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I want to lose 10 lbs in 1 week? Is it do able?
Diet & Health / 6:40 PM - Wednesday March 06, 2013

I want to lose 10 lbs in 1 week? Is it do able?


- Asked by Female, 36-45

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Well, you really should consult your health care provider. It depends how much weight you need to lose overall. Are you trying to lose water or fat? Drink at least eight glasses of water. Eat six to eight smaller meals. Cut out carbs, fats and sugars. Try a detox from GNC or somewhere similar. You'll also need to brisk walk or jog for an hour a day.

- Response by modelesqueme, A Cool Mom, Female, 29-35, New York, Food Service

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Thats very unhealthy..to lose 10 pounds in a week.I know thats not what you wanna hear but it is the truth.

- Response by gregslove77, An Alternative Girl, Female, 29-35, Who Cares?

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Well yeah, the question though is what you're going to be losing. 10 lbs should be about 35 000 calories, which is about what a woman will burn in 2 weeks. So if you didn't eat at all for 2 weeks while living normally moving about you'd lose 10 lbs. If you've got a lot of muscle this goes up a lot, and exercise will also increase it considerably, but it's still unlikely that you will lose that much in fat. That being said, if you exercise hard and you eat very few calories and a lot of proteins, you will lose a lot of weight because the muscles will hold less water. I think it has something to do with the glycogen stores in the muscles or whatever, but in addition to the fat you will be dropping waterweight as the muscles release water it no longer has need for due to the lessened amount of energy available. So it's possible to see that big a change on the scales, but it won't be real fat-loss. Some of it will be, but as I said 10 lbs is about 2 weeks worth assuming you don't eat at all (don't try this) so unless you're running ultra-marathons in below freezing conditions in between sessions of heavy powerlifting, I think you'd be hard pressed to lose 10 lbs in fat.

- Response by mrinsano, An Intellectual Guy, Male, 26-28, Financial / Banking

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According to one of my textbooks, 1g of fat contains roughly 9.4kcal. That means that 1kg of fat (2.2lb) is 9,400kcal. That means that 4.5kg (10lb) of fat is roughly 42,300kcal.

Now, the average adult (according to the statistics on the side of my cereal boxes, which I assume are inaccurate) consumes 2,400kcal/day, which is 16,800kcal in a week.

Mass is condenced energy, and calories are a measure of heat (which allows us to measure energy), so to lose 10lb of fat your body has to expend 42,300kcal more than it's given. 16,800-42,300kcal=-25,5 00/week, or -3,643kcal/day. Obviously, you can't consume a negative amount of calories, so even if you consumed 0kcal/day (which I strongly recommend against), you'd still have to increase your activity by 3,643kcal worth each day. If you actually eat (which I do recommend), it would be more than that.

The average person, according to nutrition and body composition expert Lyle McDonald (not to be confused with Ronald), can consistently burn about 5-10kcal/min of moderate intensity activity, which yields 300-600kcal/hour. You're looking at just over 3,600kcal, so we're talking 6-12 hours of exercise per day. That's before we do anything to neutralise the amount of food going into your mouth. If you consume 2,400kcal/day, then that's another 2,400kcal that needs burning, so we're talking an extra 4-8 hours of exercise. All up, that's 10-20 hours of exercise per day, for a week. Sound doable?

Now, can you make the scale drop by 10lb in a week? Yes. Will you have lost 10lb of fat? Extremely doubtful.

- Response by ryanthegreatarj, An Intellectual Guy, Male, 22-25, Student

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Not possible, that I've found. Because its just water weight. But working out harder/longer and eating protein packed fewer calories is my best bet for you to see how much you can lose.

- Response by afirecracker, A Thinker, Female, 29-35

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I've done it-- rode my bike 30-50 miles at a time and ate only plain macaroni and watermelon.

- Response by chesterdad, An Intellectual Guy, Male, 56-65, San Francisco

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