Why Runners Can't Eat Whatever They Want (Read 558 times)

There are many great points in this thread. Here is my view on food in general. If the whole nation has over 60% or even 70% overweight and obesity. The life expectancy of the next generation is becoming shorter. More people are suffering more chronic diseases in their early life. We should review our food industry and regulation. Like others said, babies do not choose to be obese. They are fed to death exaggeratedly.

 

No, but adults choose what and how much they stuff in their mouths, and how much or how little they exercise.

 

IMHO the obesity epidemic has as much to do with a lifestyle of sloth than it has to do with food.

 

I watch the cartoons my kids watch.  When I was a kid, nobody had to tell me to get up and move and getting a kid to stand up in front of the TV and waive their arms around was not considered exercise.

Sloth is linked to food. How many people stuff their faces when watching TV or a film?

If you are out running or doing  some other sport, while you can eat whilst doing it, you aren't able to eat as much.

In the case of kids if they are having fun doing something active they tend not to want to eat.

Habit trumps choice when it comes to human psychology.  Dietary restraint can't just rely on willpower--there's just too much frontal lobe involvement and people quickly get "decision fatigue" if they're just white-knuckling their way through a new behavior.  Those of us who train hard understand this principle.  Any new training stimulus is exhausting and very hard at first, but slowly (if performed habitually) becomes automatic.  Good eating habits work the same way.

It's very difficult to reverse poor dietary habits if you learned them in childhood.  I don't think it's as simple as 'it's people's choices and their own behavior.'  And I DO think the current governmental practices (agricultural subsidies) and food industry practices (deceptive advertising, spreading misinformation, etc.) are BOTH real contributing factors to an obesogenic environment.

 

I had plenty of time to eat 4000+ calories when I was out running twice a day and 100+ miles a week.

 

My point was that regulation and the government is no white knight here.  It's peoples' choices and their own behavior.

Let me share a story with you about my own heart/health history.  First, I think we all agree that there are some people who are genetically wired such that they can eat anything.  I worked with a guy once who ate bacon and eggs every day for breakfast and had incredibly low cholesterol. But these people are the exceptions.

After open heart surgery almost 6 years ago, a new aortic valve and triple bypass, I work hard to keep my total cholesterol down and pay particular attention to LDL.  My cardiologist put me on Crestor, a statin, 20 mg a day.  As a runner, I have a problem with statins and maybe you do too.  They cause some muscle pain and hurt your training performance, recovery and race times.

So my LDL was 100, and in the month of January I decided to see by personal experiment if I could alter it by giving up alcohol.  I'm a 2-3 beer kind of guy, but I gave it up entirely.  LDL went to 89, which pleased me. But my cardiologist still wants to see my LDL under 80, as I have heart disease.  Meanwhile I read that a modest amount of alcohol didn't do any harm at all and in fact was good for you.  I reasoned that the drop in LDL was not the abstinence but the difference in my food habits during that period.  Turns out I was right.

In February I went back to drinking beer, BUT at the same time I adopted Mark Bittman's VB6 diet. Go ahead and google it.  Basically you are vegan before 6 pm.  Bittman hypothesizes that it is difficult for most people to go all vegetarian, so he simply suggests your breakfast and lunch are all vegan, then you can eat meat at dinner.  I did it faithfully and it's seductive.  yes I eat meat at dinner, but a modest amount of fish or chicken.  I was eating so many good protein rich vegetables and grains that my desire for meat diminished.

So end of March I went in for another lipid panel.  How about this?  LDL was 70!  I will never give up this diet and this month I'm going back to the cardiologist and ask him to take me off statins entirely. This is a great thread.   Spareribs

 

No, but adults choose what and how much they stuff in their mouths, and how much or how little they exercise.

 

IMHO the obesity epidemic has as much to do with a lifestyle of sloth than it has to do with food.

 

I watch the cartoons my kids watch.  When I was a kid, nobody had to tell me to get up and move and getting a kid to stand up in front of the TV and waive their arms around was not considered exercise.

LOL!  What has happened?  I've thought a lot about this, since I have kids that are 8 and 11.  Mine aren't obese, though - and I keep thinking, what are we doing different?

Well, one thing?  My kids go to an aftercare program at school.  They help them with their homework, and no TV, they play in the gym or outside afterwards.  There are a couple of obese kids in their aftercare program.  But not many.  Actually, really few of them.

Kids that go home don't have the opportunity to play outside with other kids anymore.  At least in my area, there isn't critical mass of kids at home anymore.  My neighborhood is dead, dead, dead until 6PM.  IF I had my kids home at 3, I couldn't even let them run around because there'd be nobody else to play with.  Is that it?

Slippery slope much?

 

Well it is not really new information that running too much is bad for you. But I guess hiding it from the insurance company is a good reason to keep your RA log private.

Define "too much".  There lies the problem.  And not just for running, but for about everything diet-related as well.  Saturated fat is evil.  Turns out, perhaps not so much.  Now it's carbs and sugar.  Anti-oxidants and vitamins are good, take high doses.  Now it turns out not only are they probably worthless, but large doses of some may be harmful.

The problem is that we have a really poor understanding of what does constitute a healthy diet and the long-term effects of certain nutrients.  Public policy should not be based on weak data.  It may even end up forcing harm on people.

Slippery slope much?

If there weren't already examples, I'd say you have a point.