I used to run with the Apple Watch for a few days to test the device. I was amazed by how little calories the body needs to run something like five kilometers. As they say in the article, it’s quite hard to outrun a bad diet – a single bar of chocolate will easily erase your “earned calories”. And what’s worse, people tend to overcompensate after physical activity, so the excercise could even get you some calories extra. (I have no trouble with weight, I am just interested in the topic.)
Exactly. My favorite is every couple weeks someone posts on the reddit fitness boards about what exercises they need to do to target their abs. Fork put-downs, pantry closes, and fridge door slams are common answers :D
Everybody has developed abs, as long as their able-bodied. They keep you upright all day. You just can't see them. The only people who ever need to target their abs are competitive bodybuilders.
The key word is key. There's not enough hours in the day to out train a bad diet. That said, there is the psychology of training. You don't have to be a fitness freak to get that "game face" feeling. That in turns is self-support when you finally decide to eat.
Put another way, there are benefits to exercise beyond calories burned.
This is how I am with smoking. I smoked a pack a day for years and quit over a decade ago, but I still smoked the occasional cigarette socially for years afterward. Once I started working out regularly, it was easy to stop that habit. I just felt like I wasn't going to be getting the most out of my investment of effort during the workouts.
Proved this for myself and then wrote a book about it.
I personally (Richard Boegli) lost 40 kg in 40 weeks (90lb in 9 months) WITHOUT exercise. [90lb in 9 months (no exercise)].
I chose to do it WITHOUT exercise, as my theory was that I would keep it off longer, if it wasn’t dependent on exercise. Every other time I lost weight in my life, it was a combination of diet and exercise. When the exercised stop, the weight would creep back up, as I was still eating too much.
The food industry should be fined for paying off people to produce so called health studies and fake science. I read some of the comments on that article claiming footballers have great abs because they exercise, this isn't about if you're body is toned, its about your body fat percentage, you can run all you like, but you're never gona run off high sugar foods easily, unless you're doing a marathon every few days. Food is the main way to reduce your weight, it doesn't mean you eat and go hungry, it means you get clean carbs and fill yourself on good stuff. Exercise just helps tone your body up and lost a little more bonus weight.