Stalled on VLC? Try exercise.
 

This article is directed toward women but the information is useful for anyone.

http://www.bodybyscience.net/home.html/?page_id=301

To paraphrase: High intensity anaerobic exercise can be very useful for fat loss. Not because it burns calories, but because it depletes glycogen in the muscles. When glycogen is depleted in the muscles they become more insulin sensitive, which results in lower blood glucose, lower insulin, lower hepatic IR, lower triglycerides and more fat being mobilized out of fat cells. Women especially could find this useful because their muscle mass is smaller than men's to begin with, so increases can make a big difference.

What it's done for me so far: After losing about 60 pounds on VLC, I've been stalled for few years. Over the past year or so my weight creeped back up from a low of 160 to 180. I recently tried the Drs Eades "6 week cure" diet, which resulted in a quick 10 pound loss (probably from eliminating alcohol) back down to 170 but I hit the wall again. A month ago I discovered Body by Science, read the book and was inspired to give it a try. Four 10-12 minute workouts later I'm still 170 but I've dropped a size in jeans and my strength has increased so I must trading fat for muscle mass. Not bad for 45 minutes of exercise and no dietary change.

I highly recommend the book, especially for the detailed explanations of cellular and endocrine processes related to exercise (I find understanding the scientific basis motivational), but if you want to try out the protocol without buying the book, the articles and videos on the site have plenty of information.

Thank you - I'm reading the book reviews now, and am very intrigued.

So great to hear that you've blasted right on through 'the wall'. Woo hoo!!!

Slow Burn?
 

Is this similar to Eades's "Slow Burn" method? I haven't read it, but it sounds similar from what little I have picked up.

It is quite similar, but BBS recommends longer recovery. The philosophy on HIT vs cardio is pretty much the same. BBS goes into a lot more detail on the biochemistry. But I'd say if you like Slow Burn, you'll probably like BBS.

Thanks, I certainly hope this continues! It does seem quite sustainable. The time factor is always what gets me off track on workout programs.

I could argue that a stall is really reaching a steady-state, meaning calories in equalling calories out. Two ways to continue weight loss: Ingest fewer calories or burn more calories.

But neither method is popular with this group.

Or supported by science.

Or supported by clinical or personal experience.

It would have been inconceivable to me that anyone would argue with this, but the posts above mine seems to have done just that. :)

If a person is maintaining weight, it clearly means that calories-in is matching calories-out. The question, when it comes to stalls, is "why". Why is a person able to lose weight without hunger while doing LC, but only to a certain point? Why does he/she not keep losing until body fat is virtually eliminated? What determines if and at what point a stall occurs in a given individual?

There are many theories on this -- Dr. Eades had a couple good blog posts on it. But a weight loss stall means CI=CO by definition. Is this really debateable?

Wyvrn, could you describe the workout? Does it require equipment?

Over years and dozens of posts here. Check them out.

We welcome you, or anyone, to come up with something that proves your point. The Car Gas Tank analogy is not proof. The Bathtub Faucet And Drain analogy is not proof. Your own, personal experience is not proof. Beliefs held that keep you exercising but fail to explain physical phenomena are not proof.

Try to find something that doesn't write off the whole of cell biology, either. This WILL require mathematics beyond addition and subtraction.


An extraordinary array of genetic and environmental and neurochemical factors interrelated across multiple physiological systems and scientific disciplines of such complexity that only the exercise gurus and blogger-nutritionists claim to know it all.

A weight loss stall means that total body mass is not changing.

Maybe that is CI = CO.

It could also be:

CI > CO, muscle is being used up, and fat is being put on. This is the skinny-fat scenario.

CI < CO, muscle is being used up, and fat is being put on. This is the cortisol-excess-cardio scenario.

CI > CO, fat is being used up, and muscle is being put on. This is the not-losing-weight-but-getting-smaller scenario. Or the high protein turnover situation discussed by Bernardi.

When dieting long-term the body becomes more efficient with the calories coming in. Metabolism slows, more aspects are taken over by fat-burning. Fat contains twice the energy per gram as carbs or protein. I think a lot of the stall business is gluconeogenesis. Excess protein turning into sugar and ultimately fat. There are guidelines to show how much protein the body needs each day. But I think we all fall into a bell curve. At either end the protein could cause weight gain or loss while for middle majority it causes a stall. Just a guess.

I agree with your point:

"...a weight loss stall means CI=CO by definition"

I hear all the time how we can deplete glycogen. I haven't seen one paper to support it. Maybe I missed it? Or maybe we can only deplete glycogen when we are running on glucose, i.e. a high carb diet? How would this work when we're running on fat?

The way I understand it, when we're running on fat, blood glucose doesn't serve as a fuel. Rather, it works as a kind of additive, like nitrous oxide for a gasoline engine. Or maybe like a primer as in a water pump (in order to pump water, we must first fill the first immediate pipe surrounding the impeller with water, otherwise the pump is spinning in free air). Except, of course, in those cells that require glucose due to their lack of mitochondria. Then, glucose is used as fuel. Even then, some can use ketones to replace some, or all, of the glucose that would otherwise power them.

The point is, there is so little need, or even actual use, of glucose that I doubt glycogen will ever be depleted, if at all, when we don't eat carbohydrate.

On the other hand, the whole thing about insulin sensitivity, LPL activity and fatty acids uptake during exercise, I can understand and I could probably agree with it.

On the third hand, if it works, it doesn't matter how, does it.

"In the Key’s semi-starvation study (high-carb, low-fat) the subjects starved and obsessed on food constantly. In the Yudkin study (low-carb, high-fat), the subjects, who had no restriction on the amount of food they ate, volitionally consumed the same number of calories that the semi-starvation group did, yet reported that they had “an increases feeling of well-being.” Instead of lethargy and depression reported by the Keys subjects on their low-fat, high-carb 1570 calories, those on the same number of low-carb, high-fat calories experienced “decreased lassitude.”

Both groups of subjects were consuming the same number of calories, but one group starved while the other did just fine. One group had to be locked down to ensure they didn’t eat more than their alloted 1570 calories; the other group voluntarily dropped their intake to 1560 calories and felt great. What was the difference? Subjects in both groups ate the same number of calories."
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/...ways-a-calorie/

"Ever since I started what I call the Evolutionarily Appropriate Diet (i.e., paleo, caveman, hunter-gatherer... etc.), I've refrained from counting calories--after all, if what I'm eating is "appropriate," I shouldn't need to. But since I've been uping the intensity of my weight training this summer, I have worried a little about whether or not I'm getting enough protein.

In any case, I typed in a few days to see roughly where I'm at. It turns out that I'm eating more than 5000 calories a day.

Today was 5,238. Yesterday was more. That pigout day I had last week came in at 6150 calories. And I've been pretty much eating this way the whole time I've been on this diet--in other words, I've been rapidly losing weight while eating 5000+ calories a day.

Gary Taubes explained in Good Calories, Bad Calories that not all calories are the same, but the idea that I could be eating like this and still losing weight just floors me. The "caloric balance" calculator on FitDay (which takes into account exercise levels, etc.) suggests that I should be gaining 3.6 pounds a week. Instead I've lost a total of 50 pounds from my all time high.

Need any more proof that a calorie is not just a calorie?"
http://www.terminalalienation.com/2...0-calories.html

The Quality of Calories: What Makes Us Fat and Why Nobody Seems to Care
http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_d...webcastid=21216