[pct-l] what does 2 pounds mean

[Jim Bravo]

>From my trail ultra days I learned (the hard way!) that there are a WHOLE 
LOT OF VARIABLES in trying to calculate calories burned per mile, hour, or 
day...the greatest of which may be the "aerobic" factor. When a hiker is 
climbing a hill or is heavily-loaded down on a hot day, and is in the 
aerobic zone for an extended period of time, fat burning goes way up and the 
body's use of glycogen (whether muscle, liver, blood-stream, or 
tissue-breakdown derived...) goes way down. I found that on long days I 
burned 60-70% fat and needed only a modest amount of calories (mostly 
carbohydrate). You're going to go into calorie-deficit eventually...no way 
around it if you're averaging high mileage, the body just achieves some sort 
of whacked out level of homeostasis.

In short, I eventually gave up trying to figure it all out, and resorted to 
a little-used method (IMHO), that is, "listening to my body". Easy to say, 
hard to do if a person is trapped in thinking mode...As George Sheehan said, 
"we are all an experiment of one", which is the equivalent of YMMV. As near 
as I can tell, listening to the body is the only sure way to know how much, 
and what type of, food to eat.

JB