end of the week. So I get the granularity of data, the accountability of the scale going up after a binge, without beating myself up all day because the reading isn't what I wanted. I'm very prone to falling into a restrict-rebel-repent cycle with my eating and so this has been at least moderately helpful for that.

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Any fitness tracker recommendations? I love trackers, and I have a Fitbit Charge 2, but it's cracked, and I think I don't want a fitbit this time (the app is bad for syncing, and I get ads on it sometimes though Fitbit denies this is happening?). 

I'm thinking the Garmin Vivo 3 (I think that's it's name). Anyone have any other recommendations?

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On 6/6/2019 at 6:56 PM, lokisnow said:

for heavy people trying to lose weight or maintain lost weight, research has shown that the daily accountability of weighing oneself is crucial to positive outcomes. Taking away the accountability, merely gives the genetic victims (whose weight has never been homeostatic) too much room. Weighing yourself once a week, if you are non homeostatic is like telling an smoker they only have to give up cigarettes one day a week and it is the same as quitting.

I don't like the phrase "genetic victims". While there's no denying that genetics can make losing weight easier or more difficult, I think that it's not that big of a margin and that too many people are quick to revert to using genetics as an excuse.

Quite a few of my friends were rather quick to say that I'm lucky to have "such good genetics" and that that is the reason why I don't have problems with gaining weight and to describe themselves as "genetic victims". At the same time, they rarely or never exercise and eat rather unhealthy. They stopped putting so much emphasis on genetics aspect of it after I pointed out that my father has been overweight (when he was my age, he weighed 20-25kgs more than I do now at similar height) ever since I remember up until a couple of years ago.

Genetics can help or hinder but can rather easily be offset by your diet and exercise regimen.

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8 hours ago, Mikael said:

I bought a test when my wife was getting one. At least among the brands available in Sweden, Garmin was the best at tracking, though the battery was kinda weak. 

I really love the look of the Garmin Vivoactive 3. It's much bigger than the Charge 2 I currently have, but still, I think it's likely the direction I go.

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I used to love my Fitbit, but I lost it and didn't replace it. For a while, I continued using the Fitbit ecosystem even without a tracker, but they kept making pointless changes (well, I assume the point was to get people to pay for premium by making the free version useless) so I bowed out. Now that I'm having trouble getting back to my ideal weight, I'd like to use a tracker again, but I took a look at most of the ones available and I hate them. I don't really like wearing things on my wrist, and I would love to have a small, discreet, clip-on tracker (I previously used the Fitbit One). This flat-out does not seem to exist anymore. There are some older versions available, but they are not longer supported so I don't want to buy one now. This is crazy to me, there has to be a market for non-wrist trackers, but so far I have not found a single decent one.

Ah well. I will continue to use my phone. It doesn't really matter enough to make a difference, and at least it doesn't require me to wear a giant blob on my wrist.

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@baxus genetic predetermination is one of the great crutches/excuses.  I hear so often how lucky I am to look so young and be so fit.  Like exercise, healthy diet, no alcohol and no smoking are just incidental.  And my parents and siblings are all overweight.

@Triskele I’ve always noticed that alcohol ruins my sleep, even a small amount.  It leaves me tired but unable to fall into deep sleep.  Plenty of people though say that alcohol helps them sleep.

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Yes, I heard that conclusion before: Ambien knocks you out but does not allow for proper REM cycles (nor does alcohol). I don’t recall the source though, or its quality/credibility.  I’ve read so many articles, and listened to experts featured on podcasts, about the benefits of and impediments to good sleep.

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1 hour ago, Triskele said:

There are some of these trackers now that allege to measure you sleep quality (ie, how much REM, how much deep sleep, the cycles, etc...)

I own a Garmin Vivosport and I would take it with a very big grain of salt. I think it uses your heartrate and movement to determine your quality of sleep, and well, it recorded me as being asleep when I've been awake and have been at my desk for a couple of hours just because I wasn't moving my left hand. 

Oh, and I have occasional sleep records in the app even though I stopped wearing it to bed after a week. I can't make any sense of it.

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