Maximum BMI?

[oldster]

A quick point on the "poison": The poisonousness (i.e. toxicity) of a thing is not necessarily the final word on it as far either health or performance. Strychnine, for example, which is highly toxic in even small amounts, is also, in trace amounts, a powerful stimulator of the central nervous system and, as such , a performance enhancing substance. And, of course, we routinely use medicines that are toxic or otherwise harmful in large amounts.

Again, I will not attempt to gainsay whatever evidence may be out there on the specific effects of moderate beer and wind consumption on athletic performance; but, that a substance is "poison" does not automatically mean it will impair athletic performance.

[pq]

I can't help it I'm scoring easy points - you're the one who served up the big fat easy pitch.

Our own running science expert, doc Hutch, told you directly that there are NUMEROUS scientific studies linking alcohol consumption to sub-optimal performance. It boggles the mind that you'd still hang onto this silly notion in the face of clear factual information.

Can you remind me again what the word "obtuse" means?

[pq]

Mar 14, 2010 10:22:52 GMT -5 oldster said:

Strychnine, for example, which is highly toxic in even small amounts, is also, in trace amounts, a powerful stimulator of the central nervous system and, as such , a performance enhancing substance. And, of course, we routinely use medicines that are toxic or otherwise harmful in large amounts.

Now you're lollygagging, pollywogging, or whatever that big arcane word you used from ye Olde Englishe was. Or maybe I mean gainsaying. Honestly I don't know precisely what that means. What the heck does strychnine possibly have to do with this discussion?

Google the nutrition facts from a Big Mac and tell me precisely what it contains that's specifically bad for you, if consumed on occasion.

The fact you claim an occasional lapse of fast food is worse for a performance athlete than occasional alcohol consumption shows it's possible to rationalize absolutely anything if you want it bad enough.

[journeyman]

PQ your diet is making me hungry. That sounds great.

[oldster]

That's it!? I abandon this for nearly a week and all I come back to is more of pq's inability to follow the plot? Was all of that ominous rumbling from Mt. Ronb a false alarm? With there be no giant eruption of noxious bile after all?

Pq, were I to maintain it steadfastly in the face of the evidence, my assertion that the moderate consumption of beer and wine would AT WORST make me a hypocrite; it would not nullify my argument about bad food.

I mention strychnine because you claimed that the poisonousness of alcohol meant that it was "obviously" detrimental to athletic performance and good health. Strychnine is a deadly poison and also, in trace amounts, a powerful stimulant. And bee venom, another poison, is used to improve the absorption of echinacea. The moderate consumption of alcohol itself is often recommended for stroke victims as a blood thinner. Ergo, as I said before, the high- volume toxicity of something is not always the final word on it as far as health, performance and nutrition are concern. And the over-consumption of alcohol is linked to the other problems you mention in exactly the same way that obesity and high blood pressure is linked to the over-consumption of high fat and sodium laden foods. We have never been talking about extremes here; we have been talking about what is optional for serious athletes.

My argument has never been based on producing some scientific study with a title like: "McDonald's is bad for pq even in moderation, and even if he chooses the salad and avoids the fries", nor is it based on morality or any theory about a so-called "perfect" diet. My argument has been that nutrition probably matters in optimizing lifetime performance, and is based simply on the distinction-- which you accepted on page one of this thread, and then again when you wrote out your diet-- between relatively good and readily available foods and relatively nutritionally poor foods. And that argument is, in summary: The more serious an athlete is about his/her performance, the more he/she should, as a rule, choose readily available good food over less good food; in other words, the more serious an athlete, the more he/she should be attempting to optimize, within the bounds of price and practicality, his/her diet. This argument is also based on the admittedly unproven but, it seems to me, perfectly reasonable assumption that foods that are better for general health are also, as a rule, better for performance.

I have encountered no sensible rebuttal to this argument, least of all from you. If you were at all interested in or willing to engage the nuances of the argument, you would have noted that even "Dr. Hutch" agreed that serious athletes should not eat McDonald's or other fast food. His quarrel was with my perceived double-standard re: alcohol consumption, and with what he takes to be my narrow and moralistic stance against fast food (objections which, incidentally, I had already addressed several times in this thread); in other words, we are in basic agreement regarding the substance of this argument.

The differences between hutch and I are, I would argue, partly matters of style and partly attributable to the fact that I come at the issue as a coach and he comes at it as a science writer. Neither is the "correct" perspective; but, as a coach of North American athletes, I don't think a "zero tolerance" position on eating obviously crap food (especially crap food that usually requires some extra time and expense to acquire) is at all bad one. No one HAS to eat crap food simply because it's there. Athletes who are serious about their diet in this way LOSE NOTHING, and may well gain in terms of improved health and performance. And a "zero tolerance" athlete who occasionally weakens, as it is the wont of humans to do, will only become a vary occasional crap food eater; whereas, an athlete who accepts a regular or moderate amount of shit food as "normal" or "O.K." may, when he/she occasional weakens, become a temporarily heavy shit food eater. In general, North American young people who want to be top endurance athletes have to set themselves against the grain of their culture in many ways in order to reach their full potential. Ours is increasingly a culture antithetical to the production distance runners in exactly the way East African culture is conducive to the production of runners. And our diet is almost certainly one of the variable in this equation (not to say the only or main one; but, this is a sport of small fractions multiplied by minutes, laps, months and years.)

[pq]

Steve why do you feel the need to keep making the argument personal? I can see no need for the "pq this" and "pq that."

Since I see very little of the overzealous extremism in this last post, I can't say I find much, petty swipes and minor factual inaccuracies aside, that I have the energy or interest to continue arguing about.

[pq]

Let me just add - if your third last paragraph is a more accurate summary of your position vis a vis nutrition and training, then you and I believe exactly the same thing.

[ronb]

Steve Boyd,
What is the matter with you?
I did make it clear that I was (and am) in the midst of moving, and would only come back to this thread when I have enough time to do the subject justice. Did you miss that part?
However, as whatever I have to say will only be "noxious bile" to you, obviously it doesn't really matter what I say - your mind is made up, and closed to other opinions - so much for discussion, communication, and education... Are you able to identify the point in time when God tapped you on the shoulder and appointed you "the chosen one"?

[oldster]

Pq, as I've tried to make it clear in other threads, I only call people out based on the content of their posts. I know nothing about 99% of the people behind the names on here, so I have no idea about their general wherewithal. I do know, however, when someone is making a bad argument, attempting to substitute invocations of special authority in place of an argument (e.g. "as a nutritionist..."), or missing a point that I have a strong feeling they are capable of understanding with a modicum of effort. In your case, since I happen to know you're a generally pretty smart guy, I impose a higher standard. And I have addressed you more in this thread because you have been making a determined effort to oppose my argument (determined, but, in my view, not very illuminating-- I think you've been competing more than debating on this one.)

And ronb, that must be one epic move you're engaged in! And I only mentioned you because you promised not fewer than three times to set things straight on this (not that you're in anyway required to, of course); and also, because I noticed you have found the time to post in several other topics in the past few days-- posts whichhave included several sarcastic references to this thread. (And apologies for the "noxious bile" comment. It just seemed to fit so well with the image of you as a rumbling volcano that I couldn't resist.)

Judging from the level of hyperbole in your posts on this (I am now "a (temporary) moron" with a Jesus complex sitting in judgment of all humanity-- and all simply because I don't think serious athletes ever need to eat crap food, such as McDonald's, and have said so very directly), I'm going to suggest that you have canceled your decision to post here not due to lack of time, but because you probably have nothing BUT bluster and hyperbole to offer on the subject.

[pq]

Hangonjusyasecondthere... I'm "generally a pretty smart guy?". Phew! Someone in the administration of the institution where you work must have been alerted to this thread. I got a letter recently telling me they were revoking the doctorate I'd slaved three and a half long years to earn, as it had been established I was in fact stupid and obstuse, so I must have somehow duped the examining committee. My funding agencies were making noises about giving back scholarship money too.

Everyone will be quite relieved to hear that was all a little misunderstanding. Haha

[oldster]

Believe me, I wish having a doctorate were a guarantee against ever doing or saying anything stupid or obtuse. It would save A LOT of trouble.

[responserunner]

This is way off topic because it excludes training and diet, only because there is a way better reason to not eat MacDonald's. If you want my opinion I agree with Oldster. Some of his remarks are a come of as being obtuse, but that's a normal sign of frustration.

For anyone who like to eat MacDonald's I would suggest they read the chapter on Potatoes from Michael Pollan's, "The Botany of Desire." MacDonald's is the number one buyer of potatoes in the world and the farmers growing MacDonald's potatoes spray their fields with pesticides around once every two weeks. Most of the reason for this is that MacDonald's needs to serve the exact same potato to over 1 billion every day. This makes the need for astronomical sized monocultures to match supply with demand; hence the need for the agro-chemicals.

Also this is book is available as an ebook at most public and post secondary libraries.

[pq]

Mar 21, 2010 10:39:48 GMT -5 oldster said:

I wish having a doctorate were a guarantee against ever doing or saying anything stupid or obtuse.

True enough, and I'll admit I say stupid things all the time.

Does having run 100,000+ miles guarantee against being stupid or obtuse?

I only brought that up because you made numerous cheap shots related to my intellect. So I've offered up objective evidence that my intellect is at least average. To extend that thought, let me suggest I believe myself to be quite capable of following a complex line of reasoning.

If I may, then, let me distill the essence of your contribution to this discussion. You advanced an outrageous hypothesis (to wit: all McDonalds food is worse than all other food for serious performance athletes). You've subsequently written several thousand words more or less repeating the same thesis, but without offering anything in the way of substantive persuasive evidence. Instead, you've lashed out at everyone who's disagreed with you, and accused them of being unable to follow your "argument." You refer to contributions from ahutch and steller (two other doctors who I assume could also be obtuse and/or stupid on occasion) as supporting your hypothesis, when both of them have in fact said it's OK to eat occasional fast food.

The only time you started to offer factual information in support of your thesis (RE: baked potatoes etc), you were caught offering erroneous information, so you changed the game, broadening the meaning of "McDonalds" to mean "all fast food."

Since I can possibly be obtuse, and I really want to finally understand, please please please tell me what's in a Big Mac that's so scary to high performance athletes that they should never eat one. You could also tell me what's so bad about eating a baked potato while you're at it.

Anyone with half a brain understands that eating fast food all the time, or even frequently, isn't ideal. But you've provided nothing to defend the extremist position you originally advanced.

[oldster]

O.K., one more time, and this time even more simply and directly.

If you return to the beginning of this thread, you will see that the precise formulation that started this dispute-- the one you precipitously labeled "pure horseshit"-- was that McDonald's is always RELATIVELY bad for you. Everything I've said since then has been more or less an attempt to get you and a few others to understand what that means.

I think there is general agreement that fast food, including McDonald's is among the nutritionally worst food, if not THE worst, available in North America on just about every basic measure (lack of fibre, bad fats, salt content, lack of complex carbs, amount of simple sugar contents). What this means specifically is that every single menu item at McDonald's can be very easily substituted by a nutritionally better alternative, and an exact one, if one prefers -- e.g. a Big Mac for a burger with less filler and/or organic beef and a whole grain bun that is not made with all the crap CDA listed; or, fries made from actual potatoes, not some potato-like chemical mulch moulded into a french fry shape, and one cooked in a healthier oil, or baked). Even McDonald's (or Wendy's or BK's) so-called healthier items are very easily replaced by healthier versions of exactly the same thing (fresher vegetables, dressings with better oils, chilis with lower fat and sodium, etc., etc.) People are drawn to these places simply because they have a weakness for all the salt, fat and sugar they add to almost every item! Thus, we can say that McDonald's is always RELATIVELY bad for you in the sense that, if you are attempting to optimize you diet in the way I described above (i.e. in the paragraph that you said squared with your own view), you should NEVER EAT McDonald's food (or, by implication, other similarly bad and easily substituted food). And, I said you could still go ahead and eat it and not die, or even run poorly; you just can't do it and also say you're doing your very best where you diet is concerned. From here, optimizing becomes a more and more tricky thing, since you eventually run into the problem of cost and practicality, plus the limits of nutritional science vis a vis performance; but, you will still have left McDonald's and other fast or highly processed crap food far behind. They will NEVER be part of any discussion about optimizing nutrition for top performance. And, if you are as serious about your diet as it is possible to be, you will NEVER eat them.

If you were actually disagreeing effectively with THAT argument, rather than choosing to look at the whole question as through a straw, I would have agreed to disagree long ago.

And check hutch's full and final position (again, throw away the straw and see the whole picture all at once) and you will see that he is in very close to full agreement with the substance of my position. (Stellar is more ambiguous, but he does say, for the record, that no top athletes are eating McDonald's once a week, or even once a month, for what it's worth). If I'm mistaken in reading his position, hutch is free to come on here and set things straight, but you can read his words yourself.

And one final comment on the word obtuse (since you seem a little reluctant to google the meaning of words you're not familiar with): One of its meanings it to be unwilling, for some reason, to see or understand something, not necessarily unable to. In your case, I think it fits just so. As I said, I think your competitiveness has been preventing you from registering anything I've been saying (including, apparently, the fact that my PhD comment was partly in self-parody.)

[pq]

There you go calling me obtuse again.

If they've added a new definition for the word to the effect that declining to accept someone else's opinion is obtuse, then I accept I am guilty as charged. But that would make you equally obtuse. There you go... you got me to call you a name.

There was no connotation of relativism in the claim I called horseshit. You said all McDs food (later amended to mean all fast food) was worse than all other available food all the time. If that's not exactly what you meant, then perhaps the horseshit label does not apply.

This thread would be much more interesting (if perhaps not as long) if we focussed on what is actually better or worse for a serious athlete's diet, so people could learn something to support informed choices, especially when confronted with only fast food as an option.

[MattMc]

As an aside... fall of 2001 or so I was supposed to meet Hutch for a workout at 1pm... he was uncharacteristically late.... sorry Matty, got a little peckish on the way here and stopped in for a big extra meal... we proceeded to rock the workout with that Big Extra rolling around in his stomach.

I will echo what runalittle alluded to-- there is a lot of nutritional pseudoscience out there. I often see people trying to tweak their diets to the point that I wonder if they are trying a little too hard and maybe risking missing out on some basic nutrition.

I never followed strict rules, but gestalted it alot. If I was hungry-- tried to snack on healthy things. Eat lots of fruit, fish, veggies etc. Can't say I strictly avoided fast food, but never seemed to want it.

Since there is no good data linking consumption of fast food to performance, I will hazard a guess that I think there is probably only a very weak link at best. Factors like training, sleep, proper rest and mental outlook-hapiness are probably FAR more significant.

Some of the puritanical nutrition types probably want us to think that it matters alot more so they can feel good about themselves when they choose not to eat at McD's.

MM

PS I don't think I have eaten at McD's in years and if I did it was due to road-trip necessity. Never liked the stuff much. Now Wendy's on the other hand...

[oldster]

Mar 21, 2010 19:16:44 GMT -5 pq said:

There you go calling me obtuse again.

If they've added a new definition for the word to the effect that declining to accept someone else's opinion is obtuse, then I accept I am guilty as charged. But that would make you equally obtuse. There you go... you got me to call you a name.

There was no connotation of relativism in the claim I called horseshit. You said all McDs food (later amended to mean all fast food) was worse than all other available food all the time. If that's not exactly what you meant, then perhaps the horseshit label does not apply.

This thread would be much more interesting (if perhaps not as long) if we focussed on what is actually better or worse for a serious athlete's diet, so people could learn something to support informed choices, especially when confronted with only fast food as an option.

Yes, there I went calling you obtuse again. You'd think it would lose its shock value after a while!

Pq, below is the actual passage that included the phrase "relatively bad", to which you responded "pure horseshit". Go ahead and look at what you write in your very next post. This problem started precisely because of your habit of clipping phrases out of context and jumping on them (i.e. looking at the problem as though through a straw). And note that I say absolutely nothing here that I have not tried to say to you in about 10 other ways since. You just don't WANT to register (simply understand, not agree with) this point, and that makes you obtuse. There are worse things a person could be once in a while.

EDIT: It's hilarious, but you actually directly quote the phrase "relatively bad" in your "pure horseshit" response! "Connotation of relativism"? How about literal statement!? I know you don't pay much attention to the details in MY posts, but I thought you might remember your own!

Quote:

Pq, the point is not that one bite of McDonald's food will instantly compromise your athletic potential. Hell, you can even smoke cigarettes "in moderation" and still be a great athlete (e.g. Guy Lafleur, Herb Eliot, and anyone, including me, who grew up in a small house, in winter, with two smokers.) CDA's point, and mine in an earlier post, is that eating McDonald's at all is sub-optimal nutritionally, given the opportunity costs involved (i.e. eating McDonald's when you're hungry and not something better). The factual point CDA was making is simply that eating McDonald's food it always relatively bad for you. We all know that large numbers of athletes eat it once in a while (although I bet endurance athletes are the least likely to, given the relatively greater importance of fueling and recovery for us); but, there is not a sports nutritionist alive who would say that, if you're interested in top performance, you should ever eat McDonald's food. My point is that, if you're really serious about being the best athlete you can be, and you're pulling out all the stops in other areas of your life, there is no valid argument for eating McDonald's food even in "moderation".


And, Mattmc, my argument doesn't depend on any claim about precisely how much eating shit food, or good food, actually matters relative to other factors. My point from the beginning has been that, if it matters AT ALL, and you're trying to do all you can to be your best, you shouldn't eat shit food in place of food you know is relatively better, if you can at all help it. In fact, you should eat the best food the available science on performance dictates, if at all possible. Simply not eating food you KNOW is shit is a no-brainer. Again, this is not even an issue in places where fast food and the like is not widely available. Should it surprise anyone that the typical North American diet, or anything closely resembling, doesn't just so happen to also be a good diet for people trying to get their bodies to do extraordinary things?

[oldster]

P.S. Apart from a couple of references to some interesting research on alcohol consumption and performance, the ONLY thing I have learned in this thread it not to get between Canadians, even Canadian athletes, and their shitty food! Apparently, they MUST have it, and they must not be make to feel like they're compromising if they eat it!

[pq]

Here's the precise item I challenged:

Mar 3, 2010, 9:32pm, oldster wrote:...eating McDonald's food it always relatively bad for you.

And here was my reply:

This is pure horseshit, and solely your opinion, not a demonstrated or demonstrable fact.

That statement, with the word "always" retained, remains horseshit and an unsubstantiated opinion.

If you were to write "eating fast food is, as a general rule, not particularly healthy," then you and I would be on the same page.

Your dogged insistence to be unequivocally absolute is what first attracted my criticism. Your tendency throughout the thread to launch personal attacks in the place of reasoned argument is what keeps me going. You hurl insults, I'm trying to be more subtle and nuanced in rebuking you.

[feens]

www.chicagonow.com/blogs/ndigo-alter-eatgos-healthy-kitchen/2010/03/the-10-worst-foods-to-eat.html

Also: www.chicagonow.com/blogs/ndigo-alter-eatgos-healthy-kitchen/2010/02/top-10-healthiest-fast-food-restaurants.html

...although it's an American list, I was surprised to see McD's as #8 healthiest Fast Food joint to eat at...not that I like anything at McD's anyway.

[journeyman]

Mar 21, 2010 23:11:33 GMT -5 feens said:

www.chicagonow.com/blogs/ndigo-alter-eatgos-healthy-kitchen/2010/03/the-10-worst-foods-to-eat.html

Also: www.chicagonow.com/blogs/ndigo-alter-eatgos-healthy-kitchen/2010/02/top-10-healthiest-fast-food-restaurants.html

...although it's an American list, I was surprised to see McD's as #8 healthiest Fast Food joint to eat at...not that I like anything at McD's anyway.

Those are interesting links. It seems like McDs offers some reasonably healthy food, but whether people choose those particular menu items is another story. It also seems like they are basing their list mostly on the number of calories in various menu items, which is not really a determinant of how healthy the thing is, especially for runners. Runners need to add calories, not restrict them, generally speaking, so low-calorie food is not ideal. Part of the problem of the nutrition discussion is the low bar for "healthy" which is set, probably as a result of the very poor choices many people make, not just in diet, but in lifestyle.

Also, I can't believe those two guys are still going at it. Will this be the thread where Oldster admits he's wrong? Or will pq succumb to the dogged determination of Oldster to remain correct on a narrow and by now completely tangential point?

[oldster]

time=1269229582]Here's the precise item I challenged:

Mar 3, 2010, 9:32pm, oldster wrote:...eating McDonald's food it always relatively bad for you.

And here was my reply:

This is pure horseshit, and solely your opinion, not a demonstrated or demonstrable fact.

That statement, with the word "always" retained, remains horseshit and an unsubstantiated opinion.

If you were to write "eating fast food is, as a general rule, not particularly healthy," then you and I would be on the same page.

Your dogged insistence to be unequivocally absolute is what first attracted my criticism. Your tendency throughout the thread to launch personal attacks in the place of reasoned argument is what keeps me going. You hurl insults, I'm trying to be more subtle and nuanced in rebuking you.


[/quote]

Pq, you're now turning this into a comedy! Have you no shame at all? You're doing exactly the same thing all over again. Now it's the word "always" that rankles? Why do you refuse to put all the pieces together at once? Have you now forgotten everything I just said in the posts on this page? In the context of my most recent restatement, which is consistent with what I've been saying all along, clearly the word "always" refers to the fact that there is always a healthier alternative to everything McDonald's sells; hence, it is "always relatively bad for you". Since McDonald's food is among the nutritionally worst on offer, it is always possible to substitute it with something healthier, usually with NO extra effort at all. On the contrary, you have to go out and GET McDonald's food!

Why don't you just come clean and admit that you misread and overreacted to my argument from the beginning, inducing me to restate it umpteen times? Any reasonable, non-axe-grinding, person would have figured what I have been trying to say by now. I think I have been more than clear, and relentlessly consistent, in my presentation. As for my "personal attacks", they have been on the content of people's posts, and have been directed at only the most strident, egregious and (I would say), willful misunderstandings of what I have been trying to argue. I never say someone is obtuse or stupid (how would I know about this as a general condition in someone I don't even know?); I say they are being stupid or obtuse, or that they have said something that it stupid, obtuse (or, in a couple of cases, dishonest or gratuitously self-aggrandizing). Frankly, I think you have used this tiresome outrage at my so-called "personal attacks" as a means of avoiding admitting that you have been misreading my argument from the beginning. To add another adjective to describe your output (note: not your personality) in this thread, you have been somewhat disingenuous, although probably not knowingly (is that enough qualifiers for you?).

Journeyman, a "narrow and completely tangential point"!? This is about my sum of my argument from page one. And what exactly am I supposed to admit to being "wrong" about? No one has actually laid out a coherent alternative position. What I have been arguing against from page one is the almost completely meaningless (and probably factually wrong, if there's anything at all to nutritional science) statement junk food, and McDonald's in particular, is "O.K. in moderation". You're either in this argument or your not. Misrepresenting the argument, and/or sniping from the sidelines, is just irritating, particularly at this stage.

[oldster]

Mar 21, 2010 22:46:22 GMT -5 pq said:

Here's the precise item I challenged:

Mar 3, 2010, 9:32pm, oldster wrote:...eating McDonald's food it always relatively bad for you.

And here was my reply:

This is pure horseshit, and solely your opinion, not a demonstrated or demonstrable fact.

That statement, with the word "always" retained, remains horseshit and an unsubstantiated opinion.

If you were to write "eating fast food is, as a general rule, not particularly healthy," then you and I would be on the same page.

Again, pq, this is too funny. At no point did I ever omit the word "always" in referring to this statement. How have you "retained" it? Retained from what? And the "relatively" part implies all the qualifiers you suggest. Are you just trying to wind me up?

[pq]

"uncle"

[pq]

If I can explore a question related to the original thread topic...

How important, for an individual runner, is leanness, or BMI?

As has been mentioned earlier in the thread, I don't have the classic distance runner's leannness. I've tried (admittedly halfheartedly) to drop weight on a few occasions, but my body seems hardwiered to the same weight no matter what/how much I eat.

In my own case, when I have been about 5 pounds lighter than normal, I didn't notice any particular difference in my training and racing.

I know conventional wisdom is you need to be fairly lean to run your best. What's the experiential and scientific basis?

Anyone?

[journeyman]

Mar 22, 2010 9:19:06 GMT -5 pq said:

"uncle"

Boooooooo!

[journeyman]

Mar 22, 2010 8:58:48 GMT -5 oldster said:

time=1269229582] What I have been arguing against from page one is the almost completely meaningless (and probably factually wrong, if there's anything at all to nutritional science) statement junk food, and McDonald's in particular, is "O.K. in moderation". You're either in this argument or your not. Misrepresenting the argument, and/or sniping from the sidelines, is just irritating, particularly at this stage.

I wouldn't know I never eat at McDonald's.

[sb49]

I thought the following excerpt from the book: "Die Fat or Get Tough" by Steve Siebold, is relevant to this thread. The book uses a mental toughness approach and lists 101 differences between fat people and fit people.

Difference 50: Fat People Believe 99% Compliance is Good

The enemy of great is good. The A student is disgusted when she gets a
B. The track star who misses his time by a tenth of a second considers
it a failure. A fit person who has any excess fat remains unsatisfied. Most
people think 99% compliance spells success. Throughout the ages, the
masses have never understood that the last 1% of the equation is where
victory lies! It’s the difference between a world-class existence and a life
of mediocrity. It’s the final push to greatness that allows people to join the
ranks of the great ones and write their own ticket. This ancient wisdom
applies in weight loss and fitness as well. All the glory is in that last 1% of
compliance. The difference between 99% and 100% compliance is like the
difference between an amateur and a pro. To the masses, it’s only an extra
serving or a taste of dessert. To a world-class thinker, it’s the destruction
of a habit, and the beginning or continuation of a habitual way of thinking
that says; “I can go almost all the way and succeed.” Or, “I can cheat a
little bit and succeed.” Fat people take this into everything they do, which
is why most don’t get what they want. This baffles the middle-class mind-
set that says; ‘something this simple can’t be that important’. The masses
are looking for the secret to success while it’s right in front of them. Fit
people know the power of a fully committed, made up mind. They know
doing 99% of what takes to succeed is a recipe for heartache and failure.
100% is the only number that makes sense to them, and unlike the middle
class, they carry this 100% philosophy into everything they do. That’s why
they achieve goal after goal. Society lavishes these people with praise and
riches because they are so rare. But the truth is, becoming one of them is
possible for any of us. One of the first steps is making a decision to go
100%. Are you ready to make that commitment to your weight loss goal?

Fat Loser Quote
“ If you were 99% faithful to your spouse, would that be enough for
him/her? Getting fit requires 100% compliance, at least in the begin-
ning. Once you hit your desired weight, 99% compliance may be enough
to maintain it. But in the weight loss process, don’t delude yourself into
believing you can cheat your way through. This is the same thinking
that made you fat in the first place. Break all the other rules if you wish,
but stay 100% compliant and you will lose weight. ”

[pq]

I saw something from that somewhere (paper maybe? Or maybe I saw the book in the airport bookstore, not sure) today. Author is a born again ex-fattie. Some of his statements come across to me as verging on evangelical: "A fit person who has any excess fat remains unsatisfied" for example. Substitute "fit person" with "person who has body image issues" and is strikes me as a more true statement from the author.

Not suggesting in any way athletes shouldn't be serious about maintaining a high level of fitness, just offering my "drive by" take on the guy's book.

[benjamin]

I feel like this needs to be posted here.

i114.photobucket.com/albums/n255/Eddie_the_Hated/RedditBetterThanDigg.jpg