Do you find yourself falling off from eating healthy often? This might help you stay on track.

(Helland et. al, 2021)

We all know exercise is good for you. But exercise by itself is not a great strategy for fat loss/weight loss. A combination of both diet & exercise seems to be the best way of maintaining long term healthy body weight long term and minimizing the risk of disease. Weight loss studies have high dropout rates, just like in real life because, let’s face it, dieting is not the most amusing thing in the world.

Helland et. al, (2021) investigated nutritional guidance and physical activity on dietary habits & barriers and motivators for changes in diet and physical activity.
Study Structure
* Thirty-three weeks baseline, One year post-intervention.
* Two groups; Training & Nutrition Program & Training Only.
* Exercise only group was advised not to change their diet.

Findings/results
* Both groups increased consumption of fruits and vegetables.
* Both groups decrease consumption of refined grains, sugar sweetened beverages, junk food and snacks.
* So both groups made “BETTER” food choices despite being told not to change diet in exercise only group.
* They reported it was natural to establish a healthier diet after spending time on exercise.
* One participant stated, “When I’ve spent so much time on training, it seems foolish to return home to the sofa with a bag of crisps and a coke.”

Other interesting findings
* The most important motivator was improving health & general wellness.
* The biggest barriers to changing diet were work, family, and meal size.
* The biggest barriers to exercise were time constraints and holidays.

Practical Applications/What the results mean to us
* Often people stop exercising completely when life gets in the way, “Well, I don’t have the time to exercise now, so I’m just going to eat well and wait till I have the time to train properly a few times per week.”
* Realistically, how long were you able to stick to good eating habits after completely stopping exercise? I guess not that long.
* Regular exercise influences healthier food choices.
* Don’t stop training completely, hoping you will be able to eat healthy till things get better and have more time to exercise again. It doesn’t work.
* Instead, you can reduce the training frequency, the time you spend on workouts. Get more efficient with workouts. Do home workouts if you don’t have the time to go to the gym.
* Try to adopt and modify training and nutrition according to life situations rather than having one fixed way of doing things and stop when you can’t execute everything to your definition of perfection.

Reference:
Helland MH, Nordbotten GL. Dietary Changes, Motivators, and Barriers Affecting Diet and Physical Activity among Overweight and Obese: A Mixed Methods Approach. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021 Oct