Diet vs Exercise for Weight Loss

Should I try to lose weight by exercising more or should I just cut down on my eating habits? Is a diet or exercise better for weight loss? If you’ve been asking yourself the same question, I’ve got the answer right here. But first we’ll have to determine what happens when you diet vs exercise for weight loss.

Exercise alone for Weight Loss

To start exercising for weight loss practicing poor nutrition could become frustrating. The reason for that is, the more you exercise, the more appetite you develop, especially if you’re not paying attention to how and what you’re eating.
In other words, you will increase food intake on the foods you’re already eating anyway, leading up to not losing any weight at all, and if your choice of food is already unhealthy, you will be munching out on unhealthy foods even more. So, even though exercising is healthy, it does not go too well without a healthy diet.
A British study on 360,600 adults found that exercise combined with a healthy diet reduces mortality risk significantly in compearance to either eating unhealthy but still exercising or people following a healthy diet but leaving out the exercise.

Even though a widespread myth talks about how large amounts of muscle mass will help you burn more calories at rest, in reality 1 pound of muscle mass burns an average of 6 calories per day, compared to 1 pound of fat, which only burns an average of 2 calories per day. For example, if you would lose 5 pounds of fat and gain 5 pounds of muscle mass over a period of 6 months, you will then burn 20 calories more a day. As you can see, by just adding muscle mass will not get you too far.
A positive aspect of exercising and building muscle mass is, you will automatically burn more calories when exercising. This is like having a car with an enormous engine vs a car with a small engine.
–However, researchers have found a phenomenon called “metabolic compensation,” which is all about how your body actively fights your effort into losing weight by becoming more efficient at conserving energy when you’re exercising. Metabolic compensation kicks in to preserve and store fat for future energy. In other words, when you’re trying to lose weight by exercising or dieting your body will see this as a danger of not having enough energy down the road, so it will fight your efforts of losing too much stored energy in form of fat to maintain your body’s “metabolic set point”.

Dieting for Weight Loss

Metabolic compensation will also accrue when you’re losing weight on a diet. We commonly know this as “hitting a plateau.” You will gradually lose less weight until you come to a stop in weight loss. The simple way to avoid or break the plateau is to exercise more and don’t change your eating habits if you’re already maintaining a healthy diet. The most important aspect when losing weight and exercising is to maintain a healthy diet so your body can function. You’re looking to burn more calories in exercise than you take in, combined with eating foods that increase your metabolism, help you build more muscle and burn more fat and calories at the same time.

Changing your eating habits without exercising to lose weight is a common practice around the world. However, there are many reasons this course is not the most practical way to go.

Here are some reasons why:

• Starting fad or crash diets to lose intensive amounts of weight in a short time, which is not healthy nor is long lasting.
• Losing weight on diets alone is not just weight from fat, you will also lose muscle mass and bone density in the process. By losing large amounts of fat and muscle, you also start to burn fewer calories.
• By starving yourself, which is what pretty much every diet does, your metabolic rate slows down as it attempts to conserve energy. This happens because your body is designed to enter self-preservation to protect you from starving.
• By losing large amounts of weight without exercising, you will experience loose skin and muscle loss, possibly making you look emaciated and unattractive.

Let’s face it, as humans, we have evolved to a sitting generation. We LAY in bed, SIT at the table when we’re eating, we SIT in our car/bus/train on the way to work, at work we SIT at our desk/workstation, on lunch break we SIT, on the way back home we SIT, arriving at home we SIT on our couch and finally we lay back down in bed, just to repeat all the following day.

So it is very important to exercise pretty much every day. You don’t have to do high intensive exercises every day. A nice 30 – 90 minute hike/walk can be filled in a weekly workout plan.

So what is the answer to the question “what is better -diet vs exercise for weight loss-?”
The stone cold truth is that to become and stay healthy, regular exercise AND a healthy diet is essential.

Are you ready to break your sitting habits and live a healthier lifestyle now?

Sources:

Diet or Exercise Interventions vs Combined Behavioral Weight Management Programs
Diet, exercise or diet with exercise: comparing the effectiveness of treatment options for weight-loss and changes in fitness for adults (18–65 years old) who are overfat, or obese; systematic review and meta-analysis
Effect of different doses of supervised exercise on food intake, metabolism, and non-exercise physical activity
The Effects of Exercise on Food Intake and Body Fatness
Exercise alone is not enough: weight loss also needs a healthy (Mediterranean) diet?
Exercise, macronutrient preferences and food intake
Long-term weight losses associated with prescription of higher physical activity goals
Physical activity, diet quality and all-cause cardiovascular disease and cancer mortality
The Effects of the Type of Exercise and Physical Activity on Eating Behavior and Body Composition in Overweight and Obese Subjects