Rowing And Weightwatchers

[[old] Xeno]

Hello.<br>I joined WeightWatchers... It works great. I also found rowing to be the most efficient calorie burning exercises that WW has on their list of exercise. Of course WE ROWERS have known that for a LONG time.<br>You can reach me via my website: wwwgorow.com or muller2000@sbclgobal.net<br>XENO

[[old] Xeno]

Lets say you row for 500 calories on the concept 2 rowing machine you end up getting 10 food points. 10 points is a good SNACK!!!!!!! My weight is still going down.

[[old] Janice]

I don't know what Weight Watcher plan you are following, but 500 calories burnt is 5 activity points, not 10. You only earn 1 activity point for every 100 calories burnt, not 50. So while 1 point maybe 50 calories, you don't earn the same amount if you burn them, otherwise you wouldn't lose any weight as you would replace all of them. <br><br>1 Point = 50 calories<br>1 AP = 1 regular food point (50 calories), not 2 (100 calories)<br><br>I haven't lost any weight recently as I can't train properly and eat only 1500 calories a day which includes my flex and activity points. The program is good to a point, but it's crap if you are an athlete of any sort.

[[old] Xeno]

"I don't know what Weight Watcher plan you are following,"<br><br>Let's not get too sarcastic here...<br><br><br>Did you check with the list of activity that WW has on their website? <br>When I choose rowing, I have the choice between "moderate" and "race pace". This is of course very vague...to say the least. So fifty minutes of moderate rowing equals on their chart 7 points if I am not mistaken. 10 points if you row at their "race pace". If I burn on the concept two rowing machine 500 calories, I burn 10 points. I guess there are two ways to confim this. For one with their own activity calculator, entering the body weight, intensity, and duration. Second way of checking is to enter the calories burned on their points calculator...<br>After checking with their different calculators I find the following:<br>100 food calories equals 2 points.<br>235 pound rower, rowing at WW "hihg intensity" level for fifty minutes equals 10 points.<br>500 Concept 2 calories burned equals 10 points on the food point calculator and on the activity calculator.<br>Let me know if you still come to the same conculsions.

[[old] Xeno]

"I haven't lost any weight recently as I can't train properly and eat only 1500 calories a day which includes my flex and activity points. The program is good to a point, but it's crap if you are an athlete of any sort."<br><br>This last statement made me wonder what type of training you are doing.

[[old] bgood]

I have a hard time believing that Xeno needs to be on Weightwatchers !!<br>

[[old] Bayko]

Although I don't use Weight Watchers, I've know many people over the past 30 years who have successfully used it, so I believe that it is a good program.<br><br>Also Xeno has proven himself to know what he is doing, so I don't mean to criticize him either.<br><br>I'd agree with bgood though that i find it hard to believe Xeno "needs" it.<br><br>As a marathoner in my 20's I left few stones unturned in seeking to do my best. Finding my best weight was one of the things it sought. I studied nutrition from college level textbooks and current science journals, and devised balanced low-caloric diets tailored to me. I found that I raced best between 137-141 lbs. I could diet to as low as 131 lbs, with much misery, but simply got weaker as I went below 137. Also I'd get somewhat logy as I went above 141. In my late 30's, after some ten years without beating any PB's I realized that my best performances were behind me, and age-group targets were the best I could hope for. I therefore decided that the misery that went along with dieting was something I could leave behind too. I ate as I felt instead of dieting, consuming considerably more than I had before. My weight drifted up...... all the way to 141 lbs! And when I got motivated to train hard enough to approach my past training volume, my weight went down to 137, without dieting! <br><br>In short, the sum of what I've learned in some 35 years of studying nutrition is that being sparing with fat, sugar and salt in my food intake (donuts, ice cream, potato chips, ets.) , while drinking more water, covers about 95% of what I have to do to stay healthy and at a decent weight. And If I train hard enough to compete well in races, even the junk food can't put any weight on me.<br><br>Certainly, everyone is somewhat different. But my experience has shown that dieting can reach a point of diminishing returns.<br><br>Rick

[[old] Xeno]

Hi Rick<br>Your comment is very constructive.<br>All my life I have been eating very rich foods (I like to eat)...and I have a very slow metabolism...therefore I have always been grouped with athletes that try to fight weight off their body. It is also possible that my body got used to exercise and became hihgly efficient in replenishing my fat storage. Finally after 19 years being a rower, I found structure with WW. The point system is simple for me to follow and gives me a handle on when I am reaching the max of my daily caloric intake. So far I have been experiencing a steady downtrend, without training nearly as much as I can. You are right by mentioning that everybody's body is different. I have seen people absolutely ripped and capable of downing foods that I would dream of eating...<br>At the moment I am at 237 and the GOAL is 215. <br>XENO

[[old] Exrook]

<!--QuoteBegin-bgood+Sep 12 2004, 11:22 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td class='genmed'><span class='genmed'><b>QUOTE</b></span> (bgood @ Sep 12 2004, 11:22 AM)</td></tr><tr><td class='quote'><!--QuoteEBegin--> I have a hard time believing that Xeno needs to be on Weightwatchers !! <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><br>You might find this interesting...<br><br><a href='http://content.health.msn.com/content/a ... 102394.htm' target='_blank'>http://content.health.msn.com/content/a ... ><br><br>A bit more info to make it less cryptic. The title of the article is "Olympian Today, Couch Potato Tomorrow? Elite Athletes Lose Health Benefits of Training Quickly After Retiring From Sport" and summarizes a study done on 20 competitive rowers after they retired from competition.

[[old] bgood]

Ouch!<br>No substitute for eating right and exercise.

[[old] Cran]

fwiw to get to lightweight (long time ago now) I was training 2-3 hours a day so thats 'lets say' 800 kcals per hour... = 2400 kcals per day.<br><br>I was eating 5000-6000 kcals per day<br><br>So that leaves 2600-3600 kcals per day extra that I was eating and I lost 1 Kg a week for 6 weeks to get down to lightweight. (previous to that I'd been eating about 3000 kcals a day and training 40 mins a day and stayed at 82Kg for ages).<br><br>If I had done no exercise and eaten 3000 kcals a day I'm sure I would have put on weight...<br><br>So it's not as simple as energy in energy out... the body adjusts itself according to what you do and what you eat... if you starve yourself it shuts down and stores all the fat it can, if you load up on carbs you have loads of energy to train and your metabalism stays high.<br><br>The way to lose weight is to eat loads and loads of carbs (natural carbs, not just junk food) and do lots of med-high intensity cardio. <br><br>It's the carbs that give you the energy to train, and it's the training that burns off the fat...

[[old] Xeno]

And then you through into the mix the fact that you want to broaden your aerobic base... which is steady state level...at 1.5mmol of lactate. Which is around 78-80% of your max heart rate (rule of thumb), an intensity that is not that "high" and therefore does not stress the body as much.

[[old] ian]

Hi,<br>Was very interested in this thread as I am currently using the weight watchers points system along with my rowing training. Over the past 6 weeks I have lost 22 pounds from 285 to 263 my aim is for around 250-255 which was the weight I used to compete in Judo. I gained a lot for some reason during my build up to a solo 100km probably due to long but low intensity sfuff and sating my hunger with inappropriate food. The good part is I've lost this whilst maintaing my chest size of 56 inches so all the weight which had gathered has gone from the right place. I was unsure of how many extra points to add for my workouts which tend to be of 30-45 mins rowing with 20 mins of weights or ab work after. The book I had stated 1.5 points per 15 mins of rowing but gives no indication of intensity level expected.<br>Based on this I felt that I would allow 1.5 points for every fifteen mins but in reality I seldom hit the total allowed. I have also made a lot of changes to eating by choosing low fat varieties of food which makes quite a difference over the course of the day, up to 8 points on some days depending naturally on what is eaten.<br>Best regards and thanks for the topic<br>Ian

[[old] Xeno]

I am pretty sure that you can get access to the weightwatchers website if you are a current member. Check out the food and activity calculator.<br>You must feel like a million bucks to have lost so much weight in such little time.<br>XENO

[[old] Janice]

I guess I was looking at it a different way than you, you had me confused with the way you were calculating things. <br><br>I don't know why I haven't been losing lately, guess I'm just building muscle but it doesn't make much sense if I eat my target of 24 and then the 3 to 5 points I get from 30 minutes rowing and then another 5 flex on top of that.. It's still only 32-35 points at the most per day, and that's not much at all. You're a lot bigger than I am and get more points than I do and also burn more calories in an hour than I do. I'd guess that you could already eat a lot more than I can and lose weight simply because you are male and have been athletic much longer. <br><br>You should think about joining the "Rowers - Daily Strokes" thread in the WW community. It's all women, but none of us are slow. <br><br>Oh, and a good rule of thumb; 2k = 1 AP