have i hit my natural weight?

ducatiman

so - i used to be 16.5 stone and i am now 13 stone or 82kg

i do almost 10 hours a week on the bike and thats full on 20mph average stuff with a few 10% hills in the mix.

at lunchtime i also run 10km and swim 1500m (so in effect an full oly distance triathlon each weekday)

i only consume 2000kcal a day and i am not exactly fat, but still chunky
scales say i am 20% fat and i know i can get faster in i get leaner.

how come i don't seem to shift any weight. i drop to 12stone 10 after a ride but its back on in the morning. i cut out all junk food and i have been dong this routine for 2 months.

its very frustraring, since the first 3 stone seemed to drop off.

i want a natural six pack 12% boy fat 11-12 stone figure

i am 5.10-11 ft

what can i do... help!

brownbosh

Change your routine and throw in real easy long spin days and other days put in some real intensity. 20 % fat is almost definately not 'the best' you can do. I was over 30% fat and am nearly 15 now and i have had a number of sticking points but variety and intensity has pushed me over those bumps. I eat way more than 2000 calories as i am burning so many (14 hours ave per week on bike plus daily stretching and mobilisation). I probably still eat 3000 per day but average burning in the region of 4500 per day. I have found racing, testing,sportives, turbo training as well as a couple of long rides keeps that fat melting although on occasion ive lost nothing for 3-4 weeks in a row only to loose 4 pounds out of nowhere. No rhyme or reason just keep moving and changing the schedule. No changes will produce no changes. Good luck fella i know its a long struggle.

Takis61

Could be - I'm 5'9", dropped from 84kg Jan 1st to around 78kg - depends when I weigh myself & what kind of week I've had, sometimes come in around 77.7, other times 78.3 or so.
Frustrating.
I did get down to 75kg a few years ago but I was calories counting & going under 1800 cals per day as well as training, soon as I stopped it started going back up.
Living like Lester Piggot is no life, so I am trying to be content with this plateau, but my BMI is still a touch too high, belly still rounded as it is the last area the weight goes from, and like you I am measuring 20% + fat.

Escargot

A couple of things:

You will drop weight after any vigorous activity like running, cycling, etc. but this will be water meaning you might not be drinking enough. As you drink afterwards this comes back on as your body hydrates again.

Your body will become more efficient after time, hence you will not continually lose weight at the same rate. 3 stone is pretty damned good so don't feel too bad about it. If you're doing the same exercise every day then try to mix it up a bit. Maybe do some weights for a change at high intensity or do a circuits class. As above, your body will adapt very quickly to whatever regime you're following so confuse your body by constantly changing what you're doing (unless you're training for a triathlon that is).

Check your diet. There's probably something in there that's holding you back. Alcohol is a biggie but whatever it is (cheese, bread, etc) give it a break for a bit. Although they reckon 2000kcals are what we should be taking in we're all different so your daily might be less. Checking your BMR will give you an indication of what your body burns at rest so it might be worth finding out (mine is about 1700kcals.

Either way if you want to lose a bit more then you need to eat less than 2000kcals and then go on a low fat diet to get your abs showing through. I'm not sure this is particularly easy by exercise alone.

Hope this helps

jamestux

ducatiman wrote:

so - i used to be 16.5 stone and i am now 13 stone or 82kg

i do almost 10 hours a week on the bike and thats full on 20mph average stuff with a few 10% hills in the mix.

at lunchtime i also run 10km and swim 1500m (so in effect an full oly distance triathlon each weekday)

i only consume 2000kcal a day and i am not exactly fat, but still chunky
scales say i am 20% fat and i know i can get faster in i get leaner.

how come i don't seem to shift any weight. i drop to 12stone 10 after a ride but its back on in the morning. i cut out all junk food and i have been dong this routine for 2 months.

That's a lot of exercise every day - I can't see how you'd be using less than 2000 calories a day just from the exercise... I think you need to consume more calories - I'm trying to think how our body can be getting energy, I guess it could be from the muscles themselves.

I would go and see a doctor as I really cannot see how your exercise alone is using less than 2000kcal and if that is your entire daily intake what is your body using for fuel for normal living!?!

I consume over double that and do a lot less exercise (I'm 2 stone heavier) but have consistently been either dropping weight or fat every fortnight when I check at the machine at the gym.

Let us know how you get on!

Bhima

I'm your height and 66kg. Frank Schleck is 6ft 1 and was 60kg during the Tour.

Just live off porridge, veg, fruit, fish & natural yoghurt for a bit and cycle harder for longer.

ducatiman

Fruit veg and mixing it up it is then.

I do triathlons hence the training. But i was getting bored so I think mixing it up will help. Iam burning around 1000kcal a day do I thought 2000kcals a day was under eat ing. But I'll try dropping to 1500.

Thanks for the advice. Damn. I don't think I'll ever get to 60kg!!!!

Bhima

If you're doing Triathlons, you'll need upper-body muscles for swimming and running, whereas cyclists can afford to lose all that because they're almost pointless. Because muscle is more dense than fat, your minimum weight will be a lot higher than a "normal" cyclist.

Smonks

Another thing you may want to consider is cutting out dairy products as they can inhibit weight loss.

I'm vegetarian but lost 2 stone in weight when I moved to a predominantly vegan diet for a couple of months. As a veggie already it wasn't a big step for me, but as a meat eater(?) it might be a rather large shock to the system :shock:

I replace milk with Soy Milk _ you can get it sweetened naturally with apple juice
Margarine/Butter I replace with Pure Sunflower (Dairy free) spread
No cheese etc

Going 'totally' vegan can be hard work, but I'm talking of cutting out the big culprits, many processed foods have milk proteins in so it can be a mine field.

Obviously, cutting out red meat would help, stick to white meat if required but just fish is better.

When you start looking, you'll be amazed at how many foods have dairy produce in them - cutting many of them out may help, but this is my own personal view.

Good luck anyway.

Bhima

Smonks,

I don't see the problem with dairy products - they're a great way of getting extra protein here and there. Without them, you'll lose valuable calcium too, which can be quite a bad thing over time - see here: http://www.bikeradar.com/fitness/articl ... bone-21929

I drink about 3 litres of milk a day and eat about 3kg of natural yoghurt and had no problem losing weight recently. As long as your total calories used is higher than the ammount you're burning, you'll lose weight, I don't see how dairy products inhibit this, as you say. :? Most natural yoghurt is about 0.1% fat and even full-fat milk doesn't have much in it.

If you're lactose-intollerant, fair enough, but if you're not, dairy products are almost essential in my opinion.

jamestux

ducatiman wrote:

Fruit veg and mixing it up it is then.

I do triathlons hence the training. But i was getting bored so I think mixing it up will help. Iam burning around 1000kcal a day do I thought 2000kcals a day was under eat ing. But I'll try dropping to 1500.

Thanks for the advice. Damn. I don't think I'll ever get to 60kg!!!!

Hi Ducatiman,

I just can't see how that much exercise only equates to 1000kcal (I am reading right you are running 10km, swimming 1500m and doing about an hour or more heavy cycling too) I would expect EACH of them to be burning about 1000kcal...

Smonks

Bhima wrote:

Smonks,

I don't see the problem with dairy products - they're a great way of getting extra protein here and there. Without them, you'll lose valuable calcium too, which can be quite a bad thing over time - see here: http://www.bikeradar.com/fitness/articl ... bone-21929

Hi Bhima,

There are better ways of getting protein and calcium in your diet other than through dairy products.

Raw spinach has more calcium in it that Milk for example. Various nuts are great sources of protein also.

The key is understanding your foods and what minerals and vitamins are found in which ones and eating healthy accordingly - I wouldn't suggest just cutting out dairy without compensating for it - perhaps I should have made that clear :oops:

I'm sure there are studies that show the body has a harder time breaking down fat when having eaten dairy, that said, I'm sure there are studies to prove everything no matter what side of the fence you sit on eh!

It's a personal choice, I personally don't think dairy is very good for you, and any of the goodness they provide can be found in other foods and in higher concentrations.

bompington

Smonks wrote:

Another thing you may want to consider is cutting out dairy products as they can inhibit weight loss.

Use less calories than you eat = weight loss
Use as many calories as you eat = equilibrium
Using less calories than you eat = weight gain
Anything else is fiction.

Ducatiman - considering that the recommended daily intake for an 80kg man is way over 2000 cals and your exercise looks more like it's burning 2000 - your numbers don't add up somewhere.
Or else you're nuclear powered.

stevenmh

Bhima wrote:

Without them, you'll lose valuable calcium too, which can be quite a bad thing over time - see here: http://www.bikeradar.com/fitness/articl ... bone-21929

Thanks for posting that link Bhima. Made for very interesting reading.

Escargot

bompington wrote:

Use less calories than you eat = weight loss
Anything else is fiction.

That's what I keep telling myself but my waistline keeps increasing

bigflangesmallsprocket

"That's a lot of exercise every day - I can't see how you'd be using less than 2000 calories a day just from the exercise... I think you need to consume more calories - I'm trying to think how our body can be getting energy, I guess it could be from the muscles themselves. "

I think I generally agree with this comment. I get the impression that this diet/fitness regime is something you've only started relatively recently. If that's the case then I'd guess that your workload is pretty extreme. Even if you have the gift bestowed to natural athletes, that of incredible recovery ability, this is still a lot of work even if you're an experienced trainer. When the body is overworked and underfed, it puts itself into an emergency mode, concentrating on using available calories for survival, and and trying to save every single available calorie it can get hold of. That's why nutrition experts always recommend eating only slightly less calories than you need per day rather than eating as few calories as you can without collapsing from starvation.

Another thing to take into account, I think mentioned elsewhere, is that if you restrict your diet too much then your body will start feeding off itself. This might sound good, but it's not. This is not in referral to the body using up fat stores, it's about the body using it's own muscles and vital organs to provide energy for survival functions. Think anorexics, and cause of death of. Apart from the obvious dangers of your vital organs eating themselves to give you energy, there's also your muscles. Muscle is very important in energy expenditure. You should eat to support muscle recovery and maintenance, as muscle works, muscle itself burns energy and everything else being equal, more muscle equals more energy used.

For someone of your approx build, I'd guess 2000 calories would be a minimum for health for an inactive person, but the kind of activity you're doing would AT LEAST double that. Put it this way, I'm 5'7 and quite slender built. When doing manual work and exercising regularly I calculated I was eating approx 4000 calories a day. That might sound a lot, but with your (probably) naturally larger build, and height, and schedule, I'd guess you could add a thousand or so calories again onto that as well if you weren't trying to lose weight.

Summary of my long wandering waffle....I don't think you're eating enough to support your bodies health, so it may already be in survival mode, especially considering lack of weight-loss and lack of lean-ness. How long can you keep up your routine? I'd say you actually need to ease off the starvation mode; increasing 'good' calories slowly to reduce risk of what I'll call 'fat-grabbing' by your body's survival mechanism. The trouble with these extreme diets is that when your body and mind is exhausted and you're forced to quit, then your body will continue grabbing as many calories as it can for the next famine and you could end up even fatter, hence the so called yo-yo diet. I reckon you need to recheck your diet: thinking about eating to perform rather than eating to lose weight. Considering the training you are doing, and apparantly surviving despite your diet, it;d probably also be a good idea to get some training advice from the triathletes perspective rather than cyclists..as you might actually be good, I know that routine would kill me!

will3

Just how long is your lunch break?

bigflangesmallsprocket

UUURRRRRPP!!!!

will3

And how do you find time to eat those billy goats for lunch?

amaferanga

ducatiman wrote:

so - i used to be 16.5 stone and i am now 13 stone or 82kg

i do almost 10 hours a week on the bike and thats full on 20mph average stuff with a few 10% hills in the mix.

at lunchtime i also run 10km and swim 1500m (so in effect an full oly distance triathlon each weekday)

i only consume 2000kcal a day and i am not exactly fat, but still chunky
scales say i am 20% fat and i know i can get faster in i get leaner.

how come i don't seem to shift any weight. i drop to 12stone 10 after a ride but its back on in the morning. i cut out all junk food and i have been dong this routine for 2 months.

its very frustraring, since the first 3 stone seemed to drop off.

i want a natural six pack 12% boy fat 11-12 stone figure

i am 5.10-11 ft

what can i do... help!

Some of your figures seem odd. For example, dropping 4lbs after a 1 or 2 hour ride - that's some serious dhydration going on there if its true. Not healthy.

And as others have said, 2000cals doing your sort of training regime just isn't enough.

If I were in your situation (only eating 2000cals per day, burning 2000cals per day in exercise alone and not losing weight) I wouldn't be posting about it on a cycling forum I'd be seeking the opinion of my GP.

smithy1.0

Ok, first of all, your body isn't going to go into starvation mode if you burn 2000kcal and only eat 2000kcal. I just don't buy that. It also won't eat your "vital organs" if it is'nt been fed enough. Your body will use energy in this order; Glycogen, Fat, Muscle then organs. It isn't going to eat away your muscle and organs when it has a stack of fat available. It will do what it takes to survive the longest, and fat stores are exactly where it will tap into after glycogen is depleted. It will preserve muscle and organs until there is nothing else to feed off. However, you can burn muscle by exercising while in a glycogen depleted state I believe.

Anyway, I think you must be mis-calculating your energy useage or intake somewhere. Eat 3 square meals per day, breakfast, lunch, dinner. Snack on fruit in between if you are hungry. Sensible portions. Eat clean. Don't overeat. If you aren't loosing, eat less. If you are loosing too fast, eat a bit more. Simple as that. Count the calories if you wish but personally I find that a bit obsessive, and will only lead to you going off track. (Can you really see yourself counting the kcals for good?). It really isn't any harder than that. Best of luck, sounds like you have done pretty well so far.

mikeq

Eat of good whole (unprocessed) variety of foods.

It has been proven that eating low fat dairy products helps the body excrete fat

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/humanbody/truth ... cium.shtml

Soya products can have an estrogen like effect on men, so if you get moobs dont come crying.

The body can only absorb 5% of the calcium found in Spinach compared to 28% from milk.

There is no substitute for a healthy varied unprocessed diet from all food groups

ducatiman

wow! thanks for all the tips.

as to the figures, i tend to under estimate them. i.e. my garmin thinks i burn 1400 per hour. Which i know is wrong. swimming... i am so bad at it, i doubt its burning any calories. and for my 10km i burn 750kcals.

so i guess i am burning around 1500 - 2000 as people said prior.

if i am also truthful, i eat quite a bit of chocolate and 2 glasses of red wine a night, so i guess my calories are sometimes nudging the 2500.

but still, if i am burning 2000ish then surely i should be losing weight.

the reason i asked for help is that my times have plateaued and i still have a layer of fat so i was wondering if dropping weight would improve times?

i think i am going to have to bite the bullet and

1. cut out the crap (mars bars and wine!!)
2. start thinking about doing proper interval training - mix it up(instead of same commute and lunch regime)
3. start eating right post workout

these were my actions from your responses.

basically - there is no 'easy' way to push on to the next level (i.e. i came 38th in my last tri but want to go top 10)

any tips for intervals and nutrition websites to visit.
and DUMMIES guide would be good, as i like to keep things plain and simple!!!

thanks for all the help!

Bhima

ducatiman wrote:

any tips for intervals and nutrition websites to visit.
and DUMMIES guide would be good, as i like to keep things plain and simple!!!

Posted this in another thread, but i'll copy it here:

Intervals
Use the first 10 minutes as a warmup. Use low gears and spin them pretty fast to get the blood flowing.

Then, when you're mentally prepared and the road allows it:

1) Pedal harder.
2) Pedal even harder, so it hurts.
3) Pedal even harder than that, through the pain barrier for as long as you can.
4) When you can't go on anymore, give it one last push and sprint as hard as you can.
5) Re-gain consciousness, Recover, Repeat.

Then have a 10 minute cooling off period.

If you're not tired at the end of it, you didn't go hard enough. You'll be in pain, but next time you'll be stronger, as long as you eat well (lots of protein).

There's your dummies guide to intervals. Eat 0.015% of your body weight in simple sugars after a ride to get your leg's energy levels back up and to avoid post-ride pain. That's one time you can binge out on sugar, but avoid fatty mars bars etc...

Eat low-gi foods to keep you feeling fuller for longer and early in the day, to give you slow release energy. If you're fuller for longer, you'll feel less inclined to eat crap. Read this: http://www.the-gi-diet.org/lowgifoods/

If you want to lose weight, simply burn more calories than you eat. Most people get silly and eat nothing, but the mathematics of the situation say that you can actually eat loads and loads, as long as you exercise enough. Sometimes I have about 5000 calories but burn about 6000 on a super-long medium-intensity ride. I'll feel really full but still be at a 1000 calorie deficit (111.1g of fat burned) which is more comfortable than eating virtually nothing and having the feeling that my stomach is digesting itself if I were to burn 2000 and only eat 1000.

If you exercise the same ammount each day and eat the same things every day, in theory you will be able to work out your calorie deficit by weighing yourself every day for a couple of weeks, although eating the same thing every day is dangerous, unless it's completely balanced.

Unless you have expensive power-measuring equipment, you'll never know how many calories you're burning, so forget about numbers for now and just concentrate on eating healthy food, cutting the crap and then over time you'll be able to sense if you're eating enough/too much/too little.

Bhima

By the way, it only took me a couple of minutes to post that - I didn't type it, i've been testing out some new voice recognition software. 8) Very accurate.

stevenmh

Bhima wrote:

By the way, it only took me a couple of minutes to post that - I didn't type it, i've been testing out some new voice recognition software. 8) Very accurate.

Which one if I may ask? and did it take long for you to train it? Thanks.

Escargot

ducatiman wrote:

if i am also truthful, i eat quite a bit of chocolate and 2 glasses of red wine a night, so i guess my calories are sometimes nudging the 2500.

LOL I think I'd be driven to 2 glasses of red wine a night if I was able to maintain a schedule like yours

The general rule is that there is approx 1kcal per ml of red wine so if you're drinking two large 175ml glasses and a bar or two of chocs then I think you could easily be taking in an additional 500 a day. I think the trouble with this is that it's usually late evening stuff so you go to sleep with it, which is bad for weight gain.

Everyone has to drink but the wife got impressive results by just ditching it for a month and continuing with her usual routine. It could be the trigger your body needs to drop those last few kg's.

Having said that you should pat yourself on the back as losing even 3 stone is very impressive.

All the best

amaferanga

Escargot wrote:

I think the trouble with this is that it's usually late evening stuff so you go to sleep with it, which is bad for weight gain.

I think that's a myth.

mikeq

amaferanga wrote:

Escargot wrote:

I think the trouble with this is that it's usually late evening stuff so you go to sleep with it, which is bad for weight gain.

I think that's a myth.

Correct, just because you are asleep does not mean your body stops using energy.

Your brain alone uses 20 - 25% of the glucose energy in your body

smithy1.0

I believe it is total calories that matter, not when you eat, so even if you eat the majority of your calories in the evening, and less through the day, it shouldn't make much difference to weight.

Infamous

Bhima wrote:

By the way, it only took me a couple of minutes to post that - I didn't type it, i've been testing out some new voice recognition software. 8) Very accurate.

hahah fking brilliant bhima. another 5 star post. Imagine some plonker at 11pm at night talking to himself to write a post about intervals. awesome.

How do you do it? every post is better than the last, just when I think you can't get any more bhima, BAM! voice recognition software. You sir are a genius (of sorts).