losing weight and exercising

radiation man

how do i lose weight when cycling, if i dont eat enough food i get no energy, but if i eat too much food i put weight on how do you get the balance.

acidstrato

eat the right food and you can eat as much as you need

Pokerface

This is starting to sound a little like Goldilocks and the 3 Bears!



Use a calorie counter to work out what you CAN eat on a daily basis. I personally use The Daily Plate - part of the Livestrong website. http://www.livestrong.com/thedailyplate

You can set your daily calorie goals (for instance 1500 calories) and then input everything you eat. It will help you figure out how much is too much.

Plus - eat healthy foods and you'll burn it off easier.

Lastly - as you reduce the amount you eat - your body will adjust and you won't feel hungry all the time - and won't feel low on energy. But you still need to eat ENOUGH.

oldwelshman

radiation man wrote:

how do i lose weight when cycling, if i dont eat enough food i get no energy, but if i eat too much food i put weight on how do you get the balance.

Consume less calories than burnt off per day !!

ut_och_cykla

Sometimes just rescheduling your food to time with cykling will help. I.e. eat a sarnie or two or have a carb drink instead of a caffe latte and a cake! depends a bit on when how hard and how long you train but just cutting down portion sizes can also help especially if you already eat healthily. you can lose weight adn cycle hard but your must adjust your goals accordingly to create a slight calorie deficit and make sure you recover between hard sessions.

Beer, anyone?

Pokerface do you use any particular website to estimate calories in the food you consume? (i.e. I can't see anything on the livestrong website apart from manually putting in numbers...)

Ta

bobtbuilder

radiation man wrote:

how do i lose weight when cycling, if i dont eat enough food i get no energy, but if i eat too much food i put weight on how do you get the balance.

You need a dailty calorie deficit - even if it is only -100 per day.

So you need to know how many calories you burn in a normal day + calories burned in exercise. This total needs to be slightly less than the calories you eat.

Simples!

Pokerface

Beer, anyone? wrote:

Pokerface do you use any particular website to estimate calories in the food you consume? (i.e. I can't see anything on the livestrong website apart from manually putting in numbers...)

Ta

The link I posted should take you to the Daily Plate:

http://www.livestrong.com/thedailyplate

I use it and it's BRILLIANT. I can find virtually every food I eat (in the UK - not just the USA) or create regular meals (so you don't have to input the same ingredients all the time).

You can tell it how many calories a day you want to eat, put in any exercise you do (which gives you extra calories you can eat for the day, etc).

It'll even break down your daily intake of carbs, fats, proteins, salts, etc.

When I follow it carefully - I have never failed to lose weight. It's VERY enlightening as to what you put in your body and how much even a single extra chocolate bar or sweets per day can affect your weight long-term!

ut_och_cykla

Pokerface wrote:

Beer, anyone? wrote:

Pokerface do you use any particular website to estimate calories in the food you consume? (i.e. I can't see anything on the livestrong website apart from manually putting in numbers...)

Ta

The link I posted should take you to the Daily Plate:

http://www.livestrong.com/thedailyplate

I use it and it's BRILLIANT. I can find virtually every food I eat (in the UK - not just the USA) - create regular meals (so you don;t have to input the same ingredients all the time).

You can tell it how many calories a day you want to eat, put in any exercise you do (which gives you extra calories you can eat for the day, etc).

It'll even break down your daily intake of carbs, fats, proteins, salts, etc.

When I follow it carefully - I have never failed to lose weight. It's VERY enlightening as to what you put in your body and how much even a single extra chocolate bar or sweet per day can affect your weight long-term!

I heartily agree!

Team Banana Spokesman

its better to eat normally and up the riding effort or length instead of riding normally and reducing the food

i fixed up my diet last month. no junk anymore. all replaced for better food. turns out this has been enough to lose weight at my normal riding rate even though I eat a lot.... when i get to a good weight i will just keep training the same and eat a bit more to maintain it

borisface

Having returned to cycling after a 17 year break and having lost 3 stone in teh last 3 years going from 15st 12 to 12st 12 including weight 17lbs loss since Dec, teh secret is to control what goes in as much as what exercise you do. That meant for me reducing fat, sugar, red meat and alcohol intake. I've never gone hungry or missed a meal, but when you realise a cheese sandwich with butter pretty much uses up your recommeded fat intake for the day it motivated me to eat other things. Understanding a little more of what's in your food, avoiding processed junk, eating more wholemeal, grains and pulses, veg and fruit a bit more fish and chicken rather than pork or beef. Saving those treats for once or twice a week rather than everyday. And learning to like rice cakes.
I find that a bowl of porridge in the morning 1/2 milk 1/2 water spoon f honey keep you full to lunch. A sardine sarnie or bean or couscous or rice salad, then a proper meal in the evening worked for me. I hate things that are low fat like low fat yogurt, cheese etc So if I have those things I eat them only once or twice a week. You do need treats ffrom time to time after all. Finally, weighing yourself a couple of times a week and seeing your weight come off is a great motivator, but also don't get too stressed if occasionally it seems to go up as long as the trend is down. My weight can fluctuate by up to 5lbs in a couple of days.
The only problem is I now need to buy new trousres as my old ones are too big!

borisface

Oh yeah forgot to say bloody hard physical exercise that's progressive also helps.

a900ss

Counting calories works for me first and foremost. When I cycle, it lets me eat a bit more as my body needs more calories that day but that is just a bonus.

It's working for me at the moment....

bigpikle

losing weight is 90% done in the kitchen, 10% through exercise. Trying to just burn it all off is not going to work nearly as well. You must control what is going in first and foremost.

I have found, after losing 37lbs in the last 6 months, that you need to fuel yourself before and after exercise properly, and then reduce calorie intake across the other meals. That way I have been able to train 6 days a week with no issues in low energy but still lose weight easily enough. That means good breakfasts and snacks ahead of running/cycling/swimming and quality snacks immediately afterwards and lower calorie eveing meals and lunches.

Try swapping plates of pasta/rice/potatos etc for big plates of veg in all your main meals - they still fill you up for about 1/5th of the calories and 10x the nutrients. Read up on low GI eating for a way to consume enough carbs to train but control calories and eating habits.

stonehouse

Usually trying to lose weight and having a vigorous exercise plan can conflict with each other. Sure you might be losing fat, but not necessarily weight. Your appetite will increase so it's easy to overeat. Scales that measure body fat are a good motivator, at least that way if you weight doesn't drop much but your fat ratio goes down you know you are on the right track.

The easiest way to lose weight is to eat healthily, reduce fat, especially saturated fats, be wary of "fad" diets.

Be very careful of food purchased whilst out, it's dead easy to go to Pret, buy a sandwich, crisps and a cake and use up half a day's allowance, worse still you might not feel full afterwards either! Another way to look at it, a Pret Artisan cheese baguette = a 7.5 mile walk!

Also be careful of monitoring systems that tell you the calorie count for your exercise, they are often wildly over estimating the calories burned.

Keep a food diary, weigh yourself once a week and monitor your progress, aim to lose no more than 1kg a week.

G-Wiz

Pokerface, just wanted to say thanks for posting that link

I only started trying it yesterday and it's bloody terrifying. I thought I ate reasonably well but a handful of snacks and the damage to the numbers is massive.

Really impressed at how big the database is so I'm not typing in loads of fat/carb/whatever numbers in to get the figures out.

Also, I reckon the biggest difference is psychological. Tempted by a Mars bar by the till? Nope, I'll have to tell Mr Armstrong about it.

G-Wiz

Pokerface, just wanted to say thanks for posting that link

I only started trying it yesterday and it's bloody terrifying. I thought I ate reasonably well but a handful of snacks and the damage to the numbers is massive.

Really impressed at how big the database is so I'm not typing in loads of fat/carb/whatever numbers in to get the figures out.

Also, I reckon the biggest difference is psychological. Tempted by a Mars bar by the till? Nope, I'll have to tell Mr Armstrong about it.