Controversy continues

The truth is, humans have been around a couple million years and for most of it, our race has had to struggle to survive. There weren't stores, restaurants, or processed foods. People probably ate more plants and less meat. People lived off the land, they had to find, hunt, or grow their own food. They had to move to get it. Food was fresh, it wasn't processed. Machines are now doing work people used to do, we eat more and don't have to move as much. And until about two hundred years ago, the average life span of humans was about 40 years. I am not suggesting that eating at McDonalds will make you live longer, but killing your own food and eating fresh off the vine does not necessarily make you healthier, either. I for one am all about moving less if it means moving more efficiently.

Here's an off-the-wall factoid on this subject: Gwen Stefani joined her high school swim team to lose weight. Seems to have worked pretty well. Did you see her last night on the Billboard awards? She looked amazing. I want to know what she is doing to get legs like that!

I am dead sexy :p I swim OK too. Rich: With all the interest and resourcefulness you've been showing on this forum, I'm sure you're swimming more than OK. :agree: But do "dead" and "sexy" go together? :eek: On topic, I have this purely anecdotal feeling/experience that running burns more calories than swimming given the same intensity and same workout time, but I've been told that might not be scientifically correct on another thread.

Here's an off-the-wall factoid on this subject: Gwen Stefani joined her high school swim team to lose weight. Seems to have worked pretty well.

Here's one for you. Swimming burns up to 600 calores per hour, but the problem is most people do NOT swim for a full hour unless it is EZ. They swim a little, break a little, swim a little. It rarely adds up to one full hour. An another example is this: on most marathon swims (over 16 miles), the average weight loss for a woman is around 11-15 pounds. That swimmer better have some extra weight for something like that. Body fat can help a swimmer but be distrasous to a runner because of gravity. Donna

You burn more calories running at a good clip for an hour than you do swimming at a good clip for an hour. Is this true? I've always thought it was anecdotally correct. To me, I have to swim longer to get the same "bang for my buck" as running. My daughter is always saying that there are some very big girls at her swim meets. Plus, I had the opportunity to observe Worlds last summer. There were, of course, many fit lean specimens. But I did seem to notice quite a few "big" women (however that is technically defined) doing very well.

Here's one for you. Swimming burns up to 600 calores per hour, but the problem is most people do NOT swim for a full hour unless it is EZ. They swim a little, break a little, swim a little. It rarely adds up to one full hour. An another example is this: on most marathon swims (over 16 miles), the average weight loss for a woman is around 11-15 pounds. That swimmer better have some extra weight for something like that. Body fat can help a swimmer but be distrasous to a runner because of gravity. Donna So how much do I burn doing a mile of breaststroke in about 45mins? Lots? Please say lots...I'll really let go and enjoy Christmas if so...

Fat? So-what. I got a little belly roll and I am dead sexy :p I swim OK too.

Rich: On topic, I have this purely anecdotal feeling/experience that running burns more calories than swimming given the same intensity and same workout time, but I've been told that might not be scientifically correct on another thread. I agree that the burn is likely higher in running etc. However the beauty of swimming for me is that you don't have to run in extreme weather e.g. "Minus OMG how cold is it?" and "100 and holy-mMoly" neither of which are good for you. That or pound away on a conveyor belt! For me the stresses of running are too great on my discs and the likelyhood is that I am training with more intesnsity in the pool b/c I am pain free in the water. I had a slight spasm a month ago. I still swam a mile (pain free) with it; that can't happen on land. So I think the average person will not notice a huge difference. Maybe I could be thnner with running or soccer but for the last few years i'd play 3 or 4 games then go down with 3 herniated discs causing spasm etc and miss a month... Anyhow, I am an inch thinner where it counts and an inch wider where it looks good so I am happy. After the binge I will cut back on certain food for a month and see how I do. Also my workout outfit is lighter to carry :D :D

On the fat thing, I think cool pool water temps may cause the body to have subcutaneous fat. So some swimmers appear softer than other types of athletes. It's amazing, I've swum with several if not many female swimmers who still had weight problems, despite training 10,000 or more a day, Some of it might be over eating, some of it might be genetics, some people have a tendancy toward carrying more weight than others. Some big girls are fairly fast, but I believe they aren't as fast as they could be if they lost 10, 15, or 20 pounds. The problems with our society are 1) bad-for-us foods are plentiful and advertised, 2) bad-for-us foods are easy to get, 3) some children grow up with terrible role models, which gives them terrible life habits. Like if a child grows up with obese parents and siblings. 4) people have terrible calorie ingesting habits, they eat too much, drink too much, just genrally take in too many calories, like they don't think about how many calories are in a can of soda, 5) people sit around too much and don't move. which could stem from sedentary jobs, watching too much TV, playing video, and computer games. The truth is, humans have been around a couple million years and for most of it, our race has had to struggle to survive. There weren't stores, restaurants, or processed foods. People probably ate more plants and less meat. People lived off the land, they had to find, hunt, or grow their own food. They had to move to get it. Food was fresh, it wasn't processed. Machines are now doing work people used to do, we eat more and don't have to move as much. Ande, I do agree with you and Heather Reitz on these components. For me, it was number 4 that got to me along with this common swimming mentality, "oh, you can eat whatever you want." (I know not every swimming family feels this way). It was sort of an accepted lifestyle to eat pizza, poptarts, hotdogs, etc. Well, as a kid and young adult, I did eat whatever I want. A typical dinner after a swim meet would be a big salad w/ blue cheese dressing and all the fixings, a huge steak and loaded baked potato topped off by a huge piece of pie or cake - this kind of eating started at 10 and continued until sort of recently for me. And many of my swimming friends ate similarly. Needless to say, even with 2 hours of swimming a day, my calories in were still more than my calories out. I see that now, and with more "moderation" and watching what I eat (without going to extremes), those extra few (I'm not implying I'm obese or overweight by any means) pounds do seem to come off. On the flip side, there were some elite age groupers I also swam with. Their coach was a stickler on what they could and could not eat. I remember being at Juniors and their conversation was completely about being fat or not fat and what was fattening and not fattening (we were around 15 to 17 yrs old.) I must say that I was happy to just be a kid and not worry about all that until years later - just from a mental perspective. Now, as to whether or not I'm less healthy as a result of eating what I wanted when I was a kid. . . I don't know. But, I can say, in keeping in touch with some of my age group swimming friends, eating disorders are present across the board in those who ate what they wanted and in those who had restrictive diets as youngsters. I also feel that kids are VERY AWARE as to whether or not they are overweight. Kids/ teens are, in some ways, more perceptive than adults. I'm not sure that telling them flat out is helping them. I believe they know. If they are overeating, it's often for a very specific reason, frequently not related to food at all. Then, if they have a trusted adult tell them, "You need to lose weight," it's additional blow to their already fragile psyche. They try to reduce calories, find out they can't do it via eating less or better (as they aren't addressing the true problem to begin with), and then resort to very, very unhealthy methods for getting that bottom line result of weighing less. I think parents and coaches should live that healthy lifestyle themselves and that's more powerful than telling a youngster to drop some weight. :2cents: