The "genetics" aspect has always baffled me. My brother is two years younger than me, we grew up eating pretty much exactly the same diet and level of physical activity (mainly rugby), but he's always been fitter than a butcher's dog without needing to train much for it.

When he was 12 or 13 he ran a local 10k on no training, and crossed the finish line in what we were told then was a very respectable time, and as fresh as a daisy. Didn't even look like he was trying.

In our late teens/early twenties he could (and still does) stay out for multi-hour surf sessions, come in for a quick snack and some water then paddle back out for another session. No gym work, no swimming. I was lifeguarding (including regular swim training sessions, surf lifesaving club etc) for a lot of that time period and could barely keep up with him.

We're both now in our mid-40s and did IM Wales together last year. He broke his wrist 6 months out which kept him off the bike for a while, but it barely put a dent in his fitness. He beat me on the day by 2.5 hrs, on minimal run training, reduced bike training because of his wrist, and a couple of 30-45 minute swims per week on no youth swimming background.

I don't know that 20lbs is the right marker of not caring. It depends on what the 20lbs is. I'm 14lbs up on my lowest race weight, could easily make that 20, but I have more lean muscle in my upper body than I ever had racing and am damn near as fast on the bike & much more adept at doing functional things like moving furniture. I was probably more out of shape when I put on 10lbs of pure fat after stopping racing.

But none of it comes easy for me. I come from a line of people built like Hobbits and work my ass off to stay on the shape I am. I feel like a big athlete when I'm in my crowd of childless, still-racing friends, but feel great when I'm in the top 5% of fitness in gatherings of other parents at school functions for my son. I'm not getting paid to do the few races I participate in these days, so I'm gonna have fun and enjoy a few treats while still being in pretty damn good shape.

Sorry, but I have close friend with wh I spent our teen years at a summer camp. We lived and ate together for four months for a number of years. He did zero exercise, ate what I ate, and was super ripped. He always looked like a cover model for Men's health. 6 pack from grade nine onward.

We are in our 40s now, and while he does work out off and on, he still looks super fit. He was born with an ability to put on a lot of muscle and stay super lean.

Chris Christie still looks waaaay fat.

But yeah, sure. Eat less, lose weight. Simple.

I have two cats from the same litter. Brothers. One is naturally skinny. I can leave a full bowl of food out all day, he'll only eat what he needs. The other one will balloon up to obesity. I have to separate them at meals now because the porker will shove his brother out of the way and dominate meals. Now the fat one cries pitifully in his isolated meal room because he knows his brother is getting more food. It's SO UNFAIR.

Does the skinny cat have more self-discipline?

That doesn't make the lean cat 'naturally skinny'. It supports Duffy's position. Eat more, get fat. But it could be that fat cat is food obsessed. Between my folks and I we have four small dogs. One of mine is absolutely food obsessed. Follows you around as long as you have food. My cousin (ex-vet) suggests the dog could have Cushings.

It doesn't? So you think the lean cat is calculating its daily calorie balance to keep that way, and then using self-discipline to stay within the calculated range? He is scary smart, so that is a possibility.



Naturally food obsessed? Or is it a cultural trait picked up from incessant cat food marketing? Or a adaptation from heavy consumption of high-glycemic index treats? (Greenies are his drug of choice)

Ah but what was he doing those other 8 months of the year?

Ok my broad statement was s little too broad. People do have different base metabolisms, but short of some extreme medical condition, we should all have the ability to keep our weight well within check. If it means you need more self control and discipline, then apply it and stop making excuses.

All my gastric bypass patients lost alot of weight. At least half of them regained in 4-5 years and now they are obese with permanently re-routed digestive tracts and various nutritional deficiencies. It is quite sad.

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They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

My wife's uncle is severely obese and recently had this surgery. I think he was around 400lbs at about 5'10", a peach of a man but grossly overweight, diabetic as a result, and joints wearing out quite prematurely. His size led to other complications with the wound, infection hospitalized him for an additional ~3 weeks. He's out now and apparently doing better, but knowing him and how his family has enabled his behavior leads me to believe he's likely to put the weight back on unless he gets the appropriate mental health counseling to deal with the issues that he's medicating through food or to deal with the root of the bad habits (putting it nicely).

I read a summary of a UK study a while back; they tracked a large population who were at least 25kg? overweight and had been able to lose enough weight to fall into a normal range. Don't recall if they noted the method or not. After some longer period than 4 - 5 years, only 8 of 2,000 had been able to avoid gaining much or all of the weight back. 0.4%. This is all from memory, unfortunately I neglected to bookmark it. And that's just people who had been able to reduce dramatically in the first place. So the percentage who have transitioned from obese to normal on a long-term or permanent basis must be vanishingly small. There is something about permanent weight loss that is not understood, I think that's clear.

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Brian

Gonna buy a fast car, put on my lead boots, take a long, long drive
I may end up spending all my money, but I'll still be alive

Perhaps we are talking about different things. I'm referring to metabolic rate whereas you appear to be talking about an eating stimulus. That to me is bordering on some sort of mental condition. In other words you have a cray cray cat

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Yes, there is/was no Evolution, Genetics are witch craft and the Earth is flat.

Some of us are moving in the right direction....

That seems particularly bad but regardless from what I've read most studies find that successful long term weight loss is only somewhere in the 10% area maybe 20% at best. Most people can be successful losing weight short-term it's the long term that is hard. Once someone is obese fixing it appears to be quite difficult.

Without surgery, the short term regain actually occurs really early. Don't even need to wait a couple of years, you just look 6 months down the road.
This is where I focus of my research now with my lab, and on the behavioral side. So, yep, we are failing.

The pic posted at the start of this thread looks photoshopped. The background and lighting doesn't look normal. Anybody else think this?

I pretty much assume it on most pictures these days.

My experience varied some. I had periods of 3 - 4 months in a row of steady weight loss, triggered by fairly major lifestyle changes, and other periods of stair-stepping. And there were two periods of weight gain over many months, again triggered by lifestyle changes. But for me, the notion of a set point appears to be true. When I would get to a weight and then things would flatten out, if I could hold that weight for maybe 2 months it became the new normal. If I overdid things over a holiday period or whatever, a week or two of discipline would get me back to that weight. Conversely, I might have dropped a few pounds from a really big training week, but it would be easy to rebound to that weight unless I was really focused on achieving a new goal.

So yeah, I would agree that if you revert to previous lifestyle immediately after major weight loss, there's a very good chance of putting it back on. But maybe there is some length of time where if you hold the new weight you can get past that. It is a big effort to lose a bunch; not quite as strenuous an effort to hold it, but certainly much more discipline required than the original lifestyle. If a weight loss program were presented as a certain number of months of all-out focus and self-control, followed by another 2 months of maintaining the added activities and quality of food eaten but not quite as restrictive in calories consumed, could there be a better success rates?

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Brian

Gonna buy a fast car, put on my lead boots, take a long, long drive
I may end up spending all my money, but I'll still be alive

What you are discussing is what you personally experienced. I'm discussing primarily what is observed in typical large cohorts in clinical trials. Sadly we aren't anywhere near finding a solution.

I guess what I'm suggesting is a clinical trial where the program doesn't end with attaining a certain weight or number of pounds lost. The program is to get to that point and then continue with a protocol that results in another 2 months averaging that weight. I realize you may only be looking at a follow up to completed trials, so it's really directed to institutions that are testing weight loss methods.

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Brian

Gonna buy a fast car, put on my lead boots, take a long, long drive
I may end up spending all my money, but I'll still be alive

Yes, but your desire for calories in can depend on whether the body thinks it's in a time of deprivation or not. While you're losing, the body fights tooth and nail - metabolism slows, appetite increases, etc. I'm saying that for me, therefore possibly for others, there's a period where if you can at least maintain a standoff, the body backs off some in the fight. We are hard-wired such that weight loss = threat to survival. But is that to the heaviest you've ever been, or just to the average of the most recent stable period?

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Brian

Gonna buy a fast car, put on my lead boots, take a long, long drive
I may end up spending all my money, but I'll still be alive

Pretty much all the good RCTs or pragmatic trials include follow up. Some up to 24mo later.
The issue is that if you replace follow up where they aren't technically part of IE intervention anymore by continuing the intervention then we know people typically continue to lose weight or to maintain. Basically when under supervision things are good. It's after that many regain. With a few exceptions of course.

A cop out for most. I realize that genetics plays a large role and that some folks will carry more weight than others, but the vast majority eats poorly and/or too often and exercises significantly less than they should. I run almost every day and watch my food intake so that I can be 'lean' (read skinny) as it's more efficient for racing. People often comment about how eating must be easy for me (I hear stuff like "I really shouldn't have this brownie, but you could stand to eat 10!) without realizing that I work really frigging hard to keep weight off. If people had more self discipline (or a better attitude?) towards diet and exercise then we wouldn't have to make excuses like "I just wasn't born fit".