“Re: I'm Not Asking, "How Does Weight Loss Happen?"”

>The goal here is to reduce my dependency on supplementation while/when I would seem to have ample fuel reserves all over my body. Even a very tiny improvement, just a couple percentage points, would be welcome.

I guess I wasn't clear. I think the problem is while you have reserves, they're in the wrong form for use during heavy exercise. The energy is not accessible at the rate you need it. Lowering the intesity is one way to access that type of energy. Assume I'm not time constrained in any way. I get on my bike, I ride and ride... at about 8-10mph. 10 hours later I stop. According to the books I will have burned about 5000 calories, 80% or more of that energy from fat. Nice, almost two pound day (assuming you ate about 2000 calories along the way).

Mike Magnuson ate only three 550 calorie drinks a day and then rode 300 to 400 miles a week at whatever pace he could. He dropped five pounds a week.

I wonder who'd last longer... someone starving themselves or someone in the saddle for ten hours a day... :)

Anyway, back to the point. Increase the intensity until you barely keep your breath. Now your burning much less fat, but it's still burning. A half hour later you've used 330 calories but only 33% are fat. So you will burn the fat, but you'll burn a lot of other stuff as well (and accrue other benefits.) I always thought that the big bonus of burning calories having fun was that you get to eat a lot! (That may explain any number of things :)

Tour riders supposedly burn 7000 calories a day. Trail hikers carrying a backpack burn about 6000 (at least on the Appalachian Trail) a day. Some of those calories are going to be glycogen and some are going to be fat. But I'd bet the ratio is different. (And the ability to eat and drink enough is different as well.)

>keeping myself fully hydrated is an important part of this metabolic process

and every other process. It would seem that the best thing you can do for yourself is stay properly hydrated at all times.