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The Loss
AMC Outdoors, May 1997 By Karen Berger AT thru-hikers are also the ones who, according to a postcard printed by 1989 thru-hiker Carol Moore, come into a trail town and order the left side of the menu for breakfast, a large pizza with everything on it for lunch, fried chicken and french fries for dinner—and then fill in the holes with snacks and desserts. "Club AT: All you can eat; all the weight you can lose!" If it were an advertisement for a health club or a diet drink, you'd ignore it, right? But consider an oft-cited master's thesis of thru-hiker Karen Lutz. Her 1982 study of hiker nutrition found that thru-hikers simply can't carry as much food as they burn—some 4,000-6,000 calories per day. No wonder Club AT is such an effective weight-loss plan. The amount of weight hikers lose varies drastically. Interestingly, according to Roland Mueser, a thru-hiker and retired physicist, heavier hikers tend to lose both more weight and a greater percentage of their body weight than thinner hikers. Another finding: women lose less weight than men, possibly because they build more muscle on the trail relative to men. Finally, the constant calorie deficit can cause problems for thru-hikers who were at their ideal weight or underweight to start: excessive weight loss, loss of muscle mass, and malnutrition.
Photo: Chris Gailey |
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