"Do You Really Have To Count Those Calories? Wolfgang's Fitness Riddles Part 2"

Published by Marc David http://www.beginning-bodybuilding.com Part 4 of a 10-Part eCourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Wolfgang's Fitness Riddles Part 2 of 3

Do you really have to count the calories in order to gain or lose weight?

My conversation continued with Wolfgang. I think he understands the debate of 20 minutes of high intensity vs. 40 minutes of low intensity cardio. However, no'w he's starting to wonder about calories and tracking the diet.

It was only a few years ago that I gave nutrition a second thought. I had trained HARD in the gym only to be disappointed with the intensity of my gains. What I didn't know was that while my training was on par, my nutrition lagged behind.

You see, you grow when you aren't in the gym.

Yes. That's right. The notion of exercise, becoming healthy, and building bigge'r muscles plus being leaner is a 24x7x365 type of deal.

Which means that if I train 1 hour in the gym on Monday, but fail at nutrition, I'm really failing at overall training.

Onto the questions...

Question #1: Do you really have to count calories in order to gain or lose weigh't?

Wolfgang:

Bodybuilding manuals go into great detail about how to calculate your caloric intake by giving formulas and such.

Excuse me? My wif'e made spaghetti bolognaise yesterday, I can't be asked to weigh my meals in order to count the calories. Can I? What would she think about me? Not to mention what I would think about myself ;-) ?)

I tried to go to fitday.com to calculate the calories, but it totally eluded me. How many grams are in pasta and meat? Plus, they were in different categories. It is a big hassle anyway so the site was no use for me in that respect.

Good heavens, there must be a way to proceed without calorie counting. Isn't there?

Marc:

Not really and I'll tell you why and how you can get around the whole calorie counting ordeal.

You see, in order to los'e fat or gain muscle you need to pinpoint exactly what you are eating.

Let's say you need 3000 calories a day to maintain your current weigh't at your current activity level.

Now you decide you want to los'e fat.

Amping up your cardio training to longer and longer sessions will just tire you out. However, there is a way you can bump up your cardio session and follow certain fat loss tips and techniques. That being said, keep in mind the following...

Where do I burn the fat?

80% of fat loss comes from diet and 20% from cardio.

As you can see, the area you want to manipulate is the diet.

Back to the example.

You decide to lose the fat. You know you need 3000 calories a day to maintain your weigh't. You do some calorie calculations (all outlined in the Beginner's Guide) and find that you want to be aggressive and cut your calories by 20%. It's aggressive, but it is just enough to achieve fast results without making your body go into a 'starvation mode' and hold onto everything it's got.

Except you don't want to count calories.

That's similar to saying...

I want to start in New York and get to California but I don't want a map or directions. I just want to drive West.

It just won't work. You might zig zag her'e and there. Maybe one week you'll eat less and los'e a pound. The next week while on vacation you'll overdo it and gain 5 pounds. Who knows. You won't.

Do you really have to count each calorie? Especially when you look at homemade items that have so many ingredients? What do you do?

I obtain a good estimate by looking up and inputing the general food item and the quantity I consumed. This may not be the most accurate method, but the point is that it is easy to do.

I tend to eat a lot of the same things for breakfast. Therefore, overtime I already know the calories and I don't need to track it anymore. I know via portions that a bowl of oats is "x" number of calories and how this adds into my total daily allowance.

I personally do not weigh each piece of food. I will go to lunch and take a look at what I'm eating. I generally know the portion sizes of what I ate.

I know roughly that I'm 20% below my maintenance for fat loss and 20% above for weigh't gain at the end of the day.

A prevalent problem stems from the fact that most people DO NOT want to track what they eat.

The bottom line is that if you don't know where you are and where you are going then you really don't know how you'll get there. Therefore, it's no wonder so many people are frustrated.

Wolfgang, you don't have to track every single piece of food you put into your mouth. For example, when there is a home cooked meal, you aren't likely to know what is in it. However, you can and should get a general idea of the composition of the meal.

Eventually you can track your portions, especially if you tend to eat a lot of the same things every day.

In the next part of your Beginners mini-course, I'll show you how you can easily figure out if you are making progress with your workouts. You can figure this out even if you are one of those people who neve'r gets sore from a workout.

I'll talk to you again soon.

Your Friend,

Marc David

P.S. I think your wife will really enjoy the results if you lean up and start making positive changes to your body. Heck, she might even start asking you how you do it! :-)

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Just wanted to let you know that I just bought and started reading your book. Wanted to let you know my appreciation for your writing style--friendly and not overly "pumped," and thank you for the lack of typos (that I've seen yet) and grammar errors. It shows you took a lot of time and care in preparing the book. It drives me nuts--no matter how good the information is-- to read slaughtered language, which seems to be rampant in many of the fitness e-books I've been reading (yes, choice is good!).

Gregory M. Zinkl

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