Twinkie Dieter Loses 27 Lbs, Rush Limbaugh Approves

Well, this isn't going to be good for America's obesity problem (or is it?): Mark Haub, a professor of human nutrition at Kansas State University, put himself on what some are calling the Twinkie Diet or the Convenience Store Diet... and lost 27 pounds in two months. While he did include some vegetables in his diet, every three hours Haub would treat himself to a snack of sugary cereals, Oreos, Hostess products, Doritos, or some other junk food item (Meat Munchkins?)—all to prove that in losing weight, it's counting calories that really matters.

During his experiment, he never went above 1,800 calories a day (CNN notes that a man of Haub's pre-dieting size would normally consume closer to 2,600 calories a day), and his body mass index went from 28.8 (overweight) to 24.9 (normal). One might think this would have spiked his cholesterol, but it actually decreased his "bad" cholesterol and increased his "good" cholesterol! Yep, by eating sugary snacks, he actually got healthier.

Haub discussed his shocking results, saying, "I'm not geared to say this is a good thing to do. I'm stuck in the middle. I guess that's the frustrating part. I wish I could say the outcomes are unhealthy. I wish I could say it's healthy. I'm not confident enough in doing that. That frustrates a lot of people. One side says it's irresponsible. It is unhealthy, but the data doesn't say that."

Rush Limbaugh, meanwhile, is saying "I told you so," and says he's always said "exercise is irrelevant.... One of the reasons I know what I know is that I know liberals, and I know liberals lie, and if Michelle Obama's gonna be out there ripping into 'food desserts' and saying, 'This is why people are fat,' I know it's not true."

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By Jen Carlson in Food on November 9, 2010 4:04 PM

Comments [rss]

robingee

What about nutrition?

Trilby16

I totally concur that you lose weight by counting calories. But I am surprised he could eat enough high calorie food within his calorie limit to be satisfied. I eat a LOT of salad and rice cakes for example and try to stay around 1400-1500. Also, the kinds of food he was eating make most people hungrier. But yes, count calories. It works.

e07123

food desserts? deserts?

exnyer

The problem is activity....growing up on Twinkies and plenty of other junk food didn`t add an ounce to me or my friends we were outside playing all day.....sitting on your but with a joystick and video game won`t work.

neuroradical

Not exactly true, if you only eat as many calories of Twinkies as your body uses if you sleep all day, you'll lose weight by sitting and playing games cause that uses marginally more energy than sleeping. Of course, you're right that if you exercise and run around instead of sitting, you'll burn even more calories so you can eat more Twinkies. It is however possible to lose weight without exercise.

retrovertigo

And when he blows George and Harveys brains out with his six gun, what then? Are we going to let history repeat itself people?!

jaredfromsubway

Calorie-counting schmalorie-schmounting. The reason this fraud was able to lose so much weight is that he has aides.

robingee

He has people to assist him?

jaycjay

To be in on the joke:

http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/103526/jareds-aides

m015094

I wish I had AIDS err aides like Jarod.

Awesomer

I read "dieter" as the name Dieter and wanted to know who Twinkie Dieter was.

SP's Ghost

He'll be fat again in a month. Also, a BMI of 24.9 is just barely "normal." 25 and up is overweight. Second, BMI doesn't mean shit anyway. Body fat percentage is the only true measurement. A totally ripped athlete will often be determined as "obese" even if his body fat percentage is well below 15%, simply if his height to weight ratio puts him there. Considering the amount of shit he ate for two months, I'm willing to bet that he lost as much if not more muscle as he did fat. This is junk "science." No wonder it's endorsed by Rush Limbaugh.

neuroradical

Actually, a couple years ago I lost 40 pounds by counting calories and have managed to keep most of it off. While I didn't eat exclusively dessert food, I didn't watch what I ate so much as how much I ate. I also didn't exercise for the record. I actually ate a lot of burgers and fries and drank a lot of booze during this period, I just saved up my calories so I could do so. The hardest part is figuring out how many calories your body uses up in an average day. Once you know that though, it's a cake walk. If this guy gains the weight back, it will most likely be because he lost it so quickly, slow gradual change of a pound or 2 a week is easier to maintain because you slowly get used to your new daily food intake and energy expenditure. Counting calories basically works because of conservation of energy.

justthinkin

Gavin Newsom better watch his back around this guy.

Ishtar

+1

nicemarmot

Isn't Rush Limbaugh a big giant fatass?

It is true that portion size is the only thing that really matters, but somehow I doubt the twinkie diet would be very good for your health in the long run. I can't imagine what it would do to your digestive system.

H.J. Simpson

Exactly.I would like to see the long term effects from this Twinkie diet. Bulimics are thin as well, but that doesnt make them healthy.

With the chemical make-up, I could only assume one would eventually end up with cancer..