Why can't you eat fast food and LOSE weight?

[johnmolinda]

Why can't a person eat a diet that is 100% fast food (McD, BK, KFC, Taco Bell, etc) and lose weight as long as they maintain a calorie deficit? If I burn 2500 calories/day but eat 2000 calories of McDs per day, then why would I not lose 1 pound every 7 days (1lb=3500 calories)????

[poloboy406]

are you serious?

[whitechococlate]

yes u would loose weight...but ud look like ****. id say about 90% of the weight ud loose would be muscle and ud feel like complete ****...but yes ud loose weight.

[Doobie2270]

I know people who have lost weight eating that stuff. Its just that most nutritionally informed people don't. You certainly won't be able to build a healthy body, but you just might lose some weight.

It won't work for everybody, though. All those simple carbs tied up in their white breads and mixed in with tremendous amounts of fat will only elicit negative responses from your body. Your blood and cholesterol profile will take a turn for the worst, and the insulin will store too much fat every time you eat. You probably won't get enough protein from their tiny ass patties, meaning you'll only lose muscle without a hope of every gaining good lbm.

[JerG]

You would probably lose muscle and gain fat, but the muscle loss would be greater than the fat gain, so technically you would lose weight.

[tuberacer49]

Not to mention you'll be hungry most of the time from only eating tiny potions of that garbage.

[heyzeus909]

Who says you wouldn't lose weight doing this? You would.

However, unless you're being very, very particular with what you're choosing to eat, you're not going to get enough protein to keep musckle loss at bay...and the protein you do get isn't likely to be the best quality either. Which means you'll be more likely to use your own protein (your musckles) to get the job done.

Also, you'll wreck your insulin sensitivity with the processed carbs you're likely to get. This means you can kiss the post workout benefit of carbs goodbye since your low insulin sensitivity will preclude you from produding enough insulin to get the job done. And with all that excess insulin, you're going to have a harder time shedding fat for weight loss as compared to eating a clean diet.


You'll get some short term weight gain/bloat/water retention from all of the excess sodium, but that will top out at a few pounds. Nothing to worry about after a few days of your fast food only diet.


Yeah, you'll end up lighter from the calorie deficit. But you'll lose a lot of musckle in the process, and gain some bloat. Welcome to being skinny-fat.

[solstice]

You could. Surprisingly there ARE healthy choices at these places. Not that I'd want to base my diet around them... Get a side salad with grilled chicken and bring your own dressing (healthy oil, some vinegar...) McDonalds has their fruit and yogurt parfait- I believe they also have egg beaters... Most places offer a fruit option, grilled chicken and water... You're hard pressed to find whole grains, but... It's do-able if you really needed to...

But it's infinately easier, cheaper and tastier to just pack a cooler

Fast food does not have to equal Big-Mac and fries It can just as easily mean grilled chicken salad. It's all in what you order.

[Torch]

I found this interesting, I could not be bothered to go out that often for the best food on earth myself. But to each there own.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/issa115.htm

[JiP]

Why can't a person eat a diet that is 100% fast food (McD, BK, KFC, Taco Bell, etc) and lose weight as long as they maintain a calorie deficit? If I burn 2500 calories/day but eat 2000 calories of McDs per day, then why would I not lose 1 pound every 7 days (1lb=3500 calories)????

who the hell said you couldn't? just don't moan when your cholesterol and blood pressure are through the roof and you become addicted to the stuff. watch supersize me

[tweaked17]

yes u would loose weight...but ud look like ****. id say about 90% of the weight ud loose would be muscle and ud feel like complete ****...but yes ud loose weight.

You would probably lose muscle and gain fat, but the muscle loss would be greater than the fat gain, so technically you would lose weight.

lol

[siamesedream]

Of course you can! Fast food is the staple of all healthy eating. The only difference between cutting and bulking is supersizing and subbing the coke for a shake.

[DJohnson]

The crappy refined and heated vegetables oils in all that deep frying will slow your thyroid, so maybe if your maintenence was 2500 it will be 2000 after eating all that crap. Plus good carbs and protein is burnt up 20-40% just through thermogenesis, whereas refined fat and carbs is burnt up 1-3%.

So maybe you'd have to consume 1300kcal of fast food to lose a reasonable amount of weight, and then you can REALLY kiss your muscles goodbye.

[getgot211]

yes u would loose weight...but ud look like ****. id say about 90% of the weight ud loose would be muscle and ud feel like complete ****...but yes ud loose weight.

You would probably lose muscle and gain fat, but the muscle loss would be greater than the fat gain, so technically you would lose weight.

yeah, its not like you can exercise while eating fast food huh?

who the hell said you couldn't? just don't moan when your cholesterol and blood pressure are through the roof and you become addicted to the stuff. watch supersize me

think critically when you watch it.

and he most certainly was not in a deficit.

[stealth_swimmer]

who the hell said you couldn't? just don't moan when your cholesterol and blood pressure are through the roof and you become addicted to the stuff. watch supersize me

I don't think you'd get addicted to it. I think that's mainly attributed to the individual and their tendency to create bad habits. There was a time for a few months when I was little and my family was especially poor when all we ate was stuff from fast food restaraunts, mainly Jack in the Box Jumbo Jacks or Double Cheeseburgers from the dollar menu at McDonalds, and when we started making enough money to afford better food none of us had cravings for fast food.