Diet vs Exercise: The Fitness “Order of Operations”
OK, the title of this post is a bit misleading. But, it seems as though many people believe that “Diet vs Exercise” is a valid question with an obvious answer: Diet.
They may not believe it consciously. But, in their actions this is what happens. In truth, of course, there is not an exclusive “or” separating diet and exercise – you need both. If you want to change your body composition; if you want to increase performance; if you want to live healthier; then you have to pay attention to both.
That said, there is an ordering of the two.
I can sum up my entire fitness-philosophy with two phrases:
- Exercise before Diet.
- Weightlifting before Cardio
These two phrases imply an ordering of the list {diet, weightlifting, cardio}. My ordering is
- Weightlifting
- Cardio
- Diet
What is amazing is that my ordering is precisely to opposite of the order in which most people go about getting “in shape”. When someone first decides they want to make a change, the first thing they do is go on a diet. After they’ve gotten that down, they add in some cardio. And if by some miracle they haven’t given up yet, they finally throw in some half-ass weightlifting.
I’m here to tell you to do the opposite.
If you want to get any benefit at all related to fitness (fat loss, muscle gain, strength gain, etc) then you must begin with weightlifting. Slowly add in cardio (but not the kind most people think). And finally get a diet plan that makes sense.
Why? You ask.
Dieting by itself doesn’t work long term. If you’re goal has anything to do with performance or muscle gaining, then you know this. But, people looking to lose fat seem to delude themselves into thinking that they can solve their physical problems with a “magic” diet. I’m not even talking strictly of “fad” diets. Even a well-designed diet is worthless in the long run without exercise.
When you go an a calorie restricted diet you put your body in a catabolic state. This lowers many of your bodies “good” hormones, and increases many of the “bad” ones like cortisol. (OK, strictly speaking there are no good or bad hormones, but some are better for your fitness goals than others.) The negative hormones will decrease muscle mass, lower metabolism, and make it harder for you to lose fat. (Ironic, ain’t it!)
This hormone change is a negative byproduct of dieting that you have to deal with. However you need to mitigate it. Exercise increases the positive hormones and decreases the negative ones. It helps preserve muscle mass, and increases both metabolism and fat loss.
Yes, if you want to make fitness progress you have to have a diet in place. But, you can’t rely on it by itself.
OK, so exercise first, diet second. Got it. But, why not start with cardio? There are 2 reasons.
One, even when we’re talking about interval training (like sprinting) we’re only hitting part of your body.
Let’s be honest, however. When most people start their programs with cardio, they are not doing hard sprints (or metabolic circuits which involve weights), they are using steady-state cardio (jogging and its ilk). Steady-state forms of cardio just don’t confer the same metabolic effects that interval training or weight training do. While both intervals and weight training (done with intensity) raise your metabolism for up to 36 hours after exercise (called the EPOC effect), steady-state doesn’t.
In addition, steady-state cardio will cause your body to become more efficient at fat burning. While that may sound good, it is very bad. A more efficient car uses less gas to go the same distance. You want your body to be a gas-hog. You want it to burn tons of fat with little time – not tiny amounts of fat with massive time! Weightlifting makes you the Hummer of fat-loss.
Two, starting with cardio can increase injury rates. Weight training is very controlled. You only lift the amount of weight you can safely in a controlled pattern of movement. Cardio is not as controlled – even on a treadmill or other machine. Think about how many “repetitions” your legs do every time you go jogging, or when on on the stair stepper. It’s in the hundreds to thousands. That is a lot of potential damage. Each impact is worth many multiples of your bodyweight, slamming down on your joints.
Conclusion
When you start with weightlifting, you increase the positive hormones you body needs to reach its goals, you increase metabolism, you lose fat, you gain muscle, and you decrease injury rates. No other one thing can do all of that.
Once you are comfortable in your weight training routine, you can add in some cardio work. I strongly suggest some kind of intervals over steady-state (the only exceptions are distance athletes – like marathon runners, tri-athletes – and strength athletes, as odd as that sounds).
And finally, when you have a solid weightlifting routine and a cardio routine, THEN you can start worrying about your diet.
