This has been something I've wondered the last few years. I used to be a college swimmer, fit and trim, but the 10 years since then I've drank my fair share of beer and ate plenty of cheeseburgers. Just curious what peoples' take is on how much the extra baggage really effects swim races.
I don't really fit the swimmer mold anymore. I'm 31, 6'2", and 270lbs with a huge beer gut. I got some strange looks since the meet i was in recently was a USAS meet and I outweighed my competition by 100lbs in many cases. My first race in about 5 years i went 23.4 in the 50y free. I didn't expect to be that fast at this weight but at the same time I almost wonder if the added intertia is helping me more on the start and turns. Followed it up with a low 52 in the 100y free but I had a horrible reaction on the start and incorrect pacing. I think if i raced again today that'd be deep in the 51 range. For reference, typical non-taper times for me in college were in the low-mid 22 range at just a tick over 200lbs but I was obviously a lot stronger, younger, and doing a TON more yards at the time, that's why it makes me wonder just how much the weight is actually holding me back.
How much time do you think I stand to drop if i were 50lbs lighter? Could it be a measurable difference or something just slight? I guess I ask that to see if it'd be worth my while to drop that much weight quickly by dieting in addition to the swimming i'm doing. I don't really like dieting, and i generally eat what I want, when i want. Not gorging myself at every meal doesn't really seem to fit into my lifestyle :blush: Anyone have a similar story? "I dropped XX lbs and went XX seconds faster because of it."
Maybe it's an immeasurable, but I thought I'd ask for opinion anyway. I'm hoping it doesn't turn into a "to diet or not to diet" discussion though.
It always comes back to calories in and calories out in the end. You can change the equation by far more by modifying what you eat (e.g. a 1,000 calorie burger) versus training.
Nothing beats working both sides of the equation, but purely from the point of view of fat loss, I'd suggest that you start with food.
You're probably right for some people, but this isn't necessarily the case with everybody.
In a couple oft-cited weight studies with identical twins, Thomas Bouchard studied a large number of twin pairs via two different scenarios. In the first, he measured their maintenance diet, i.e., how many kcals they could eat per day to maintain their weight, neither gaining nor losing anything during a regular day. He then fed each guy 1000 calories less per day for a month. Most everybody lost some weight, but how much varied considerably. The old chestnut a lb. equaling 3200 calories didn't apply for most. Some people lost 20 lb., some lost less than 5. The once consistency: the amount you lost was very close to what your twin lost, indicating that response to diet is genetically mediated.
In the second scenario, the men's diets were not restricted--they were still fed their previously determined "maintenance" number of calories--but they were required to burn 1000 kcals per day by exercising on a stationary bike--a sizable daily exercise load. Once again, how much different men lost during this period varied considerably. Once again, the only consistency was that you were very likely to lose close to the same amount as your identical twin.
The bottom line: some people are diet responders; some are exercise responders; some respond to both; and, sadly, some don't respond terribly well to either.
The body has all kinds of feedback loops controlling hunger, satiety, basal metabolic rate, wasting calories through so-called non shivering thermogenesis, etc. Americans like to think that we can control our destinies with the right amount of will power and commitment. I think it's true that we can temper our fates to some extent, but this extent is dictated by genes over which we do not have that much control.
A person who lucks out and is both an exercise and diet responder is likely to give his character much more credit that it deserves. A person who responds well to neither diet nor exercise is likely to assume more blame than is warranted.
Those in the vast middle are likely to have vacillating opinions on this, depending on whether hope or a sense of futility happens to predominate on a particular day.
It always comes back to calories in and calories out in the end. You can change the equation by far more by modifying what you eat (e.g. a 1,000 calorie burger) versus training.
Nothing beats working both sides of the equation, but purely from the point of view of fat loss, I'd suggest that you start with food.
You're probably right for some people, but this isn't necessarily the case with everybody.
In a couple oft-cited weight studies with identical twins, Thomas Bouchard studied a large number of twin pairs via two different scenarios. In the first, he measured their maintenance diet, i.e., how many kcals they could eat per day to maintain their weight, neither gaining nor losing anything during a regular day. He then fed each guy 1000 calories less per day for a month. Most everybody lost some weight, but how much varied considerably. The old chestnut a lb. equaling 3200 calories didn't apply for most. Some people lost 20 lb., some lost less than 5. The once consistency: the amount you lost was very close to what your twin lost, indicating that response to diet is genetically mediated.
In the second scenario, the men's diets were not restricted--they were still fed their previously determined "maintenance" number of calories--but they were required to burn 1000 kcals per day by exercising on a stationary bike--a sizable daily exercise load. Once again, how much different men lost during this period varied considerably. Once again, the only consistency was that you were very likely to lose close to the same amount as your identical twin.
The bottom line: some people are diet responders; some are exercise responders; some respond to both; and, sadly, some don't respond terribly well to either.
The body has all kinds of feedback loops controlling hunger, satiety, basal metabolic rate, wasting calories through so-called non shivering thermogenesis, etc. Americans like to think that we can control our destinies with the right amount of will power and commitment. I think it's true that we can temper our fates to some extent, but this extent is dictated by genes over which we do not have that much control.
A person who lucks out and is both an exercise and diet responder is likely to give his character much more credit that it deserves. A person who responds well to neither diet nor exercise is likely to assume more blame than is warranted.
Those in the vast middle are likely to have vacillating opinions on this, depending on whether hope or a sense of futility happens to predominate on a particular day.
