Who said: “Exercise doesn’t help weight loss. Marathons only burn 2,200 calories, so a dieter would need to run almost two marathons to lose one pound.”
Exercise confuses many diet experts. For example, Despite all the ‘expert’ misinformation, exercise is the single best thing you can do for your body and for your diet program. It may not speed the rate of weight loss, but it will help you lose fat and water while it gives you a trim body. Much better than moving the needle on your scale.
Does Exercise Burn Many Calories?
- The number of calories your body burns during a single workout is not important. What’s important is the number of calories your body burns all day, every day.
- If you exercise regularly and vigorously, you will build muscles that burn more calories – all day, every day. Yes, even while you are sleeping.
Dieters Have Two Goals
We dieters have two primary goals: to get healthier and to look better. That means losing fat and adding muscle. If you diet and stay on the couch, you will lose fat but you’ll also lose muscle. However, regular exercise creates healthy, dense new tissues – muscles, bones, and more – while it targets your stored fat, so it will give you a sleek, firm look. By contrast, a pound of fat – so fluffy that it floats – takes up much more space on your body. Big, lumpy space. Dieters who exercise regularly may slow their weight loss slightly, but they will be trading big and lumpy for sleek and firm. Much better.
And there is a bonus, too. Active people stay sharper as they age – more mentally alert – because exercise strengthens the heart and arteries, the feeding tubes for your brain. Ever read an ad for those expensive programs that claim they will ‘exercise your brain’ with puzzles and games? However, it is very clear that people who stay physically active as they age will retain their intellectual skills longer than people who don’t. If you exercise your body, your brain will take care of itself – for free. Much better.
The Scale Is Not Your Friend
Doctors and trainers who pretentiously say things like “A dieter would need to run almost two marathons to lose one pound.” are encouraging us to focus on the scale, not on our bodies; they sound like rookies. A pro would encourage us to focus on making our bodies healthier and more attractive. That is the value of regular exercise: it diminishes the importance of the scale by making us stronger and sexier – at any age. Much better.
Here’s an easy thought experiment: if by some miracle you could have a body like a swimsuit model and live an active, healthy, happy life until you were 120, would you care about how much you weighed? Of course not. You would never get on a scale again because your weight wouldn’t matter. The only people who would care how much you weigh are the whores at your insurance company; they would leap gleefully at a chance to raise your rates.
The problem is that too many people still believe the Kokos of the world. They worry more about their scale than they do about their exercise program. Are you one of them? Are you exercising regularly but feeling unhappy because you aren’t losing weight fast enough? Okay – think about this: does Charlize Theron care how much she weighs? I don’t, and I’ve been looking for an excuse to use her picture for months. I just found one. Much, much better.
