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Thread: Calories in Calories out, fat storing, macros, protein: A Clarification

  1. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by Robert Santana View Post
    No one ever said CICO does not hold. We are talking about what it looks metabolically.
    No no, I understand. I'm not doubting that CICO DOES hold. I know it holds. What I don't understand is How it holds.

    One stores the excess calories, regardless of macronutrient composition. I don't see how this happens. Since carbs and protein are virtually impossible to convert to fat, how can for example 1000kcal worth of excess energy (energy above maintenance) be stored REGARDLESS of whether of those 1000kcal, 1000kcal / 500kcal / 290kcal, are from fat? If only the fat is stored, it would seem as if a 1000kcal surplus might result in the same weight gain as a 2000kcal surplus. As I said, I know this isn't the case, I just can't make sense of the numbers.

  2. #12
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    You are overthinking this. If you add 1000 calories from fat (~111 g fat) to your diet most of that fat will be stored as body fat and your nutrient oxidation rates will remain relatively stable. If you add 1000 calories from carbohydrate (250 g carbohydrate) your carbohydrate oxidation rates will increase and your fat oxidation rates will decrease, resulting in the majority of your fat calories being stored as body fat. Protein is similar to carbohydrate in that it also stimulates its own oxidation as does alcohol. Put simply, fat always gets preferentially stored as fat in overfeeding conditions while the other macronutrients stimulate their own oxidation. The exception is during extreme overfeeding of CHO, PRO, and ETOH but again that would require an impractical amount of those macronutrients to be consumed.

  3. #13
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    If you add 1000 calories from fat (~111 g fat) to your diet most of that fat will be stored as body fat and your nutrient oxidation rates will remain relatively stable. If you add 1000 calories from carbohydrate (250 g carbohydrate) your carbohydrate oxidation rates will increase and your fat oxidation rates will decrease, resulting in the majority of your fat calories being stored as body fat.
    Thanks for your explanation! I suspected that this had to be the case for CICO to hold.

    The exception is during extreme overfeeding of CHO, PRO, and ETOH but again that would require an impractical amount of those macronutrients to be consumed.
    Yeah, I was just curious as to the theory. Sure, CICO always holds in real life, but I was thinking that there had to be a way for calorie surplus X to result in equal weight gain as calorie surplus X+n, mathematically at least, although not practically.

  4. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by adamanderson View Post
    Robert Santana,

    I get you. But if we made those ratios more realistic, I still don't see how CICO holds (i.e. above maintenance calories are stored regardless of macronutrient composition), given the fact that only the calories from fat are/can be stored. I'm not denying that this is the case, I just don't see how the math fits together.
    Adam, The reason only fat calories are stored in almost all cases is because eating a caloric excess that is larger than your fat consumption is extremely difficult for any time span relevant to body composition. In the hypothetical of the couch potato above, if he ate 2,000 Cal above maintenance he would gain 4 lbs of body fat per week. The people I have seen gain fat quickly are usually more on the order of 1-2 lb per week, and then they keep doing it for a year. If he ate a 500 Calorie excess he would have to get his fat below 20% of calories in order to store any protein or carbohydrate as fat. A 20% fat diet is not appetizing enough to overeat more than 500 Calories a day on, outside severe psychopathology or severe determination to gain weight. Assuming he did somehow manage to overeat 1,000 Calories at 25% fat (considered a low fat diet)a large part of the 333 Calories of excess protein/carbs would be burned in the storage process, and by elevation of his metabolic rate. If he was really determined and ate the 4,000 Calories still at 25% fat he would store the 1,000 of fat, he would burn a few hundred of carbs, he would store some protein as higher levels of various enzyme, structural, or serum proteins, and he would convert some carbohydrates and/or amino acids to fat. After doing this for one or two days he would say: "at last, I have proved that other macronutrients are in fact stored as fat" then he would go back to eating 500 over maintenance or switch to a higher fat diet because what he was doing was disgusting to him. Try it for three days. To demonstrate the fact you need a month or so of MyfitnessPal or equivalent data along with weight so you actually know what maintenance is, then adjust protein/carbs to maintenance plus 1,000. See how long you can keep it up, and report back.

  5. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by Philbert View Post
    Adam, The reason only fat calories are stored in almost all cases is because eating a caloric excess that is larger than your fat consumption is extremely difficult for any time span relevant to body composition. In the hypothetical of the couch potato above, if he ate 2,000 Cal above maintenance he would gain 4 lbs of body fat per week. The people I have seen gain fat quickly are usually more on the order of 1-2 lb per week, and then they keep doing it for a year. If he ate a 500 Calorie excess he would have to get his fat below 20% of calories in order to store any protein or carbohydrate as fat. A 20% fat diet is not appetizing enough to overeat more than 500 Calories a day on, outside severe psychopathology or severe determination to gain weight. Assuming he did somehow manage to overeat 1,000 Calories at 25% fat (considered a low fat diet)a large part of the 333 Calories of excess protein/carbs would be burned in the storage process, and by elevation of his metabolic rate. If he was really determined and ate the 4,000 Calories still at 25% fat he would store the 1,000 of fat, he would burn a few hundred of carbs, he would store some protein as higher levels of various enzyme, structural, or serum proteins, and he would convert some carbohydrates and/or amino acids to fat. After doing this for one or two days he would say: "at last, I have proved that other macronutrients are in fact stored as fat" then he would go back to eating 500 over maintenance or switch to a higher fat diet because what he was doing was disgusting to him. Try it for three days. To demonstrate the fact you need a month or so of MyfitnessPal or equivalent data along with weight so you actually know what maintenance is, then adjust protein/carbs to maintenance plus 1,000. See how long you can keep it up, and report back.
    In other words, it's an impractical pursuit.

  6. #16
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    Philbert,

    If he was really determined and ate the 4,000 Calories still at 25% fat he would store the 1,000 of fat, he would burn a few hundred of carbs, he would store some protein as higher levels of various enzyme, structural, or serum proteins, and he would convert some carbohydrates and/or amino acids to fat.
    That's all I wanted to know. I never said that it was common nor smart. Thank you.

    See how long you can keep it up, and report back.
    No thank you.

  7. #17
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    This is very interesting. Can't seem to recall ever having seen this explanation elsewhere.

    On a similar note: what is the metabolic process when you do cardio in a caloric surplus? What gets used first, and what is the end result?

    For instance, if one were to do slow, steady cardio for a long time I'm assuming part bodyfat, part blood glucose is used for fuel. If one would also eat enough to remain in a surplus despite this,
    would the dietary fat simply replenish the bodyfat that was burned off? Would metabolism shift to convert more carbohydrates to bodyfat in the end?

  8. #18
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    If you do cardio on a caloric surplus you will burn primarily carbohydrates in the first ~20 minutes then you'll start burning off dietary fats. It also depends on the intensity of the cardio. The higher the intensity the greater proportion of calories burned are from carbohydrates the lower thee intensity the greater proportion of calories burned are from fat.

  9. #19
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    This was really interesting to read.

    On the subject of CICO, I was wondering is there a point at which we cannot rely on the calculators we find online as far as how much we need? I'm still pretty overweight (I won't go into why, I'm sure we all have our sad stories) in spite of losing a lot already and every time I think I've found a value that works I stop losing. I've been at it long enough to be well out of the novice stage. The first 80 pounds fell off. The next 50 I had to work for and it took twice as long. And I understand that's the deal, the longer you are at it the harder it gets. But if I go too low on calories, I just can't lift and lifting is what helps me stay sane enough to do this. (In fact, lifting is how I got my head together enough to start cleaning up my diet.) I'm just wondering if there is a reliable way to calculate or is it all just trial and error.

  10. #20
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    Hey, Mr. Santana! Not meaning for this to be posted I just didn't know how to message you to tell you that I found your article that detailed how about how they find out how many calories one puts out and it answered my question about the accuracy and nature of the online calculators. I wanted to let you know so you don't have to repeat yourself helping me out or anything. I really appreciate the info you put out here for us and I'm sorry I asked about something you already covered. I know that gets old and I didn't mean to do that. Anyway, thank you sir and have a wonderful day.

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