In terms of human calorie consumption and fat loss, how is cycling for 3 hours at a steady pace 2 days a week different from cycling 1 hour at the same pace 6 days a week.

Question

In terms of human calorie consumption and fat loss, how is cycling for 3 hours at a steady pace 2 days a week different from cycling 1 hour at the same pace 6 days a week.

In: Biology

Answer 1

Generally speaking, the two exercise scenarios have generally the same caloric expenditure. Regarding how it’s different, physiologically it simply involves a different ratio of fats/sugars used as with prolonged exercise comes increased lipolysis.

But the kicker is that the body will upregulate fat storage replacement in the event you spend more time relatively in a fat burning state, and the same in context of sugar use and storage.

Energetically, a calorie is a calorie. Over subsequent weeks, it will be mentally easier to perform at given intensities with repeated bouts of exercise challenging the body’s ATP production pathways but otherwise 6 bouts of 1hr exercise at a given intensity will be virtually identical to 3 bouts of 2hr exercise at a comparable intensity.