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You should know that exercising a bunch and jamming more food into your system IS NOT the "healthiest" option, if life span is your goal. Calorie restriction I
by rubicon33 8y ago
You should know that exercising a bunch and jamming more food into your system IS NOT the "healthiest" option, if life span is your goal.
Calorie restriction IS perhaps the healthiest route, if you are mainly interested in living longer. Feeling better is harder to quantify. The "TLDR" is: Exercise moderately, and find the minimal amount of calories you can consume without feeling like shit. That's the optimal balance.
The unfortunate reality is that often the "healthiest" path in life, doesn't FEEL the best. I felt my best lifting 3-4x a week, running, and eating 3600-3900 calories per day. I was constantly full, but felt like I had tons of physical and mental energy. Alas, plenty of research has been done on the effects of large calorie diets EVEN WHEN CONTROLLED FOR WEIGHT. Large calories = bad.
If you're interested, here's a good place to start:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2686342/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2686342/
- naasking 8y agoControlling for weight isn't meaningful if you're not also controlling for body composition.
- stochastic_monk 8y agoYou make an interesting point. I glanced over the article and I’m curious: is weight a sufficient proxy for activity/lean body mass? The anecdata I have of athletes generally supports longevity and health, whether training strength or long distance exercise.
- nradov 8y agoPerhaps, but no study has yet shown that calorie restriction actually extends human life. It works on lab animals. Given that human lifespans are already relatively long it will take many years to gather reliable data.