Weights & Plates Podcast

[Bill Anders]

#21 - Macro Tracking: Going from Training Wheels to Intuitive Eating - Yet another good one, Robert & Trent.

Years ago, I was a fanatic tracker, weighing/measuring everything and thinking that I was getting down to the gram on my macros (endurance sports). It became a chore, a stressful, neurotic chore. There was nothing worse than getting to 9pm and seeing that although the food intake was constant during a highly active day, I was still ~1,000-1,500 calories behind and the only path to catching up was eating crap. While that sucked and I quit that 10+ years ago, it gave me the framework to have a general idea on how I'm doing through the day and when I can throw in a bit of "fun." Because life's too short to not have a bit of fun.

Thanks for covering the issues with restaurant dining. I had that eye opener a while ago when a friend who had attended culinary school made a home-cooked meal as she would in the higher-end restaurant that she worked at. The amount of fat used was incredible. She spent the preparation time talking about all of the tricks of the trade and the reasons why that steak at home never tastes like the one at the restaurant.

Keep at it!

[Robert Santana]

Weights and Plates Podcast: Macro Tracking: Going from Training Wheels to Intuitive Eating on Apple Podcasts

[Robert Santana]

#21 - Macro Tracking: Going from Training Wheels to Intuitive Eating - Yet another good one, Robert & Trent.

Years ago, I was a fanatic tracker, weighing/measuring everything and thinking that I was getting down to the gram on my macros (endurance sports). It became a chore, a stressful, neurotic chore. There was nothing worse than getting to 9pm and seeing that although the food intake was constant during a highly active day, I was still ~1,000-1,500 calories behind and the only path to catching up was eating crap. While that sucked and I quit that 10+ years ago, it gave me the framework to have a general idea on how I'm doing through the day and when I can throw in a bit of "fun." Because life's too short to not have a bit of fun.

Thanks for covering the issues with restaurant dining. I had that eye opener a while ago when a friend who had attended culinary school made a home-cooked meal as she would in the higher-end restaurant that she worked at. The amount of fat used was incredible. She spent the preparation time talking about all of the tricks of the trade and the reasons why that steak at home never tastes like the one at the restaurant.

Keep at it!

Would your friend be open to joining us on the podcast? I'd like to touch on this issue with more specific information derived from actual experience preparing such dishes.

I appreciate the feedback on the episode. At the end of the day the goal is to eat. Like anything else, new skills need to be front loaded with work. Eventually, those skills should become routine habits.

[Bill Anders]

I'll check with her. I know that she has been pretty slammed for a while and looks to be even more so in the coming months.

[Robert Santana]

Excellent.

[Bill Anders]

Excellent.

email sent.

[Robert Santana]

Thanks Bill. She reached out and I'm in contact with her. Should be interesting.

[Robert Santana]

Weights and Plates Podcast: Peaking for Performance, and Debunking the "Forever Volume" Crowd on Apple Podcasts

[rkjohns1]

Hi Robert, I enjoy listening to your podcast, thank you for taking the time to produce it. In the latest episode, you discuss the inability to accurately gauge the calories burned while training unless a whole room calorimeter is used. I sometimes use the fitness app on my apple watch when surfing, training and exercising for no real reason other than to look at the data. Here are some example results: surfing on 2/27/2022 - 710 total calories, 560 active calories over 1 hour 27 minutes; HIIT Peloton ride on 2/16/2022 - 253 total calories, 219 active calories over 20 minutes; volume training on 2/14/2022 - 487 total calories, 369 active calories over 1 hour 17 minutes. It's interesting to see the significant peaks and valleys of my heartbeat while surfing and training, while the exercising is a nearly continuous increase over the duration of the ride. I assume the heartbeat data is accurate, but the calories burned is probably not. How far off do you think it is?

[Robert Santana]

Heart rate and Volume of Oxygen Consumed (VO2) are tightly correlated during steady state aerobic activity. Calories expended can be derived from VO2 data using caloric equivalents. Since HR and VO2 are almost perfectly correlated during steady state aerobic activity, you can use HR to calculate calories expended following this assumption. However, there is no relationship between HR and VO2 during strength training and this is why that data is of no value. HR increases during aerobic activity due to an increase in oxygen demand, hence why such a relationship exists. During strength training, heart rate increases because of catecholamine release in the with much smaller changes in oxygen demand, which is why there is no relationship. That doesn't mean you aren't burning xxx number of calories, it just means you cannot measure them using a method (HR) that is based on the underlying assumptions of indirect calorimetry. However, if you measured heat expended in a whole room direct calorimeter you could get some accurate data.