Progress Photo or Exotic Dancer Audition?

I know it has been talked about many times, but there is a resurgence of Insta-famous “fitness models” flooding social media with over-sexualized pictures. Pictures of breasts, super-low bikini bottoms, packages, and bare ass are popping up everywhere under the guise of #hardwork, #sweat, #inspiration, #fitness, and other trendy tags. They’re dressed and posed in a way that you don’t need an imagination, all for “likes.” It’s a teenage dream. They’re shaping how advertising is done in the fitness industry with the “sex sells” mantra leaving out the parts about actual fitness. Contrary to popular belief, if you do the hard work, you don’t have to show it all to get recognized. To quote an instagram post by our friend, @rachreid21 “build a booty you can see without having to show IG your uterus.”

The outfits and staged photos are brainwashing some into thinking this is how they’re supposed to be. Women are supposed to walk around with chest out, hips turned down to make the lack of ass appear bigger, and showing as much skin as possible to generate attention. And if things aren’t perfect, let’s pull the ab skin up tight, pushing our breasts up even more. Men are always supposed to be huge with a ripped eight pack, flared lats, and skin tight pants. Let’s not forget the ones that post amazingly lean pictures every week as if they are always perfect. Apparently these folks maintain their competition level body all year all without drugs because companies don’t want models that admit to things like SERM’s, SARM’s, AI’s, Clen, T3, Peptides, etc. And of course, what model wants their hordes of followers to see they cycle up and down like the rest of us? Can’t sell that overpriced, overhyped plan if you can’t lure people in year round. It’s no wonder there are photoshop gains, disordered eating, and the search for the perfect pill dominating the industry.  Everywhere you turn, there’s a picture of another “perfect” body.

It’s seems like a small thing because I can just scroll on by… to the next one and the next one, through the never ending stream of them, but it is a direct reflection of how fitness is changing. Fitness is becoming less about actual fitness and more about who can be the better exhibitionist, poser, and manipulator. It has moved from classy pictures of muscle and footage of actual training to contortionist posing, tough-ups, and bad acting with ultra-light weights. We’ve accepted the porn star O-face for every picture and grown to expect sweeping curves and ripped abs all year long. Hell, we can’t even challenge somebody’s imagination anymore by taking pictures in shorts and tanks.

Some may read this as a piece against the competitors, but it isn’t against the competitors on either side, it’s about the whole industry and their re-defining of how men and women should look, pose, walk, etc.

The women have their own special battles. The figure and bikini poses are all about displaying assets and creating a sexual atmosphere. And it carries over to all the women that see pictures plastered everywhere. You never see men in the hip tilt position do you? Twisted ass pose? Is there an ab pose holding his package? It’s warping reality and the fact that it is now the norm can discourage some and push others to do things they wouldn’t normally do.

And the men aren’t much better in all of this. Lately, I’ve seen a lot of pictures where the photoshopping is blatantly obvious. The extra filtering, the perfect oil and sweat, and the photoshop gains that go all the way from just a little trim to inches on all the right muscles are all creating a similar reaction. Guys are looking at these photos and instantly jumping from eating healthy and busting their ass to buying fake ‘roids and all kinds of chemical compounds that nobody really knows if they work. The “fake natty” has warped reality.

How about some truth?  How about posting a picture of your current condition, head to toe, every day, no filters, no perfect lighting? Hell, post a second picture of what you look like at every training session, not just the staged ones. How about we bring a little bit of taste and class back to the industry? And before you jump out and say “where's your post?” I'm not claiming to be stage or photoshoot ready year round...and I’m definitely not posting my ass all over the internet because likes = $$.

It is completely possible to take an ab shot without making your ass, chest, or groin a focus. It’s possible to take a leg and butt picture without showing the camera everything. And it’s possible to #dowork and be #sweaty without taking just another gratuitous shot. I know it’s a novel concept, but taking a picture that shows your hard work without drawing attention purely for the sexual content is possible and maybe it’s time we learned how to do it again.

Weight Loss - The Internet is Filled with Stupid Ideas

As most of you know, I spend a lot of hours reading articles and blogs posted by other fitness minded individuals looking for “new” information or research, something I can use to improve my skills and understanding. Most of my time is spent on the weekends going through blog after blog and article after article looking for something unique. Instead of finding unique articles, I have been finding unique viewpoints on old material. There is value in having a disagreeing viewpoint when it comes to creating traffic, but sometimes, the foundation of disagreement is so stupid it can’t be ignored. Two posts I have seen lately are how a lady “stopped exercising and lost weight” and how “simply cutting carbs results in fat loss”. Total click-bait, but I fell for it and got sucked into the posts and scared for the thousands of people that would read and believe these posts.

Between the magic bullet articles that promote eliminating entire food groups, “detoxing” with lemon vinegar tea coffee bean extract, or “15 fast fat burning foods”, common sense about sustainable weight loss takes the backseat because it isn’t what people want to hear. People don’t want to hear that it isn’t quick or easy. They don’t want to hear that it takes time, effort, and a little bit of common sense. They don’t want to hear that sometimes you can do everything the way your favorite fitness icon does it and fail. Sometimes their lives are so hectic they just need the Disney ending to their struggle with eating, body-image, and fitness. Sadly, Walt didn’t figure out how to make fairy-tale magic happen for us.

This would have been a short post had it not been for the number of posts and messages we receive from similar cases. The lady that stopped exercising and lost weight was like so many people first starting out. She was doing everything right, or so she thought; five hour-long sessions per week, tracking her calories in, and tracking her calories out. Where she went wrong was instead of having weight training and cardio, she was only doing cardio like rowing, walking, etc. She also made the huge mistake of estimating her caloric burn and then eating back those calories. After some time of trying to lose weight this way, she was injured by her dog and unable to be active. Because there was no exercise, there were no calories to eat back and amazingly, she lost weight! This led her to the conclusion that not exercising and eating normally is the way to go instead of performing exercise, building muscle, and still eating in a deficit by not eating back your calories.

Many people forget that building muscle is healthy for our metabolism and believe that a low scale weight is all they need. When we move from active to couch potato, our body will waste muscle, especially when faced with a caloric deficit. Remember, a pound of muscle takes up less space in the body than a pound of fat, so while the scale drops, the tape measure may increase as the body loses muscle but builds up fat. In the evil scenario, we lose precious muscle and reduce our intake, slowing our metabolism. Similar to the “The Biggest Loser Scenario” where contestants lose weight only to regain it years later, losing weight only through reduced intake is likely to result in the regain of fat. When discussing TBL and the downfalls, I’ve had more than a few people misinterpret my objection to mean not eating at a deficit. That is not what I am suggesting at all. I am suggesting having a set number of calories regardless of whether you train or not. I am suggesting a small to moderate deficit caused primarily by activities, specifically resistance exercise. No matter how you cut it, weight loss requires some form of deficit.

Another factor the post brought to light is the concept of “eating back” exercise calories. One popular food / activity tracker in particular encourages you to eat back your exercise calories by giving you a low target and increasing your target intake as you exercise. I find this to be a poorly thought out recommendation for several reasons. Calorie labels / trackers rely on averages. As PN points out in “The Surprising Problem with Calorie Counting - Calories In” it is very hard to reliably say how many calories we are actually consuming. Further, calorie expenditure, even when monitored with a good heart rate monitor has a minimum 10% error. The second part of “The Surprising Problem with Calorie Counting - Calories Out” breaks down just how bad estimates are for predicting how many calories we burn through exercise. Combine the inaccuracy of calories listed on a label with the variance of calories burned and you have the beginning of a recipe for disaster when you attempt to eat back your calories.

Some believe that adjusted macros will create fat loss. Simply adjusting macro intake won’t translate to fat loss or weight loss with few exceptions. Yes, I acknowledge the concept of a recomposition, which is the process of building muscle and losing fat at the same time. No, your body doesn’t turn fat into muscle and no, it isn’t easy. The post proclaiming all that is needed to lose fat is reducing carbohydrate intake is a sad oversimplification. Regardless of how low you get your carbohydrate intake there are other factors:

Total caloric intake and deficit - if there’s no deficit, the body has no need to burn fat stores.

Stress - causes Cortisol release. Cortisol is a factor in the accumulation of visceral fat and sugar cravings.

Sleep - it’s our body’s chance to repair and recover. If you’re not getting enough sleep, you don’t recover, have a tendency to eat more, have impaired glucose control, and are likely to have higher Cortisol levels.

The solution:

Avoid the scale -

Like many others, I recommend limited use of the scale only to track patterns in weight gain or loss. Scales can be highly inaccurate measures and vary up to 10 lbs per day depending on our size. Unless you are severely overweight, there are better measures. If we only watch the scale, we risk losing the right kind of weight for the wrong kind.

Body Composition -

We know it’s possible to be at a “healthy weight” and have a high bodyfat percentage and that it’s possible to be “overweight” and have a low bodyfat percentage. There are hundreds of pictures of people that have gained weight yet become slimmer by building muscle. Even if the goal is to lower your weight, there needs to be a focus on building and maintaining muscle to keep burning calories. The result of losing muscle is a soft physique with less than ideal metabolism.

Hip & Waist Measures -

While body composition is one of the best, tracking changes in hip and waist circumference (two places we all tend to store fat) is a good indicator of our training and diet progress. There is also a high correlation of disease associated with people that have a high waist to hip ratio.

Tracking -

Track what you are eating, not necessarily taking calorie count as being exact, but understanding it is a range. When you find how much you can eat and maintain your weight for a week, decrease your calories by a minimal amount, say 10%. If you aren’t active, add some activity. No fancy gym necessary, but some basic bodyweight work to start.

Use the scale to track for weight changes, knowing that your weight can fluctuate +/- 10 pounds every day depending on your size. I like to keep a running five-day average, which will allow for those daily fluctuations.

Track progress using a variety of tools:  clothing fit, tape measure, progress photos, general feelings throughout the day. If two or more measures are moving in the right direction, you’re making progress, even if the scale isn’t moving.

Patience -

Be patient. Understand that most changes takes several weeks to show up and that good, lasting progress will take time, so if your goal is to be “bikini body” ready in 6 weeks, it may be time to re-think and re-plan.

Be patient through the failures, the slip-ups, and the lack of progress. Each time we don’t move forward is an opportunity to learn and make progress. Each opportunity allows us the chance to figure out to do it better and how to forgive ourselves when we make mistakes.