I have a friend who regularly does “iron man”-type events. She’s way fitter than I am. She’s also fat. She just don’t look good naked. Reason is, as she happily admits, is that she can’t stop eating cakes.
It all depends what your goals are. If your aim is to lose fat and keep it off, in the most painless possible way, I’d just go with a low-carb high-fat regime. It’s foolproof. It works for anyone. And as mentioned, if you’re doing some serious workouts, you don’t need to get obsessive about it - just dropping the junk food and sweets is going to get you 80% of the way there. Slight complication (I think you mentioned this earlier) is that a lot of the things we think of as “normal” are actually loaded up with sugar and processed starches.
If you’re regularly doing high-power endurance events, then (experimentally speaking) a low-carb, high-fat diet with sugars consumed during the event gives you a serious performance advantage.
I don’t disagree with you and as a matter of fact I’m doing just that. Not to any extreme, but I am definitely reducing carb intake. Just not this weekend (and actually most every weekend when I do my longer distance workouts). I came close to fainting the last time I was dieting and did some endurance activities. I now know better and don’t avoid carbs the night before and the morning of long workout sessions. So far, so good.
As for the Ironman tri (not what I do), getting nutrition including lots of sugar during the race is essential (not just preferred). 11 hours plus for most and so it makes sense. Check out what Ironman (the brand) races offer in the US:
IRONMAN course offerings
IRONMAN aid stations are approximately every 10 miles on the bike and every mile on the run. If you’re racing in the United States, for example, here’s what you can expect:
Bike:
Gatorade Endurance Forumla (Flavor: Orange) (24 oz - 42 grams CHO, 600 mg Sodium)
Water
Bananas (one medium - 30 grams CHO)
Clif Shot Energy Gels (1 gel - 22-24 grams CHO, 60-90 mg sodium)
Clif Blocks Energy Chews ( 3 Chews—24 grams CHO, 70mg sodium)
Clif Bar Minis (1 bar - 17-18 grams CHO, 65-100 mg sodium)
Red Bull (8.4 oz - 27 grams CHO, 100 mg sodium)
Run:
Gatorade Endurance Formula (Flavor: Lemon-Lime) (24 oz - 42 grams CHO, 600mg Sodium)
Water
Cola (8 oz - 26 grams CHO, 30 mg sodium)
Clif Shot Energy Gels (1 gel - 22-24 grams CHO, 60-90 mg sodium)
Clif Bloks Energy Chews (3 chews - 24 grams CHO, 70 mg sodium)
Clif Bar Minis (1 bar - 17-18 grams CHO, 65-100 mg sodium)
Red Bull (8.4 oz - 27 grams CHO, 100 mg Sodium)
Pretzels (1 oz - 23 grams CHO, ~450 mg sodium)
Fruit
2.5 kilos after a little less than 5 weeks. And this even though I ate a lot and drank beer starting Friday night. I ran Friday evening, swam in a 2k open-water event Saturday, and competed in a sprint triathlon on Sunday.
So it can be done without going overboard and by timing heavy eating and drinking with workouts. I’m stoked and looking forward to meeting my goal of losing 4 kilos.
Fedor or even Khabib have so little of the muscle definition that we associate with strength. Makes you think that a lot of what is commonly accepted is actually nonsense
Even middle distance runners, like the girl featured in this video. Qualified for Olympic trials. Sub 16 minute 5k and a bit over 32 minutes for 10k. A bit chubby. Appears at around 1:40. Probably not possible to be chubby if you’re a marathon runner though (and still be good).
Down 5 kilos. I decided to lose one more kilo and not stop after reaching 4 kilos. I feel great. This took two and a half months. Basically, I replaced my lunches with a protein shake, a banana, and a soyjoy bar. I also reduced alcohol intake. That’s it. I exercised throughout but not too much more than usual. I still draink once a week (cheated a couple of times on that), and even heavily at least twice during that period.
Exercise benefits: Much easier cycling up mountains (though I’ve only done that twice since losing weight). I’m actually pushing myself up the mountain by my house, instead of just trying to make it to the top. My running is getting faster but then I hit a wall just yesterday when it was already 30 degrees when I made it to the track at 7 am. No shade there, either. My swimming has deteriorated a bit, but that’s because I’m not swimming much lately and I’m losing my feel for the water as a result. I imagine I won’t feel any benefit in swimming because of reduced weight.
It really hasn’t been that hard. I highly recommend just biting the bullet, no more excuses, etc. for anyone else out there that would like to lose some blubber. Several have noticed the difference. I don’t care about that because I didn’t do this for aesthetic reasons, but it’s still nice to know that the weight loss is evident and not just some numbers on a scale.
Damn. Well done. What are you doing for the protein shake? Maybe I should try something like that, but for dinner … I’m not really trying to lose weight, but it’d be nice. Maybe I’d be able to jog again - knee problems have stopped that for over a decade.
However it does amuse / bemuse me that over the past fifteen years or so my weight has only varied by about 5 kg total, despite widely varying exercise & food & drink habits over that time - and huge variations in how fit I’ve felt. For example, I’m currently at the low end of that weight range, but that’s after a month of not exercising because of health issues! I’m pretty convinced that I’ve put on fat but lost muscle, for net weight loss.
Congrats! Good to restrain yourself from the booze. How I see it is, if you booze hard, you train harder the next day or following days.
Not seeing your Strava for this one. I’m guessing your keeping the activities private, or have given up on Strava. Nothing wrong with that. You don’t need Strava to track improvement!
I’m drinking this stuff from Atomy. But I’m convinced that it’s really not the protein, but the meal replacement aspect of what I’m doing that resulted in the weight loss. I’m hungry for a few hours every day, but I’ve got to say, it bothers me a lot less now than when I first started.
I decided to keep things private. I’ve always had a hard time having any easy days on my workouts. I think having everything visible contributed to this (though definitely not the only reason). I made things private for a while before the races the last couple of months and discovered I actually like it better that way! By the way, I’m still way slower than you and others on “Wimp Mountain” (Xiding Road). But I’m still very happy that I can see some improvement down the road and I’m actually pushing myself on some parts (again, instead of just trying to make it to top).
Trust me, this gets harder as you get older. I used to almost enjoy this pain back in the day. Sweat it all out and then head out again to the bars.
My primary sport is cycling. Yours is swimming. I won’t mention the weight factor, but there’s absolutely no shame in being slower than me up that climb. I know for a fact I’d feel the same if I jumped in the pool and tried to match your PR.
Nonetheless, it’s good to hear you’re improving. Tbh, it’s not a very simple climb. Most of it is low gradient, but you’re still climbing!
It’s not being embarrassed by my times, but knowing that I have an audience (albeit a small one) and I don’t think that’s ideal for me. I have a hard time with slowing down and just having an easy run, ride, swim. Knowing that others might be looking at my times makes that even harder. And it’s not smart to never have any slow days. I’ll probably open things back up soon.
Xiding Road is a good one for me. I’m right there so I can be up and down and back home all in an hour and a half or even less. I also find it quite challenging.
The best thing you can do is change what you eat. Your typically moderate exercise plan is not going to make a huge impact if you’re eating like crap. Think about how many things you eat or drink that have sugar and how often you have bread, pasta or rice with your meals? These are the things that are making you overweight.
Here’s what I did. I dropped from 175 to 162 and <10% body fat. Here’s are my workouts:
Monday: Run 3 to 4 miles
Tuesday: Lift 10 reps/3 sets (bench press, curls, inverse curls, pull ups, cockroaches) / Elliptical 3 miles
Wednesday: Bike 45 minutes or 3 miles on the elliptical (full incline/resistance)
Thursday: Lift 10 reps/3 sets (inclined bench, Nautilus row, planks, wide grip pullups) / Elliptical 3 miles
Friday: Run/walk 2 miles HIIT
Saturday: Lift 10 reps/3 sets (bench press, curls, inverse curls, pull ups, cockroaches)
Sunday: Hockey
Also, I fast intermittently. I find skipping lunch various times throughout the week is easiest because that’s when you’re most busy. This will allow you to lose fat. BTW, I’m 40 years old, and I’m in better shape than 98% of the population.
This is exactly how I did it. I don’t completely go without food, though, and I have a protein/nutrition drink, a banana, and a soyjoy bar. I sometimes change that around a bit. Nothing magical about what I do take in. It’s more about minimal caloric intake for one meal every day.
[quote=“SuperNintendo,
post:56, topic:90016”]
BTW, I’m 40 years old, and I’m in better shape than 98% of the population.
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What do you mean by being in better shape than most? I’m honestly just curious (not trying to be a jerk). For example, I would consider myself to be in good shape, but put me on a mountain on a bike, and I’m through after around 40 minutes and just struggling after that. That’s probably still not bad, but doing various different sports has humbled me and I wouldn’t be so confident in declaring how fit I am.
Sure, no problem. I can bench 205 lbs, do 100 pullups in 15 minutes, 40 consecutive pushups, run 3 miles in 23.5 minutes or less depending upon how I feel that day.
Anyway, I play sports too, and I suck. I’m too slow. I have to think about everything I do before I do it. So you put yourself at a disadvantage to other people who can just react to a play.
I think I’m being very humble in saying that there are 140 million people out there that are in better physical condition than me.
