how effective is swimming for weight loss?

[Danny]

Gary, pretty dramatic pictures! Your ability to do that is very impressive. I have also noticed that some people gain and lose weight very easily and see large fluctuations in weight. Someone I know who is into weight lifting is a good example of this, and you seem to be also. On the other end of things, my weight has only fluctuated within a 10-15 lb range over my whole life, even though I probably exercise less than you. It would be easy to attribute this to better eating habits, but I don't really believe this. I think there is a genetic component as well. Of course, a determined glutton can squander any genetic blessing he is born with, but I am quite sure that I have gotten off a lot easier in this regard than other people. Anyway, the lesson everyone seems to agree on is that exercise without diet control isn't enough. The other lesson I am hearing from people in this thread is the benefits of a low carb diet.

I started swimming several years ago. My main goal is exercise, but neither my weight nor my body shape has changed. I eat well: No carbs, no processed food, water only to drink, little read meat. I swim a mile in about an hour, 3 to 4 times a week. I am tired after I swim. I recognize that I am a slow swimmer. As I read through the posts, I am wondering if the reason for my lack of change is my physique is my speed/intensity. If so, can I get some guidance on improving my speed/intensity. Thanks

[Tom Pamperin]

Originally Posted by Danny

sclim, your comments triggered a whole range of thoughts and questions that I would like to ask you. I have been diabetic (type 1) for over 50 yr, and I have no weight problem, but I have considered going to a low carbohydrate diet because it might offer me better blood sugar control. What is keto-acidosis and why do diabetics have to worry about it when non diabetics apparently do not. Is this an issue for me if I want to go on a low carbohydrate diet?

While waiting for sclim to reply, you might want to check out "The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living" and "The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Performance"--both books by Jeff S. Volek and Stephen D. Phinney. That's how I found out about all this.

[Danny]

Thanks, Tom. I just ordered the book from the Michigan Electronic Library Catalogue. Things move slow around here, but I guess I have the time to wait :o)

[Danny]

Originally Posted by dk2943

I started swimming several years ago. My main goal is exercise, but neither my weight nor my body shape has changed. I eat well: No carbs, no processed food, water only to drink, little read meat. I swim a mile in about an hour, 3 to 4 times a week. I am tired after I swim. I recognize that I am a slow swimmer. As I read through the posts, I am wondering if the reason for my lack of change is my physique is my speed/intensity. If so, can I get some guidance on improving my speed/intensity. Thanks

I personally don't think that speed is what you need to burn calories. If you are tired after swimming, it seems to me that this is a good indication that you are pushing your limits. I once met someone who was running marathons in about 3 hr, and he had quite a belly on him, so not everyone is designed to become lean and mean with exercise. You could drive yourself crazy pushing yourself harder and harder to lose weight and wondering why it isn't happening.

On the other hand, poor swimmers tend to work mostly with their arms, shoulders and legs, and these muscles get tired pretty quickly when used for swimming. The main advantage to improving your technique is that you will start to use the larger muscles on your torso to swim, and these muscles are much more capable of maintaining the load over distance. So if you learn how to swim in this way, it should enable you to work harder for longer times. It is also a lot more enjoyable swimming with good technique. In this regard, you can get a lot of help on this forum. I would start by looking at the books or video available from TI. Then, if you get stuck trying to follow the programs outlined there, post questions on this forum.

Good luck!

Originally Posted by sclim

One consequence of the prolonged switch to low carbohydrate, low sugar diet is the gradual loss of my addiction to sweetness. For years I had a really sweet tooth.

I also am addicted to sugar (carbs/fructose).....the MDs here point out that sugar triggers the release of dopamine. It is a true addiction, in every sense similar to alcohol or nicotine.

[novaswimmer]

Originally Posted by Danny

Novaswimmer and Bujanglokal, Have either of you succeeded in using swimming to lose weight? The other question I have is whether you can do it as quickly swimming as you can, for example, by running.

I never answered your question, but yes, I have lost weight by swimming AND by reducing the number of carbs I eat. I have a very busy life with both wife and I working and a kid in school. Between all our schedules I never know when I might get a swim in. But I aim for swimming at least 2 sessions a week for at least 40 minutes and add one more session doing just 'land exercises' of elliptical and weights.

Since my wife started to watch her diet -- mostly high protein and lots of (non -starchy) veggies, BOTH of us have lost weight, since she does the cooking much of the time. If it weren't for watching diet though, I doubt I would lose weight just swimming.

I would say that running can be more strenuous than swimming (I have nothing to back that up). But I don't want all the knee/foot/back problems associated with it. Plus I can swim indoors nearly any day of the year, I love the water, and never notice that I'm sweating when I swim!

Everyone swims with a different level of exertion though.

[sclim]

Originally Posted by Danny

I personally don't think that speed is what you need to burn calories. If you are tired after swimming, it seems to me that this is a good indication that you are pushing your limits. I once met someone who was running marathons in about 3 hr, and he had quite a belly on him, so not everyone is designed to become lean and mean with exercise. You could drive yourself crazy pushing yourself harder and harder to lose weight and wondering why it isn't happening.

On the other hand, poor swimmers tend to work mostly with their arms, shoulders and legs, and these muscles get tired pretty quickly when used for swimming. The main advantage to improving your technique is that you will start to use the larger muscles on your torso to swim, and these muscles are much more capable of maintaining the load over distance. So if you learn how to swim in this way, it should enable you to work harder for longer times. It is also a lot more enjoyable swimming with good technique. In this regard, you can get a lot of help on this forum. I would start by looking at the books or video available from TI. Then, if you get stuck trying to follow the programs outlined there, post questions on this forum.

Good luck!

I fully agree with Danny. When you finally get into TI you will swim more efficiently. You will go further distance with the same exertion, or less exertion, actually. But because you are getting less tired, you will keep on going, and end up doing as much or maybe more exercise, because it so enjoyable and interesting, and you are reluctant to stop.

This is not the primary mode of weight reduction, but it certainly doesn't hurt!

[sclim]

Originally Posted by Danny

sclim, your comments triggered a whole range of thoughts and questions that I would like to ask you. I have been diabetic (type 1) for over 50 yr, and I have no weight problem, but I have considered going to a low carbohydrate diet because it might offer me better blood sugar control. What is keto-acidosis and why do diabetics have to worry about it when non diabetics apparently do not. Is this an issue for me if I want to go on a low carbohydrate diet?

As for the question of what you are used to eating, I started eating less salt years ago to control my blood pressure. Now I seem to have a problem eating at restaurants, because the food they serve me always seems to have way too much salt and I don't like the taste of it.

Danny:

Glad you ordered the book(s) -- it is far more authoritative and scholarly than me, and you will have the opportunity to read it over and over, and let the rather obscure details set in, as you practice the principles, and soon you'll understand it like the back of your hand, or in your case, the palm, the straight wrist and the vertical forearm, and the feel of the great water ball trapped behind it.

The greatest misunderstanding is in the word "ketosis" which appears in the term "dietary ketosis" which is a benign condition that you will soon be inducing in yourself, but also in the term "keto-acidosis" which is a serious deadly condition, a complication of untreated Type 1 diabetes, and a potential cause of immediate death. In both cases, blood ketones are elevated, but in the first case the ketone levels are one tenth or thereabouts of the levels found in diabetic keto-acidosis. Moreover, in dietary ketosis there is no acidosis at all (except in unrelated circumstances, such a the end stage of a race, where the athlete is limited by lactic acidosis -- he thinks he's dying but once the race ends he recovers -- I should know, it happened this morning to me).

You have to understand, most doctors learn biochemistry in first year med school, in my case 1969, pass the exam, then promptly lose all sophistication with the details, as they hardly ever revise the science again. With compulsory medical education as part of the continuous recertification process (in Canada, at least) the situation is better than in the past, but the biochemistry that is quickly reviewed by the specialists who are teaching the course is quickly glossed over to hammer in the clinical teaching points, which are of course biased towards the current theoretical paradigm.

So most doctors hear the word "ketosis", connect it up with the only other ketosis that they have encountered, and quite understandably, freeze up in terror. I had the same experience today, talking after my 10 k race with an older lady doctor specialist (who, quite admirably also ran the 10 k race that I did at -18 degrees) who, after I told her I had converted to a low carbohydrate diet almost 2 years ago and was in nutritional ketosis, immediately asked "How are your kidneys". (In diabetic keto-acidosis the kidneys shut down as part of the progression towards rapid death; in dietary ketosis the kidneys function just fine). To be fair, she is a pediatric ophthalmologist who is still in practice, and she has seen loads of cases of diabetic retinal degeneration, but knows nothing first-hand of the primary treatment and prevention of diabetes, less so than I did as a General Practitioner doctor -- and remember I was totally ignorant then of the difference between dietary ketosis and diabetic ketoacidosis.

The real mystery is why and how most endocrinologists, who should know the biochemistry intimately, certainly in more detail than the non endocrinologists, still don't get the full picture. The answer, I guess, is in the severity of the bias of the last 40 years of total rejection of any opinion that contradicts the cholesterol hypothesis, and hence any published papers that express that contradiction.

The amazing thing is that doctors, and this includes endocrinologists, will come out and say that a low carbohydrate diet, especially one that induces ketosis is not-sustainable and incompatible with good health. This is clearly untrue, as a review of the medical literature would show. In fact, anyone with some interest in the History of Medicine will know that prior to the mid 1930s, the only treatment that was successful in treating epilepsy was a ketogenic diet. Consequently many patients spent their lives in dietary ketosis, which successfully suppressed their epileptic seizures. However, once the first anti-epilepsy drug was developed and found to work, this approach became the new modern way to treat epilepsy, and dietary treatments became "old-fashioned" and then forgotten, it seems. (But the ketogenic diet is starting to come back as an adjunct to the treatment of epilepsy, I recently found out randomly in talking to a young doctor whose son has epilepsy, and is now on a ketogenic diet, with the approval of his neurologist!).

Danny: I cannot practice medicine over the internet, nor do I have a medical licence now. But I state in the strongest possible terms: Type 1 Diabetes is compatible with a low carbohydrate diet, even if it leads to dietary ketosis. In fact, in the long run, the outcome will improve the treatment and prognosis of the diabetes. The only proviso I would caution you is that the transition is uncomfortable for some people. That is, because most people's type 1 diabetes is poorly (OK, I mean less than ideal) controlled, their brains and muscles have got used to higher blood glucose levels than is good for them. So, when blood glucose levels drop, in the period before the fat metabolism (enzymes have to be primed, metabolic pathways need to be greased, then started up, then encouraged -- this all takes time) kicks in, the subjective symptoms of hypoglycemia are felt (fatigue, headache, irritability, loss of concentration) are felt, and this triggers further anxiety, and following the old instructions, often this means taking in an emergency mouthful of glucose and omitting your insulin until your blood sugar spikes again. But if this happens, it will suppress the priming of the fat metabolism pathway, and defeat your purpose. It may take longer because you may be starting with a body accustomed to higher levels of blood glucose. But if you bring the level down in a slow and controlled manner, particularly with an absence of wild fluctuations, it will be more comfortable, and you will surely get there. And even if your diabetologist is not familiar with the concept of ketogenic diet state, he can't argue with the final result of a constantly lowish blood s glucose level that doesn't fluctuate much, and which you are perfectly comfortable maintaining. If your blood pressure drops as a result you may end up needing more salt (and magnesium) in your diet, but he can't complain with that either if your blood pressure remains lower than that of other people, like mine is, and specifically within the low range recommended for people with diabetes).

The only way is to become intimately aware of your metabolism, and the intricate balance between your insulin doses, your fat, carbohydrate and protein intake and your physical exertion levels, and pay attention to what happens to your blood glucose when you alter any or all those factors. Fortunately, as a diabetic, you will be familiar with most of these already. It may surprise you that even as a practicing doctor I was very vague about the actual nutritional content of foods. Fortunately, in Canada, every packaged food item sold has to have complete nutritional labelling, and non-packaged food details are easily found on the internet. So once I started paying attention and reading labels I got pretty tuned in to how many grams of carbohydrate, fat and protein I was eating at every meal pretty quickly -- it's just simple mathematical addition. And I got a blood glucose and ketone meter (you probably already have a glucose meter, but Abbot makes a combination meter that measures ketones using a ketone strip and glucose using a glucose strip). It was pretty straightforward. It should be the same for you, especially if you make the changes systematically and gradually, with meticulous records, like I did.

There are numerous credible references in the internet -- too many to read all, actually. But I would recommend "The Eating Academy" blog by Dr Peter Attia who is a Cancer surgeon by specialty, but who has taken a special interest in the ketogenic diet state (not the least because they also prevent cancer), and himself went on a ketogenic diet for several years. BTW he is a high level cyclist, a powerful swimmer and a power lifter, and he documents his experiences doing this high level activity while on nutritional ketosis. He is highly erudite, way smarter than me, and involved in research in several fields, so he knows of what he speaks.

[sclim]

P.S. Danny:

If the book takes a long time to get from the library, buy it. It's worth it. In my case I got it instantly from Amazon on my Kindle, It's scary how they're dominating the Universe. But if you need to stop them, the book titles are very popular and you should find them at your local bookstore.