Andrew Webber is an ex-pat living (for the moment) in the Middle East, with his long suffering wife, 2 cats and Rusty the Wonder-Dog.
Among other things he is a writer - his first novel is in it's final draft phase and is due out on the first of June.
Yes... I am a writer.
Among other things he is a writer - his first novel is in it's final draft phase and is due out on the first of June.
Yes... I am a writer.
Or at least I am a massage therapist who calls himself a writer.
In the 10 years I've been a massage therapist I have had every personal trainer and their dog tell me that they have the answer for any over weight person.
Or as one personal trainer put it, smugly "I can get the fatties thin".
Hardly someone I'd wish to take advice from.
Still, there's not much to do when you are a massage therapist and the client decides to educate you on the weakness of others not in the hard body brigade... other than throw more oil on them and jam your thumbs it to their sore spots in the hoe that they cease their monologue. Essentially, when one of these paragons of the training community would start telling me how they had it all sorted out (through the muffled towel of the massage table) I had no choice but to listen.
Usually their "answer-to-all-things-fat" would encompass there a lengthy process of flogging their client half to death in the gym and making them drink protein shakes by the gallon.
Same old same old.
Fast forward to now (or at least January this year) and I'm now an expat in a very hot country, and having climbed on to the food pyramid during the holiday period ....then EATING the food pyramid, along with everything else I could see, I had blown out to 103 kgs (227 pounds).
And felt like crap.
I just felt like I needed to clean the old system out (I am nearing 40 after all) so I set some ground rules and set to it in March.
So I thought "Why not make an experiment out of it?"
What if I shunned everything that the fitness industry has been banging on about for years?
What if I just ate food? No supplements, just pick the foods I'd eat and waited to see what happened.
What if I did all that AND DIDN'T work out for the whole 28 days?
That's right. Sure I had to see a few massage clients a week, but that's hardly a strain on the old energy resources...
But my job as a writer gives me the great (mostly) opportunity to sit on my backside for extended periods though the day.
The resulting 10% weight loss was a surprise.
I have no idea what would have happened if I had added training to the equation as well...
I guess I'll find out soon enough as I have decided to continue the experiment to an additional month with very basic training.
Fear not - I'm trying to fool you in to training during the coming 28 days, that is a whole other experiment, and separate to this little walk in the park.
Join in, and you'll be surprised how easy it is too.
No gym memberships.
No expensive and horrific tasting goop to drink 4 hourly.
Just food.
And sitting on ones a***.
It's a cool premise for a website, though I feel it's kind of limiting to think that training is an "either/or" proposition. I eat all real food, and refuse to drink protein shakes/goop (as I prefer to, ya know, CHEW my calories), but I also lift very heavy weights, and only two times a week, and I maintain a really great physique after having lost 40 pounds without "killing myself at the gym".
ReplyDeleteThe problem with just straight weight loss (even with "basic training", which I assume means some kind of aerobics) always ends up being the loss of muscle mass, which means that you will reach a point where your weight will go up again (not to mention, muscle maintenance is so important as you get older). I don't even do any cardio other than just being active (taking stairs, etc). By maintaining my muscle mass, I've kept off the weight for 4 years and counting.
But anyway, like I said, it's an interesting premise. I've always thought that if people just ate unprocessed REAL foods, that they wouldn't have to worry themselves about being overweight to begin with. Best of luck to you.
Hi Anonymous! (well, you are :-p )
ReplyDeleteI hear what you are saying - I actually think that not exercising in the long term is not smart.
Bear in mind that while the premise of this whole experiment ended in weight loss, it actually wasn't what I started out to do.
I just wanted to feel better - the loss of weight is as much a surprise to me as it is to everyone else who has finished the experiment as well.
There is enough evidence that would suggest that living a no exercise life and simply focusing on food will in time drop muscle mass.
BUT - the drop in muscle mass in a month will be negligible. The reality is that the body will support as much muscle as it needs. You will no doubt carry more muscle because you are lifting heavy. For your body it has become a requirement that in order to fulfill its weekly duties it needs to accumulate muscle.
For average everyday folk though, who up until now haven't required that their body lift heavy weights twice a week, there isn't a lot of non functional muscle to diminish.
If a super heavyweight power lifter decided to ditch all their exercise, and adhere to the blobmosis experiment would they, in time, lose muscle?
Sure, in time. But not in a month.
I used to work with people who's primary sport was body building.(my clinic was in a body building studio, and frequented by competitive body builders/sculptors)
15 days out from competition they'd go in to strip phase. Which meant they dropped their diets to the most unhealthy levels they could do while still allowing themselves to draw breath, and reduced workouts to high rep and (comparatively) low weight. And Walking. A LOT of walking.
So with almost zero healthy nutrition, and seriously reduced working out they would strip fat,(often to as low as 8% of total mass) and budget on losing no more than 1% muscle mass.
Many fear (I'm not suggesting you are one of them, you seem to have things sorted out) that if they start an eating plan and don't work out that they will lose all their muscle.
If they haven't been working out prior anyway, they'll lose nothing, because the muscle they have is functional for what their current activities require.
What I HAVE seen in the past is people, who previously haven't worked out, diet back to a foundation weight and then GAIN because they are adding muscle to their frame.
Which is fine - it's belt loops and jean sizes that matter at that point.
Blobmosis is about allowing the body to get to a functioning level to allow training to commence. (if the blobmosis folk feel like they want to add training to their lives)
Choices. Everything is about choices.
Thanks for your comment!