Exercise Isn’t Your Best Friend for Weight Loss

I’m bombarded with remarks, even from other fitness and health professionals, repeating a very common belief: you gotta burn the calories through exercise to lose weight.

Problem is, it’s not true. And potentially dangerous as it’s leading many of us down the wrong path.

Don’t get me wrong. Overall, exercise is super-beneficial to health. But not for weight loss. The wrong exercise at the wrong time could actually slow your progress—or even make you gain weight.

Fact: The only way to lose weight is to turn your body into a fat-burning machine through nutrition.  And no, this isn’t another excuse for you not to exercise.

Why fewer calories outdoes more exercise

For starters, it’s simply easier and quicker to eat fewer calories than to exercise enough to burn them off.

Seems obvious, right? But too many people don’t get it. Maybe that’s because the thought of exercising later today or maybe tomorrow or next week is a whole lot more appealing than not eating something you really want now!

So let’s say you are up for busting your butt an hour a day to burn a few hundred calories. First off, the “calories burned” feature on your machine or tracker is likely overestimating your results. One study showed the calorie burn inflation with various machines varied from 7% for stationary bikes to 42% with ellipticals.

Think this through … if your “calories burned” show you burn 50 more calories than you actually do. And your reward yourself with a 50 calorie snack thinking you worked that off, you’ll actually gain several pounds over the year. No wonder the gym is full of frustrated, sweaty folks.

Plus, exercise sets off a cascade of events that affects how much you eat, how many calories you burn off, and ultimately, how much you weigh. The result of this complicated and not well-understood equation is that exercise is grossly inefficient for weight loss.

In the end, you have to work so hard just to drop a few pounds. Who has the time, energy, or patience for that?!

Research says so

Here’s a surprise: Focusing on exercise more than nutrition can actually slow weight loss – and may pack on even more pounds.

That’s right. Recent research shows that, contrary to popular belief, working out more doesn’t always lead to burning more calories. Why? Because it turns out your body is programmed to keep your energy burn within a fairly narrow range. This means that you will increase your energy burn at low exercise levels but that, as you exercise harder, the burn “plateaus” (levels off) instead of increasing.

Need more proof?

One study looked at everyone from marathon runners to people who did not exercise at all. They monitored what they ate very closely so their calorie intake stayed largely the same. Then all groups increased their exercise. Sadly, they lost no more than a few pounds despite all their efforts.

Many of us in the weight loss world talk about how today’s environment sets us up for failure because we sit at our desks all day. If we were hunting and gathering for our food like many years ago, we’d all be a lot more slim. So one researcher looked at one such society in Africa. Shockingly (even for me), the lifestyle of hunting and gathering for food did not burn off any more calories than us desk jockeys in Western countries.

Perhaps after a hard day’s work, they accounted for their extra food-gathering activities by resting more. Perhaps we do the same thing after a good workout. Whatever the reason, why weren’t the dwellers in this African society overweight then? You got it. Calories in! They didn’t overeat.

The list of studies pointing to the inefficiency of exercise for weight loss goes on and on. It’s well studied. It doesn’t work.

Exercise more, eat more

Then there’s the all-too-familiar fact that exercise makes your appetite sit up and yell, “Feed me!”—and, let’s face it, you often do.

Combine this with the “plateau” effect, and you get the results of a recent study of people taking part in exercise-focused programs to lose weight: Over time, they burned less energy than expected and ate more.

But exercise speeds things up, right?

Now let’s talk about what happens to your metabolism (how efficiently your body burns calories) when you lose weight. As you may already know, it tends to slow down your calorie burning as you get lighter, which can slow your weight loss over time.

Thinking that exercising more will speed it up? Again, a lot of people do. And like you, I sure wish it did! But it doesn’t have a significant effect on metabolism. Think “plateau” again.

Here’s where exercise can really help

It’s very important to me that you appreciate how important exercise is, and you don’t use science as another reason not to  exercise.

The list of health benefits from regular exercise is quite lengthy, including reducing diabetes, triglycerides, blood pressure, preventing certain cancers, and possibly preventing Alzheimer’s and more. There is absolutely no question that exercise is one of the best things you can do for you health. But weight loss just isn’t one of those benefits.

In addition to its other health benefits, the good news about regular exercise is that, once you’ve reached your weight goal, it’s a powerful tool to help you stay there.

In a long-term study of more than 10,000 Americans who each lost an average of 66 pounds, nearly all kept it off for 5 years or more with the help of regular exercise.

Now you know what doesn’t work for weight loss. So, what does? It’s all about what you put in your mouth – and what you don’t. With the right nutritional program, you can drop weight fast – burn fat without losing your muscle. Exercise needs to be part of any optimal health program, but the right type at the right time — and not for weight loss.

Ready to explore what’s possible for you? We’ll walk you step-by-step through your journey towards optimal health. To learn how we can help you reach your health goals, fill out the contact form here.