[eastbound]

Does gym correlate with being fat later in life?

I’ve seen it a lot: A sports jock at 20-25, gets a manager job and becomes quite unhealthy at 40, much more in US than in, say, France, where gyms arrived much later and there hasn’t been a culture of muscle size in high school/uni until very recently.

[kelipso]

Athlete turned overweight is so common. They keep up their diet as they grow older but not their exercise. Opposed to someone who have the same diet their whole life and only occasionally exercised, they'd just maintain their weight.

[bluGill]

Many sport create bad eating habits. Wrestling is the worst where kids are taught to cut a lot of weight in a short time (by dehydration), but even in other sports the coach will often give out diet advice that is at best good for the year but not good for long term health. (and at worst it isn't even good advice for the current year - coaches are not nutritionists)

[evantbyrne]

I would assume the opposite. Childhood obesity probably correlates very strongly to obesity in adulthood. What you are observing is probably just an overall trend in society and not specific to jocks.

[zen_1]

ime Gym or high intensity physical activity correlates with getting fat when you stop unless you put a lot of effort into eating less. When I stopped all sports and powerlifting during covid lockdowns I certainly gained a few pounds because my appetite was still at around 3500 kcal/day despite my physical activity not being at that level anymore.