I read the article provided by CJZee. It had some very good parts to it and some thing I did not like. ...but all research is like that. I'm pretty picky but over all the article was a good source. One thing they did that I like was use a DEXA scan to measure body fat. It is the gold standard for getting tissue make up for the body.
So this is what the article claims.
"Results: Both fish oil and exercise independently reduced body fat
(P is less than 0.05)." I wasn't able to cut and past the less than symbol so I wrote it for those that are checking my accuracy.
The truth:
Only those that took fish oil and exercised had a reduction in percent body fat.
Those with fish oil alone
stayed the same.
Those that were in the sunflower oil actually
gained in percent body fat and those that exercied and took sunflower oil
stayed the same. For those looking at the article see Table 1 under Body Fat%.
So what was actually statistically significant???? OK...this is what they say in the results
"Oil and exercise interactions were also evident
for fat mass (exercise x time, P less than 0.05; oil x time, P less than 0.05;
Figure 6), which indicated that both FO supplementation and
regular aerobic exercise reduced fat mass."
Ok....so looking at the figure.
Here is what they are saying is the big change in body fat The change in mass as measured by DEXA.
For fish oil only people..... they lost 200g lean mass and 200g fat mass.
200g is about 1/2 lb. So if both lean and fat mass increased what decreased I ask???? And why didn't they say they saw a loss in lean mass also? I guess it doesn't make for hot headlines when they say you lose lean mass.
People that were in the Fish oil and exercise group..... Lean mass increased by 300g and fat mass decreased about 1500g.
Which you would expect with exercise.
They did not have an exercise only control group
It took me about an hour to go through and break down that article. But knowing the truth is important. There is no magic pill. We know that it takes hard work and good friend for support like we have here.