The Integra Blog

‘That’ Time Magazine Article

Time recently published an article Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin which (in a nutshell) states that exercise is a waste of time due to the fact that if we exercise, we will be more likely to opt for something fatty as a reward, than something healthy. He goes on:

Spurts of vigorous exercise could lead to weight gain

And then talks about lower intensity walking being more beneficial for weight loss. Regardless of whether John Cloud’s point about his blueberry bar reward is accurate, (a study at the bottom shows it isn’t) the article misses out on a bunch of other benefits of exercise.

Drew Baye and Chip Conrad have both written articles on the Time article, both coming from slightly different angles, which summarise some of my own thoughts on the subject.

Drew talks about how the fitness industry itself, is failing people.

Of course, the fitness industry is going to respond to this the way they always do when profitable nonsense is being threatened: they’ll continue making the same ridiculous claims they have been for years and hope people keep believing them.

Unfortunately, most people will keep believing them, because it is a lot easier to spend an hour or so performing some mindless activity a few times a week than to exert the kind of effort and discipline required to change one’s eating habits.

People want to believe things like hitting the gym on Monday can make up for a weekend of drinking and overeating, or that going for a brisk walk will burn off those Oreos they had at lunch.

Chip, on the author of the Time article, John Cloud’s position on exercise:

“BE WARNED” he says! “Avoid real exercise folks!”

Despite it leading to improved overall fitness, greater self confidence, increased speed, workload, sporting prowess…. basically an increased ability to do ANYTHING and making you feel better, a couple people might have gained a few pounds from it somewhere because they also ate like shit. So DON’T DO IT.

And just having a quick look around some studies, I found some research in the Journal of Endocrinology, which showed that exercise produced a significant decrease in relative energy intake, rather than the opposite shown in the Time article.