Guest Article: Cutting Weight
Weight. There are few segments of the population more obsessed with it than cyclists, apart from teenage girls and young men hoping to be selected for the highschool varsity ballet team (wrestling). Our sport is unique in the respect that friction between road and rider doesn’t significantly increase or decrease with rider weight, meaning that the amount of weight we carry up and down hills directly reduces the amount of work we do, leaving more juice for going way more fasterer. That, and we wear spandex in conjunction with having high expectations of Looking Fantastic.
Based on what we’ve learned of him, Steampunk shares several genes with the elusive Sasquatch, and as such is a bigger (and hairier) guy than the typical cyclist. This year, he’s taken some pointers from the Spanish Meat Industry and gone to work dropping some kilos and has been kind enough to share his experience with us.
We caution you not to treat any of the following as any kind of medical recommendation. Steampunk is not a doctor, although he plays one on the internet. Before embarking on any diet/nutritional changes, be sure to consult a real doctor or someone who has more than “guesswork” and a sample size bigger than 1 to go from. Also note that Historians are about the last people you want to get advice from regarding anything not to do with things that happend in the (distant) past, particularly physical fitness and well-being; that can’t even agree on the past, which should be fairly simple to settle on because it already happened. Consider another nutritional study conducted by our very own Historian, Joshua, as further evidence of this.
Yours in cycling,
Frank
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Looking pro is like searching for the Holy Grail: you need to be able to distinguish between your African and European swallows. This kind of attention to detail is something on which the Velominati pride themselves. But rather than a subtle upgrade on my bike, my recent progetto has involved upgrading the engine. Since the turn of the year, I have cut from 87kg to below 80kg while maintaining full piston power in the BFGs (take that, weight weenies!). Though still not in top condition, I’ve been blown away by the difference it’s made to my riding. I’m faster, stronger, and able to climb out of the saddle for longer, more intense periods. I love dancing on the pedals up steep hills. Say what you like, but this makes me look more pro (so sayeth I).
At the end of the day, no matter how slick bike, kit, three-point system adherence, etc., that gut bumping against the guns while you ride in the drops is going to be the first betrayal against looking pro (that, or the heaving lungs and the “tactical” decision to gear down). The soft mid-section does not a casually deliberate pose make. Put another way, the sleeker rider is more able to dish the V. While much of the Velominati rhetoric is about appearance, at the end of the day, I’ve read enough on these pages about the attention to performance detail. After a mucky ride, cleaning the chain is more important than polishing the frame. Performance.
So here’s my story””the short and the wide of it. I went through a breeding and blimping phase in the late 1990s. For good measure, my wife and I had a third child in 2008, almost ten years later. I’m a compassionate, new-age kind of husband (more fool me), and I put on close to 10kg for both of the first two. Older and marginally wiser, closer to 5kg for the third. At the peak of my powers””during grad school””I tipped the scales at 102kg. I stand 175cm. Claiming a muscular build only gets one so far. At that kind of weight, the weight of the bike is immaterial. Or, more to the point, shaving a few milligrams off the bike here or there is denial at best””more realistically, lunacy. Over the past decade, I have hovered around a reasonably fit 87kg without really making long-term reductions. Even this past fall, when good weather allowed me to ride consistently right into December, I couldn’t put a dent on lowering the scales.
Winter is not a friendly season. Not for the cyclist in Ontario, anyway. If being off the bike weren’t bad enough, it’s busy time at work, which means I’m an infrequent visitor to the gym. Off the bike and not working out is a bad combination as I am very good at putting on weight; winter becomes a desperate shill game of trying to sustain the fall weight””if not condition””and limit the amount of work necessary to get back into shape in the spring. But this winter has been different. Since Christmas, I have dropped more than 7kg. I’ll spare the pics, but I’m seeing cut abs for the first time since, like, forever. More importantly, the guns remain huge and the definition is awe-inspiring (so sayeth I). For an otherwise sedentary academic in his mid-30s, I’m pleased with the results. This with minimal exercise (on early January and February rides, I was reminded that while weight loss is good, it does not replace good fitness). But form is already on its way and easier to come by at a lighter weight. This might sound like the beginning of one of those late-night ads on TV: I’ve lost 7kg in 9 weeks while not exercising! How did I do it?
Clenbuterol was first synthesized in…
Well, I have been experimenting with supplements, but nothing that would ever run me afoul of the UCI or any other sporting body (especially the Spanish). More on that in a moment, but the emphasis has primarily been on revamping my diet. With a full family in the house, we eat well: sensibly, making healthy choices, not drinking too much, etc. I always thought that my standard diet was not just good, but really good. Starting on December 26, I cut carbs drastically out of my diet. Instead of cereal for breakfast, I switched to bacon and scrambled eggs. Instead of sandwiches for lunch, I switched to beans, meat, and salmon (lots of salsa and guacamole””strangely, this diet consists of much more cholesterol than my previous practice (eggs and avocados), but I’m stronger, fitter, and lighter). No bread. For dinner, while making rice for the kids, I switched to spinach, which really didn’t take long to get used to (especially as I watched the scale show a smaller number on a daily basis). In addition, I stopped eating fruit (high fructose) and cut out dairy. Fructose is exceptionally good at building and storing fat. Dairy: I don’t understand this one as well””milk has a low glycemic index””but it does have a high insulinemic index; I miss my cheese! The higher protein diet has resulted in my not feeling hungry between meals so much, but in those rare instances, raw almonds””not too many: these pack a massive caloric load!””do the trick. Six days a week, I adhere to the above religiously. One day a week, I binge. Big time. The danger with cutting so many carbs and sugars out of one’s diet is that the metabolism can slow, too. Spiking it once a week has the benefit of ensuring that I’m continuing to keep the metabolism high.
My lone concern with cutting so many carbohydrates was that it might inhibit my energy and performance on the bike. While the season is still young and I’m still finding my fitness””and haven’t yet had a chance to get in a ride of more than 60km””I haven’t felt slow or weak. If anything, I’ve had more energy. During intense exercise, it is also possible to take in carbs, since you’re burning them immediately, anyway. So, energy drinks and bars on the bike are still okay. We all likely suffer from any number of mild and undiagnosed food allergies (or annoyances). I can’t pinpoint it, but I feel much better with this diet, suffer from less stomach discomfort, and have more energy.
Then I started popping pills. I’ve begun a fairly standard regimen of Alpha-Lipoic Acid, green tea extract, and garlic””all powerful fat-burners. Four times a day. The last pill-popping stack of the day also includes Policosanol. Also, I’ve been taking extensive levels of Vitamin D. While 1,000 IU is the recommended daily allowance, I’ve been popping more than 4,000 IU a day, combined with Vitamin A & K, which help in Vitamin D absorption. Vitamin D is a wonder-hormone and worth more investigation””not just as a winter supplement. Chances are we all suffer from Vitamin D deficiency, and that can hurt our performance. Vitamin D is crucial in the creation of fast-twitch muscle fibers and overall physical fitness. Some studies also indicate that Vitamin D deficiency can be responsible for what appeared to be chronic injuries in athletes. I ride without a computer and decided not to get a series of tests and measurements taken for before and after comparison, but I regret that now. I’d be very interested to check BMI, Vitamin D levels, and cholesterol, especially.
The inspiration for the diet and supplements came from Tim Ferriss’s book, The Four-Hour Body. At first””and from a professional perspective””I was interested in the concept of self-experimentation and the difference between abstract theories and the practical experimentation he did. But I was also interested in the health and nutritional science behind it. There’s some interesting stuff here, not just on weight loss, but also on muscular development, endurance””hacking the body in general, as Ferriss puts it. Given the tone of the book, I don’t think I’d like Ferriss too much if we ever met. He comes across as too much of an egotistical alpha-dog; but for his former national kick-boxing championship title, I suspect I’d want to beat the snot out of him. But the kid’s done some interesting homework here. And my cycling is reaping the benefits at the moment. If you’d told me a year ago, I would weigh less than 80kg, I would have thought you were delusional. I was pretty fit at 87kg””I still carry enough upper body muscle for three Schlecks””and not particularly soft. But looking back, 7kg is a lot of extra weight to carry around. And for it to come off so quickly…
In all, so much of cycling is about tradition, ceremony, routine, and discipline. Being able to bring that praxis out of the saddle and out of the garage and into the other necessity in life (eating) is an exciting prospect that keeps me closer to the bike. As spring appears to have finally sprung around these parts, I already feel like I’m in early summer form.
This diet is very similar to the peleo diet. I suspect that the reason he’s got more energy is that he’s eating more fats than he’s ever eaten before, which get converted to usable energy faster than carbs do.
Huh, wow. I’m impressed Steampunk, but we’re going to have to start calling you “Clenbuterol of the North” from now on.
Even without before and after numbers, I still think it would be interested for you to follow up with your doctor and see how the diet changes and the addition of supplements has changed your cholesterol, etc.
I’m 182 cm and 81.6 kg, and I have not seen any weight drop so far in 2011 due to cycling – which I’m telling myself (a.k.a lying to myself) is because I’m putting on leg muscle which is offsetting any weight drop. I also struggle with a small man paunch.
In reality I eat carbs almost every day, perhaps both at lunch (sandwiches often) and dinner, as I like rice and pasta dishes. I also love me some bagels. And toast. And rolls. And pizza. Perhaps if I cut carbs it would help… but carbs are so good and tasty! Sigh.
I just might show this to the VMH and give this a shot. Having gained a few KG since the birth of our first in March, I can relate. And having a similar work schedule and life to yours, the not exercising and still eating healthy and dropping weight scene would be right up my alley. I normally retain most of my fitness and don’t gain much over the winter by skiing but this winter it didn’t work out. Thank you Steampunk.
Excellent write-up, I can confirm these methods have worked for me as well. I’m down over 10kg since January and hope to lose another 15kg by next Spring. I’ve been using a mix of Mark Sisson’s ‘Primal Blueprint’ and ‘The Four-Hour Body’ with great results.
Much more scientific and structured than my own weight loss program which goes. 1. Don`t eat chocolate or other snacks. 2. Dont eat until actually hungry. When you do eat dont eat until you burst. This method has got my weight down from 95Kg to 81Kg( at 186 cm) but it seems to have bottomed out now so a bit more thought might be in order.
@Xyverz
I thought carbs converted to energy faster than fats. I thought that was why cyclists like to load up on them before a ride and bonking is running out of carbs. Your body then has to process fats which it cannot do as quickly and so you have less energy ?
Quite happy to stand corrected on this as I dont claim to be any kind of nutrition expert.
Wintertime is the cruelest to cyclists. Other kinds of excercise suck, they all seem like a chore so I don’t do them, occasionally get on the trainer, and then pack on the kilos. I’m working on losing 5-7 kgs right now and I’m experimenting with eating clean which means no processed foods. This also means no white rice, which for a Hapa is a big adjustment (I’m only eating brown rice now, blech). The thing that struck me about this article was that Steampunk avoids fruit! That’s become my go to snack. Maybe I should be replacing it with foods in my diet that are high in omega-3s or maybe I should get in more 3-4 hour rides, that seemed to work just fine last summer.
@ramenvelo
Hapa? Mixed Asian/Pacific Islander?
@Lepidopterist
I could very well be incorrect, but this is my understanding.
@ramenvelo
Yeah, I was very surprised by the exclusion of fruits as well, but forgot to comment about it.
I’m trying to make fruit my go-to snack, as I like bananas and pears (available year-round), and LOVE Washington state cherries during the summer. I’m trying to replace work-time snacking on Trader Joe’s peanut butter filled pretzels, Goldfish crackers (the cheddar ones are like toasted, golden crack), and the like. In my simple mind, I figured fresh fruit is better than processed snacks, even with the sugar content.
Nice job, Steampunk! Seven kilos is a pretty decent amount of weight, especially for someone already riding a bike a fair amount. I’d glad to read that you are feeling, looking, and pedaling better. That’s awesome.
I’ve just hit the 30 plateau and I’m curious to see what it does to my metabolism. I’ve actually lost weight since college, as I was a collegiate athlete and lifted weights while now I mainly cycle, with some calisthenics tossed in here or there.
I don’t think I could handle a diet like that, but who knows in a few years. I have always eaten a variety of foods. The main thing I try to do these days is eat the majority of my carbohydrates early in the day, then taper off as I go along. I’m only 170 cm so I do have to be careful, as even a few kilos kills my RDV V-Locus position.
As far as pills, I’m a daily vitamin guy and that’s it.
Interesting reading, even though I don’t trust historians! (I’m one as well;))
And my spring has been ROUGH – Breyer’s has been on sale for a solid month at the grocery store. Hard to resist half price ice cream!
AND, I didn’t know Jamieson made vitamin A. I thought they were strictly in the vitamin W business.
@Xyverz
You can never win (or even finish) a race on such a diet. Eating normally, only use pills when you know you have a shortage of something and HTFU is much more efficient.
I’ve been on a similar quest with similar numbers 227lbs (103kg) from a racing weight of 172lbs (78kg), 5′ 10″ (178cm), 42 years old (6 dog years).
4-5 years ago I dropped from 227 (103) to 172 (78) like that, no cycling, just a diet and a few months, easy as pie.
Well each year after that I put on a few only to find myself back at 195, OOPS.
Last year started cycling and dropped to 186 where I stuck for like 7 months and no matter what I did NOTHING would get me down an ounce.
A few weeks ago, reduced a lot of the carbs and dropped right to 182 in a week, where I still am (thanks to my wife’s high carb menu this last week). So I’m hoping this is the final word.
I still have 10 to go and I’m just not sure it will ever come.
FWIW re vitamin D, the jury is still out on some of the benefits which are being fairly rigorously tested down under. Because of all you fossil fuel burners in the northern hemisphere, we suntanned southern bronzed gods have been living under a hole in the ozone layer for a few decades. I can remember halcyon days where being in the sun would NOT lead to third degree burns, nausea and a few days inside on the couch. Because of the fierceness of the sun, and the effective ‘education’ on sun safety down here, some people are ironically short on vitamin D from the sun. The amounts are tiny compared to what SP is taking, but us southerners are a very good test group for how a shortage of vitamin D affects health. Of course there’s a bun fight among academics over what causes what, and the evil sunscreen lobby. (?!?) I guess watch this space, but it is interesting over what some people think are caused by Vitamin D deficiency – bone density, anaemia, immune system problems, all sorts, but all of which are still to be proven.
one way to cut weight, is burn off those delicious foamy calories from your favorite beer, following the techniques of the chinese super-high cadence, as demonstrated below…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAxgsKgs-_w&feature=player_embedded]
Well done on the weight loss – but buddy, you lost me when u mentioned cholesterol and avocados. Avos contain NO cholesterol – u need animal fat for that.
Giving up fruit ain’t a long term solution my friend.
Moderation in everything, including moderation. A brother of mine is a physician specializing in blood pressure and related problems – ie he deals with a lot of fat fuckers. His recommendation for losing weight – eat a balanced but reduced diet. Keep reducing volume until you start seeing results. “but doc I only eat a lettuce leaf a day and I still put on weight”. Then eat half a leaf a day. No fat people walked out of POW camps… Volume is the key
@Paco
That may be true, but I’ll tell you from experience that I’ve had great success in the past with low-carb diets and healthy weight loss. The fats in the diet gave the energy to succeed with my exercise (at the time, I was rock climbing 3+ days per week at my local rockgym for about 3-4 hours a night), and the lack of carbs meant I could stuff myself to the gills at lunch and never suffer from carb-coma upon returning to work.
YMMV, of course.
I’ve been stuck at 180-185 for the last six weeks after starting my weight loss 16 months ago at 265 lbs. I’d be happy if I never lost another pound – if only the paunch I still have would finally disappear. It’s because of this that I’ve contemplated going to a reduced-carb diet again. I figure once I lose the gut, I can start bringing carbs back in, proportional to the amount of cycling I can get in. =)
Nice work, Steampunk.
Diets are like arseholes – everyone’s got one. The common ground in the diet world is discipline. Every regime is based on calorie defecit – burn more than you ingest – but if you can’t stick to your regime…If you really want to get lean, it had better be pretty fucken high on your list of priorities.
Sugar or more specifically, fructose, is nasty shit, especially without fibre. Check out a book called Sweet Poison. Fructose has entered our diets with stealth and in massive increases since the 60’s. Empty carbs but more importantly it messes with our natural appetite comtrol. Fruit is OK as long as its in moderation and with fibre – ie the whole fruit – juice is nasty.
What about beer Steampunk? MMmmmmm, beeeerr.
Inspirational!
@Xyverz
Your “healthy weight loss” has been achieved by upping your fats?? Hmm, not sure that’s too healthy. Think most of those diets like the Atkins etc. have been de-bunked as being terribly damaging if taken on long term.
@all
Did you know that every time a male cyclist writes something about dieting techniques, a HTFU angel falls from the sky?
I was thinking something similar re upping fats and atkins, that guy didn’t seem too healthy before he kicked it. Nutritionalists all bang the same drum, which is the one you bought up earlier, moderation.
I prefer to think that the man with the hammer books a visit rather than HTFU angels falling from the sky. Cos you know, the angels wouldd only kick our arse for losing their place in the paceline.
Fats have gotten a bad rap, check out the health of the people who eat blubber all day.
Back about 50 years ago when people started studying heart disease and it’s causes, there were two candidates, saturated fats and refined sugars. For no good reason whatsoever “they” decided that saturated fats were the culprit, there was ample evidence at the time and that evidence is still evident today that sugars appear to cause more problems than fats.
I’d rather hear a male cyclist talk about how he took weight off the engine through discipline and hard work and made himself stronger and faster in the process, than about how he dropped $2,500 on a set of carbon wheels that saved .5 kg of rational weight.
One took a lot of effort and hard work, which is worth respect. The other simply takes a fat wallet.
@mcsqueak
Er, rotational weight.
I also just got an idea for a brilliant fake Photoshop. Think of all of the covers of women’s dieting/glamor/trend magazines, but in the place of the usual toned, sexy women is a cyclist surrounded by catchy headlines. Wait, I guess most cycling mags are ALREADY like that…
@mcsqueak
+1.
My riding alter ego/evil twin is nicknamed funcrusher 3000, which requires a certain heft. Losing weight isn’t really in his MO.
@heath
Right you are, Ken!
Steampunk, I ordered the book (yes, I am a sucker), make sure they send you the commission.
@jnunberg
Im a sucker for books like this. In general I lead a unstructured life, so a book like this could help me think things out.
How about sleep, Steamer? I’ve read that there is considerable evidence that sleep deprivation is a significant contributor to weight gain (Breeding and Blimping, anyone?) but am not sure if that means getting enough sleep should assist with weight loss. Would be excellent if it did…
She Who Must be Obeyed: “Why are you lying in bed at 11am on a Saturday morning?”
Me: “It’s my weight-loss program, dear. I’m doing it for you. Please close the door on your way out.”
170.2 cm, 63.5 kg and I eat carbs all the time. But, I limit my amount at night time or on days that I don’t ride at all. I personally think your diet sounds too much like an atkins diet which is a horrible for anyone doing endurance athletics. Good quality carbs like veggies, fruits and whole grains are our fuel, cutting them will ultimately affect your performance greatly. Eating carbs pre-ride, mid-ride and just after ride (also protein at a 4:1 ratio post ride) is very important to fueling muscles and keeping up glycogen stores in muscle tissue. The reason you feel less hungry is most likely because of your replacing carbs with good quality lipids. Lipids will satisfy hunger but despite previous comments, they do not turn into fuel quicker or more efficiently than carbs. A carbohydrate molecule is much closer to our bodies usable fuel, glucose. Breaking the storng carbon bonds of a hydrocarbon (aka lipids) takes an immense amount of energy, energy that could be being ulilized to carry your ass up that hill. All in all, with my 6 years thus far in medicine…carbs are not the enemy of such athletes as The Velominati.
Timely article as we hit the first day of winter in this part of the world. Inspired to make some changes, will miss the cheese & shiraz! How do the French do it?
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.
@mcsqueak
Bang on!
@Marko
Exactly. But in my case half-Japanese.
And for those of you claiming that the effectiveness of high protein/fat diets have been debunked and are damaging, well, it turns out it’s not so simple. Here’s an article from today’s NY Times saying that high fat diets can actually help you drop weight without affecting your health.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/01/eating-fat-staying-lean/
@ramenvelo
IMHO that article reeks. You have the Aitkins name dropped twice in the opening paragraphs, a word perfect brand title,(aitkins new life etc) the expert cited in the opening paragraph lost weight on an unnamed low carb high fat diet in the last paragraph, the opposing opinions are sandwiched between said expert, and don’t include much detail or explanation, the caveats are significant, it smacks all over of advocacy research.
Sorry to get all angsty but seriously. All that article says is that in the absence of a control group one group of people on a calorie controlled diet lost weight faster than the other. If smoking was introduced it would probably help them lose weight too.
@minion
All I wanted to say it that there is a debate going on and there are no simple answers. The thinking that the calories-in < calories-burned=weight loss is not true for everyone. There are no silver bullets, but different strategies work for different people. Look at Steampunk's diet, does it appear to be similar to this one? Is it working for him?
Simple calorie restriction works only so far. Calories are not equal – try eating a Big Mac and fries worth of calories in broccoli. You’ll sh*t green.
If you want to lose fat (not weight) in a healthy way, get stronger, and stay lean, low carb and high protein is the way to go for most people – old info to the weightlifting bunch. My diet has been low carb for about seven years. Commuting daily and weekend rides have allowed me to add carbs back in – oatmeal every morning for the first two meals – but I try to stay away from them after lunch. Longer weekend rides and a need to restore glycogen mean a controlled cheat day (or day-and-a-half). A carb cycling diet I think works well for weekend warriors. Check strength sites like t-nation.com for diet information and ideas and modify them for your activities.
Keep a food log. You can track stuff with sites like fitday.com. Trying to eat 2500 clean calories with few carbs and enough fiber or a 40/40/20 (p/c/f) split over six meals takes planning. You’ll adapt quickly though and get a feel for how your body reacts and how your diet affects your performance. It gets easy quickly.
Nothing like hearing a bunch of guys whose bib shorts are girdles talking about getting new wheels or a stem to save a few hundred grams. Hey, if your bodyfat% is more than the weight of your bike in pounds, ride more, and eat and spend less.
@ramenvelo
Yeah I recognise that, my problem was with the article and how it was written and presented. I honestly don’t give a crap what people eat, and the basic premise of the Aitkins diet is a scientific fact. A spade is a spade as far as I’m concerned, and that article was a pig dressed up as a duck. You’ll know the difference when it craps on your shoes.
Well done Steampunk.
Long time lurker. You see I’m predominantly a mountain biker. I have a roadie I love, a litespeed team, I have 3 mountainbikes and a cruiser. I call myself a cyclist. I ride whatever or whenever. I also found Tim Ferriss (AKA self promoting wanker) through my wife who was starting the diet via a heap of her twitter friends. She is in the web content industry. I joined in ‘for support’. Hey a happy wife is a happy wife. I went from mid (suuure) 90kg to 80 kg even in 3 months. Same xmas starting point. I am currently 81kg, leaner and fitter than ever. Mid 40’s. Father etc as with steamo.
I totally agree with the increase in ability after the weight reduction. 15kg is a huge amount less to climb with and my fitness has rolled on better and better. Some regular selective gym work has added lean muscle while I continue to reduce bodyfat. It is a total transformation. Please don’t delete me as spam as I push the V and love my bikes n=5!
If you wanna lean off and lose weight and vastly improve your riding give it a go!
Right on Steampunk!
OK, first off I didn’t have time to read every single comment here, but I did see a lot of good thinking and ideas. Throwing my two cents in, and sorry if I’m repeating what someone else has said.
Also, though strong opinion, that’s what this is. Opinion. Just mine. Based on my experience (but also observation of like, uh, everybody else in the world, lol – who DOESN’T feel like they need to lose weight?). I’m not saying I have THE answer(s) for everyone or even anyone else. I’m throwing this out here to be digested along with all the other info here. I blab, you decide! OK, here goes.
“DIETS” DON’T WORK. You can’t eat one way, lose weight, and then go back to eating the way you used to! There is NOT a quick magic fix. I really encourage anyone willing to, to think about that. It’s easy to say ok, forget diets, I’m going to just start eating “healthy,” (maybe learn what that is), watch my calories in vs calories out, and do that for the rest of my life… which is an improvement over thinking in the “diet” mode, and more or less what will end up happening on it’s own, if you can tap into it. But if it was that easy, why is it so hard for people to do??? I dunno about anyone else, but I have better things to do than obsess about what I can/should be eating, let alone calculating calories.
I went through some fairly serious eating disorder crap a ways before I started cycling, tried dieting and “just eating healthy,” and my weight went up and down when I began riding and into some of my serious racing… it was a book with a simple (not EASY, but simple, philolsophy) that originally inspired me down a path of change, and I haven’t had weight/muscle/fat issues in decades. And besides being muscular and lean for cycling, some of you who’ve seen some other posts of mine know the way my body looks and the shape I’m in is an integral part of my career.
Basically, the author said: eat (only) when you are hungry and eat what you really want, and stop eating when you aren’t hungry. That’s it.
I eat whatever the hell I want. REALLY want, which means what my body wants, not my brain, and teaching brain and body to get in sync was what took time… your body knows what and how much it needs. And frankly sometimes that’s cookies or a snickers bar or some ice cream or a filet mignon. I eat when I’m hungry, and stop eating when I’m not hungry (not when I’m stuffed!).
End of story. No counting calories, no thinking about how much protein vs carbs vs this fat vs that fat, no trying magic nutrients or supplements.
Caveat – somewhat from food problems when I was young, and other than that I’m not sure where, the way I was raised maybe: I guess I’m relatively knowledgeable about nutrition in general – fats vs carbs vs proteins, fiber, nutrients, calories and what they’re used for, fat vs muscle in your body, yadda yadda; so that info is in my noggin as options… if your body wants to eat a head of broccoli but you aren’t used to eating vegetables, you might not recognize the desire for broccoli. But I no longer actually think about this stuff. It’s just “I feel like….” and eat it. I’m hungry more often when I’m riding harder, so I eat more. Sometimes I don’t hear right and eat the wrong crap and feel gross later. No biggie. I go through cycles, sometimes over periods of a year or two, of eating some weird stuff — without thinking about it. It’s just what felt right.
Don’t get me wrong, there can be complex psychological garbage mixed up with “food”, and changing over to be able to hear and TRUST your body can take a long time, and real work (the book I mentioned has exercises. Thinking exercises, no meal plans or suggested foods or anything like that) — I think it’s one of those things you never stop learning, listening to your body. But it’s worth it. Instead of fighting a war against your own being, against cravings for “forbidden” or “unhealthy” foods, you end up on the same team.
Get those summer V skinsuits out, wouldjya? For those of us who CAN wear them??!
@Karolinka
What do I do when my body says ‘Beer, I need BEER’? Coz it says that a lot…
@G’phant
If you’re hungry, go drink beer until you aren’t hungry! Or drink it with whatever else your body wants, and stop all ingesting as per above when you are no longer hungry! If you’re not hungry, no beer! Nothing wrong with beer… good beer, anyway…
sa
@G’phant
SWMBO must be a busy woman.
@Karolinka
Thanks for sharing. This is a conversation where common sense is often overlooked because of buy in to a diet plan or concept that benefits someone else more than it benefits you/the person on the diet.
BTW what wheels are those?
@Karolinka
You had me – right up to the bit about if I’m not hungry then no beer. (Actually I jest. I dropped about 17 kg by taking up cycling, watching what I ate and, ‘er, dropping beer. But I can’t say I liked the no beer part.)
I know what I should eat, especially if I want a snack. It’s just that I prefer to eat cake. And Pie. And things of caramel stuffed full of caramel.
I should eat an apple. I find it hard to bring myself to do that.
There is a lot of “myth” mixed-up in diets and I assume that most of us, or at least those who have raced at one time or another will have been on a “diet”. But it as much about the type of riding and how we ride as about how we eat and perhaps that’s where the focus should be.
How many of us go riding with energy drink and food, even if we are riding less than two hours? Or how many rely on training on a turbo? Nothing compares to a good few hours in the saddle to help with the weight loss programme because you simply can’t consume enough calories to replace the 3000+ you have lost in that four-hour ride through the hills. Sit on a turbo for 30 minutes and you might burn 500 calories, that is nothing a good meal or two slices of bread won’t replace.
There is no point in starving the body of calories as it will adapt and as soon as a few extra calories arrive they will be stored as fat. An old mate used to have diet “issues”, in that he would eat almost nothing, ride lots and so lose weight quickly. then his head would fall off, he’d binge for a weekend and pile on the kg’s.
I just ate a biscuit.
Posts too long to read after a big night on the gas now trying to get the young fella to sleep. Seriously please Rule #5 it – the rest will take care of itself – and no long posts. Noone reads ’em
Find the broken ones – no calories!