Is cycling the panacea to not becoming a fat ............

[Nightfly]

......... lazy barsteward?

British Men And Women Are Getting Fatter And Fatter Through Lack Of Exercise And Overeating | UK News | Sky News

Can righteous smug fit cyclists claim the health high ground? There must be zero fat/obese regular cyclists unless people are cycling because they have been obese. There is only one I know of and that is the amazing shrinking gaz who is now normal weight down from 33 stone  .

"Get off your arses and onto your bikes .........." fair comment?

[Wowbagger]

It helps, definitely, but it's not the solution.

I've gone up from 17½ to 18 stone since the bad weather set in. The correct weight for my height is about 13 stone. I've cycled over 7500 miles this year.

[FatBloke]

Answer......no it isn't!  Unfortunately.   

[Clandy]

Since I got back into regular cycling a few years ago I have gone from 17.5st to 14 - 14.5st (I seem to vary between those weights now). But I also try to keep my calorie count to around 2500 a day.
So IMO cycling definitely helps.

<edit> Plus there are other heath benefits. I returned to cycling because I was overweight, had a high enough blood pressure that my GP wanted to prescribe medication, and had an ongoing depression/anxiety problem. Since my return to cycling my blood pressure is now perfect, I am no longer overweight (I am 6'2"), and thanks to the regular exercise the anxiety is becoming more controllable.

[Kim]

There's a not insignificant cycling-makes-you-hungry factor for most people (I'm unlucky enough to have the opposite problem, which means I end up forcing myself to eat by numbers to stave off the bonk), which can cancel out any weight loss.

Of course being overweight and fit is vastly preferable to being overweight and unfit, so getting on your bike is a good thing generally.

[numbnuts]

"fat man on a bike" comes to mind 

[simonp]

That article got me googling.

First, the contrarian website where they debunked the obesity epidemic myth. They claimed that the distribution has merely shifted and the rise in obesity is simply down to the whole distribution moving up a bit.

Except it's not that simple. Any idiot can look at the bell curve for BMI is not a normal distribution, it's log-normal with a much longer tail on the >mode side than on the <mode side; and it's fairly clear that the shape is changing, with the peak at around 25 becoming smaller over time and the tail becoming longer, so the increase in obesity is real.

[Canardly]

How much of this weight gain results from processed crap being introduced to the foodstuffs we all eat me wonders e..g peanuts bulking agents and so on?

[simonp]

Junkfood Science: JFS special report: Obesity statisticulation — When will people get it?

(Image showing change in distribution in this article - hotlinking doesn't seem to work)

My current BMI is right under the peak of the curve from NHANES I from 1976-1984; the 1999-2004 data show the changed distribution.

[oncemore]

Exercise/cycling, little exercise/no cycling, huge amounts of alcohol/no alcohol, manual work/sedentary/retired, no difference here. Ain't changed shape in over 45 years. But I've always been a "small eater" and a "big worrier".

Watching the sheer AMOUNT of food - good or bad - that people eat at restuarants etc always simply stuns me.

[Regulator]

...

Watching the sheer AMOUNT of food - good or bad - that people eat at restuarants etc always simply stuns me.

Then you'll be scared shitless if you see Teethgrinder 'snacking'.... 

[Clandy]

My current BMI is right under the peak of the curve from NHANES I from 1976-1984; the 1999-2004 data show the changed distribution.

BMI is not necessarily a good guide to weight because it doesn't take muscle mass and bone structure into account. According to the BMI chart. at 6'2" my ideal weight should be about 12st. I would have to be near skeletal to reach that weight.

[simonp]

My current BMI is right under the peak of the curve from NHANES I from 1976-1984; the 1999-2004 data show the changed distribution.

BMI is not necessarily a good guide to weight because it doesn't take muscle mass and bone structure into account. According to the BMI chart. at 6'2" my ideal weight should be about 12st. I would have to be near skeletal to reach that weight.

To reach a BMI of 25 you'd have to be at least 14st, though.  I am 6ft, have an "ideal" BMI (22) and I'm not skeletal at all, in fact I'm not skeletal when a stone lighter.

I already pointed out that people who are a weight that would have been quite normal 20 years ago are now considered skinny, but that's the effect of the norm shifting upwards.

[jogler]

This

Answer......no it isn't!  Unfortunately.   

& this

It helps, definitely, but it's not the solution.

are my experience.
Always remember that the entrance hole  is larger than the exit hole,in most cases

[teethgrinder]

...

Watching the sheer AMOUNT of food - good or bad - that people eat at restuarants etc always simply stuns me.

Then you'll be scared shitless if you see Teethgrinder 'snacking'.... 

I was at the retirement do for a former manager 10 years ago. A colleague of mine, weighing in at 24 stone (he was quite tall though and had a fair few stone of muscle) commented, "F*&k&£g hell!, you eat more than I do and I'm a fat b£$%a%d!"
I was cycling 6-700 miles a week at the time...

I don't eat so much when I don't cycle as far. I have put on a little bit of blubber in the last few years though, must start getting the miles in again.

I think there's more to it than just exercise. Eating habbits and sleep are important to IMO.

[Jaded]

I already pointed out that people who are a weight that would have been quite normal 20 years ago are now considered skinny, but that's the effect of the norm shifting upwards.

This.

[hellymedic]

I already pointed out that people who are a weight that would have been quite normal 20 years ago are now considered skinny, but that's the effect of the norm shifting upwards.

This.

Indeed. just watch any old footage (news, ToTP, anything) from the 40s, 70s or 80s and see how slim people seemed back then.

[campagman]

My local paper has a bygones section. The photos are noticeably absent of fatties. Maybe this was due to post-war shortages and we are now returning to the norm?
Cycling is obviously very good exercise but unfortunately some people think that cycling is an excuse to eat what they want.

[hellymedic]

Watch Top of the Pops from the 70s, long after the War. The kids look skinny...

[mark]

My local paper has a bygones section. The photos are noticeably absent of fatties. Maybe this was due to post-war shortages and we are now returning to the norm?
Cycling is obviously very good exercise but unfortunately some people think that cycling is an excuse to eat what they want.

Very doubtful. The US had no such shortages (that I know of) after WWII, and we have a somewhat more serious problem with obesity than does the UK.. We also show a similar pattern of people from the 40s, 50s, 80s being distinctly thinner than they are today.

Life has gotten more sedentary, food portions have gotten larger, food has become less healthy (high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated fats, corn-fed beef, livestock raised in feedlots instead of allowed to graze in pastures), and we are all fatter as a result.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I have noticed that the generation born during and shortly after the war in Poland, which had far greater shortages than UK or US, tend to be significantly shorter than those born later and much shorter-lived than those born in the 20s and 30s. I can think of various wartime and post-war effects that may have caused this, but AFAIK there's been no study into it.

Cycling, I think, has great physical and mental health benefits which far exceed its role in reducing overweight, however good or bad it may be at that.

[L CC]

And yet the 'ideal' female shape in the 40s and 50s was curvier than it is today. I have Marilyn Monroe's figure in the era of Kiera Knightley.

Like Wow just 4 weeks off the bike has had a detrimental effect on my size. I'm feeding a 150 mile a week appetite while managing about 20 miles. But, a couple more weeks off and it'll be self limiting, the appetite is driven by the exercise.

[Clandy]

My local paper has a bygones section. The photos are noticeably absent of fatties. Maybe this was due to post-war shortages and we are now returning to the norm?
Cycling is obviously very good exercise but unfortunately some people think that cycling is an excuse to eat what they want.

For adults I think it is a result of the transition from a manufacturing economy to a service economy. Until the late '80s early '90s the majority were employed in hard physical work, and so burned more calories in their daily lives. Now the majority have soft, far less physical jobs, and so burn less calories.
In children it is the transition from spending the majority of free time playing outdoors with friends, cycling, running, climbing, walking etc. to nowadays when they are more likely to be stuck indoors sat in front of a TV or playing computer games.

 Consequently people are fatter.

[Cudzoziemiec]

And yet the 'ideal' female shape in the 40s and 50s was curvier than it is today. I have Marilyn Monroe's figure in the era of Kiera Knightley.

But that was the contemporary ideal, which is likely to be far removed from the majority reality. In fact, it may be the ideal because it was rarely attained. Where this leaves us with the flappers of the 20s I'm not sure.

[hellymedic]

People had waists a generation ago. The French still have them. Even skinny Brits now have fullish waistlines.
The amount of 'unhealthy intra-abdominal fat this represents is colossal. (An M&S size 12 waist fitting is several inches fuller than the 24" of yesteryear.)