Quoting: vinny82
Sure metabolism plays a factor in how people gain weight I am not denying that, however everyone has a base TDEE they need for maintenance which accounts for metabolism. For example, a 5'11 165 lb male athlete training 2x per day needs roughly 3500 calories per day just to maintain weight at 165. In order to gain steadily 1-1.5 lbs a week they need 3800-4000 per day, 28,000 per week, and someone with a higher metabolism should be taking in over 4000 per day. Some people just under estimate just how much they actually need to eat to hit 4000 calories per day, especially when eating "clean" as people like to call it. 4000 calories per day is an actual insane amount of food when you are talking about grilled chicken, beef, rice, fruit and veggies.
This isn't how metabolism works though.
It's why dieting isn't a long term solution to weight loss and why people struggle to lose weight.
For many people, not all, but many, when they diet their Metabolism balances...and eventually they regain weight or at the least stop losing.
This is why no dietician would tell you to diet but instead eat a healthy balanced. Because you just make weight loss harder when you do.
When you calorie restrict, your body adapts to it, and simply burns less.
Read about fasting. the first 10 days of fasting is the fastest weight drop... then your weight drop becomes less as the body adapts.
You can do the exact same activity... you will lose less weight.
This is what I am referring to on the study above about the runners.
Your body is set to balance. You can run miles....then take months off sitting on the sofa... when they test your metabolism...same.
The same is true with eating more.... your body balances.
Yes for a short period of time you might gain weight, but you will rebalance out and it will be hard to keep.
Furthermore you have to keep eating more and more and more...
So simply eating 4000 calories or what ever isn't a solution.
Because weight gain for some people is just as hard as weight loss for others.
You eat more, your body says great more to burn.
It's just not as simple as you want to make it.
Most people don't experience that. They eat they gain weight. They eat less it comes off and typically they yo-yo.
But that's not always true with young adults with a high metabolism.
They eat... they don't gain weight. Their metabolism isn't just "set to" some calorie amount.
Just think about what you are saying.
If it was how you describe it.... they would hit starvation at some point after all that time they weren't hitting say 4000 calories they needed to "gain" weight.
Right, they would have eventually just withered to a skeleton without those calories on that 4000 line.
Because if it was just a "line" they need to hit, then above the line they gain....below they lose, and at the magic number they stay the same....
But clearly that isn't how it works.
They don't hit starvation....they just stay thin. They can go years way under the 4000 line you mentions... and just stay thin, not starve.
So when they eat more.... the body adapts.
Like the person who diets.... and they are right back where they started.
It's one of the reason people needs steroids to grow muscle. At some point you just can't gain more naturally. There is a limit set.
In working out for years you should be able to hit those 32" arms..... but naturally you never will. Doesn't matter what you eat... or how much you work out. Your body has it's limit.
This is why the in/out formula is just garbage. It's not as simple as a math equation.
Because the body is always adapting.
Some people can pig out, and nothing. That's just how it is till they age and the metabolism slows and it will slow for everyone.
No one knows why its like that in some young people but they do know that it is.
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