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Nutrition counting calories

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Geoff Chafe said:
I have never, nor do I ever plan to count calories, but I just watched this:


Munchies has a great series called Fuel that is really interesting.
Click to expand...


This annoyed me enough to post about it. (This is a warning to readers, not an attack on Geoff.)

You cannot take the context of an elite young female who has been an athlete most of her young life; who obviously has never had metabolism issues; likely under ate in the past and reproduce her experience with any kind of success. It would be akin to reading the current training program of an elite lifter, full of performance enhancers and years of training experience and assuming that it is a viable option for everyone. Physiologically, these are the exact same statements.

If your metabolism and experience are similar to hers, you might see the same results.

Yes, counting calories works in theory. It works because it is a mathematical way to reduce the amount of energy you take in (and we just love placing numbers on s***) and reducing energy works to reduce body fat, in theory, as sure as starvation works in practice. Trouble is, in free-living society, if your physiology is such that (e.g.) any excess glucose will cause fat accumulation and hunger, you will not willfully "starve yourself to weight loss while eating".

Turkey corn dogs and TV dinners for breakfast? There was a rather successful twinkie diet conducted by a college professor some years back; and I have bridges for sale all across the eastern seaboard.
 
A famed diet for ballet dancers is cigarettes and Diet Coke. Al's point is a good one, as always, we see this all the time in fitness magazines. I saw one about Andy Murray's diet with the 'eat like a tennis player'. You know 6000 calorie kind of thing to support all those 5 hour games against Federer that people tend to play regularly....bonkers. If it's alright for Andy Murray it's alright for me, kind of thing. Similarly Mo Farah, eat like a world number 1 endurance runner! Bring it on, fill your boots. There is this massive disconnect going on with the overbearing messages and information concerning food intake and that disconnect starts with calorie counting as the foundation for this warp factor. I dunno is there a better term? Energy balance, or something. I know it's p*ssing in the wind against the hurricane force of mass food production, advertising and all the nonsense but if people start ditching the terms it may have a positive effect on their psychology of food, or their belief systems and the way food intake is framed. A bit of a cognitive behavioural affect, words and actions influencing behaviour change.
 
What I liked about the video is that she seemed fairly non-judgmental about food and her consumption of it, while keeping a fairly good accounting of what she was eating. There is information available about food (nutrients, energy content) -- use the information in a healthy way to enable yourself to get what you need in the way of intake to support what you do. Many people get caught up in emotions about amount and content of food. She didn't seem to fall into that trap, despite a high degree of attention on it.

I agree, less processed food would be good! It is unfortunate that processed food is easier to count due to nutrition labels. Recently I heard the advice (but I don't recall where - on this forum somewhere) - eat food without nutrition labels; i.e. real food. I like that advice.

I've never been a calorie-counter, and not a big dieter. My whole adult life, my weight has been between 152-185 (Edit: except pregnancy, 200!) (currently 164 at 5'8", and about 6 lb more lean mass than I had 3 years ago according to the Bod Pod). Always a bit more than I'd like, but basically within reason, and I rarely "diet". A few times I've lost weight on low-carb (Atkins) pretty effectively, but I don't like some of the effects so it's not my go-to. I think the diet that taught me the most about balanced eating was Richard Simmons' "Deal a Meal" back about 20 years ago. It was a great visual representation of how much to eat in a day, portion control, and how to balance intake across different macronutrients, while giving plenty of choices about how to do it. Those lessons stuck with me ever since.
 
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Everyone makes good points here. What I like about what she does: she's found a strategy that works for her, enabling her to meet her body composition goals without undue suffering. What I don't like about the video: that _anyone_ might think this strategy would work for someone else.

-S-
 
If my other post stirred debate:

This female bodybuilder strictly counts calories also.
 
I've come from a bodybuilding background prior to my powerlifting and kettlebell work.

calorie counting works - there's so many different diets out there all with different degrees of pseudo science but the one consistant in any successful diet is that controls calorie intake.

for those who use a rule based diet (i.e no carbs, no processed foods etc) the question comes when weight loss stalls what do you do? if you dont know what your taking in how do you know if you can trim it? What you measure you can manage - maybe for those wanting to just drop a few pounds it's not an issue but when you need to hit specific wright classes or body compositions it becomes more critical

my feelings is often the best approach is a combination of food tracking/macro targers combined with rule based diet choices (no processed foods, focus on veg etc) - its never a choice of quality or quantity IMO as both are important.

at the end of the day what works is whatever you will stick with long term
 
Food is fuel, and it should be enjoyed. And as Mr. Freides has said, it's personal.

It seems you are most worried about your total calorie count being too low, but it seems you also want to lose fat. Well, if you strength train 2-4 times a week while you're in a caloric deficit the loss is mostly going to be fat. So I'm not seeing the problem.

Why don't you try out the paleo diet only by worrying about the type of food and that you are full. As you have reported, it's unlikely that you're going eat too much. Try it out for a month or so, and see if you're enjoying your food and getting the results you want. I don't think counting calories is necessarily unhealthy, but in many cases I think it is not necessary and a waste of time. That's obviously just my opinion.

Finally, being social is about being social, it's not about what you eat or drink. And don't let your friends rag on you (or don't take it to heart); you're eating for your goals, and that's nothing to be ashamed of. That being said, maybe you should look into Eat Stop Eat by Brad Pilon: it's an approach to fat loss that is very easy to fold into practically every lifestyle.
 
I count calories pretty religiously...when trying to gain weight. For maintaining or even losing a few pounds I don't find it to be helpful.

I have a heck of time putting on weight if I don't count, in fact I have never reliably put on weight without counting calories, and breaking it down by protein/carbs/fats.
 
Estimating how many cals are in your foods can be as much as 25% out!

So can trying to estimate how many you burn.

So you can be as much as 50% wrong!

Its way more reliable to get in tune with your bodies natural hunger and full up signals. Try eating slower to as it takes 20 mins for your body to get the full signal.

When you are hungry, wait a little bit and ask yourself on a scale of 1-10 just how desperate you are too eat.

These two practices will help you with the above.
 
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