Research

Energy balance

When energy balance is maintained, exercise does not induce negative fat balance in lean sedentary, obese sedentary, or lean endurance-trained individuals.

If you exercise but eat back the calories you burned, you will not lose fat. To lose fat through exercise, you must not replace the calories expended. Simply adding exercise without adjusting diet will not create a negative fat balance.

GoodRefutesHIGH confidence
These data suggest that when exercise is performed with energy replacement (i.e., energy balance is maintained), 24-h fat oxidation does not increase and in fact, may be slightly decreased.
Edward L. Melanson et al. · Journal of Applied Physiology · 2009

Why this rating

Randomized controlled trial using whole-room calorimetry, a gold-standard method for measuring energy expenditure and substrate oxidation, with rigorous control of energy balance.

Source

When energy balance is maintained, exercise does not induce negative fat balance in lean sedentary, obese sedentary, or lean endurance-trained individuals

Edward L. Melanson et al. · Journal of Applied Physiology · 2009

DOI 10.1152/japplphysiol.00958.2009

crossover · n=27Cited 53×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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