The Skinny On Calories

Perhaps the first thing to be said about diet and fitness is that there’s a glut of programs out there, the overwhelming preponderance of which are sheer baloney.

Here are a few facts:

A calorie is in scientific terms “a unit of heat required to raise the temperature of a kilogram of water 1 degree (Celsius) at a specified temperature.” (Note: this is called a “food calorie,” also known as a “large calorie.” The so-called small calorie, which is the type used in chemistry, is defined as “a unit of heat required to raise the temperature of 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius.”)

Every food contains calories.

A gram of fat contains about 8 calories.

A gram of carbohydrate or protein contains about 4 calories.

A pound of body fat contains about 3,500 calories.

Thus, by cutting caloric intake by, for instance, 500 calories a day, you will burn approximately 1 pound a week.

To lose weight, you must simply burn more calories per day than you take in.

No amount of hype changes these basic biological facts.

According to the National Research Council, the average woman (5’4″, medium frame) who does absolutely nothing, burns between 1,600 and 2,400 calories per day; the average man (5’8″, medium frame) burns 2,300-3,000 calories per day.

The body burns most of its calories replacing tissue, processing food, pumping blood, and so on.

The most accurate equation for calculating how many calories the body burns is called the Mifflin equation. For 78% of the people tested, the Mifflin equation estimates the number of calories a person burns to be within 10% of the measured number of calories they burned at rest.

But there’s a simpler formula for estimating how many calories you burn when you’re completely at rest: add a zero to your weight (if you weigh 175, make it 1,750) and then add your actual weight twice to that figure (1,750 + 175 + 175 = 2,100). Thus 2,100 is roughly how many calories a 175 pound person uses in a completely sedentary state.

Using these same figures:

“To determine your total calorie needs, you have to add calories for general activity and exercise. With your desk job and workouts, you probably burn one-half again your resting needs, for a total of 3,150 calories (2,100 plus 1,050 equals 3,150). If you were engaged in a regular aerobic exercise program, you would require more calories. On average, walking or jogging a mile consumes about 100 calories” (From the desk of Clarence Bass).

These are, of course, only estimates, and in the end you must get to know your own body, as indeed the Stagyrite once sagely advised.

There is, ultimately, only way to get and stay in shape, and that by wanting it with all your heart and soul. All the fads and all the hype will never, I’m afraid, provide a shortcut for that, although some things may motivate you more than others.