Weight loss

Hi

I wonder if anyone can give me some advice please.

I run 10k usually twice a week and do 2 spin classes twice a week as well.

I have been following the  the Slimming World plan since the end of April last year, and have lost 1 stone 5 pund since then.

My problem is that I am really truggling to lose anymore weight and have been bouncing aroud the same weight mark since after christmas.  I need to lose one more stone.

Any suggestions on how I can shift more weight??!

 

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Comments

  • grodergroder ✭✭✭

    I eat very healthily, dont see how I can eat less!

  • MillsyMillsy ✭✭✭
    Something must be wrong if you are not losing any weight.

    If you don't think you can eat any less then you may have to do a bit more exercise.
  • grodergroder ✭✭✭

    I am in the gym 4 evenings out of 7, dont have time for any more.

  • skottyskotty ✭✭✭
    groder wrote (see)

    I am in the gym 4 evenings out of 7, dont have time for any more.

    work harder while you are there.

  • MillsyMillsy ✭✭✭
    I'm sorry but is this a joke?

    What sort of advice were you after?

    If you want to lose weight you have to put less energy in and burn more off.

    It worked for me anyway.
  • If you are following slimming world - is it still unlimited pasta/potatoes/rice?

     

     

    This might be the problem.

     

    Personally I am more inclined to recommend calorie counting using something like Myfitnesspal    You can put your exericise in and make sure your macronutrient ratios are sensible. You might need more protein or more fat etc etc than something like slimming world will give you.  Of course the closer you get to a healthy weight - the harder it gets and the more you have to faff around with protein/carb/fat combo's to find the one that suits you the best. Keeps you full while still supporting your training AND allowing a small fat loss.

     

     

    ( I did slimming world after my second baby - managed to struggle to get 10 lbs off - switched to weight watchers and lost the last 2 stone much more easily - different things suit different people)

  • When you say you need to lose another stone, says who? Is that to reach a healthy BMI or something like that?

    Do you keep a food diary on slimming world? Feel free to message me with it if you like and I'll compare it to my intake while I've been losing weight. I'm no expert but after years of trying I've cracked my weight problem big time the last 6 months.

  • PG3PG3 ✭✭✭

    You could try logging your food on the free app - myfitnesspal. That should tell you if you are eating too many calories.  I suspect you are.

  • Nessie73Nessie73 ✭✭✭

    With the running, or any other form of exercise, you will plateau unless you mix it up and change it around regularly.  Weight loss stops.  I found this and in fact gradually started putting on weight over a fairly long period of time, despite eating healthily and running 4 times a week. I joined Weight Watchers at Xmas and I follow the plan. I've lost nearly a stone with a few more pounds to lose until I will feel at a good running weight. It does work but it's boring counting points / tracking.  For me, that bit really helped though because I was not being conscious of my (healthy) snacking in the evenings and at weekends, which was obviously causing me to gradually gain weight.  Tracking all my food on WW has really helped me get some self-discipline back.

    Agree with Rob though- what is your weight now? Are you trying to lose too much?? Personally my aim is to be around the middle of my healthy BMI, and I was a bit over...

    HTH

  • What are you doing in the gym ? Building up muscle or using the running machine ? Personally I'd get out of the gym and take to the roads. Worked for me as I've taken off two stone.

  • Groder if you are following slimming world then there will be a lot of 'free foods'  Although they are free they are not necessarily healthy.  Are you sure you're not being fooled into thinking they dont count as they are on the free list ?  

    Some of my family have done really well on SW but they had a lot to lose.  I joined (about 12lb over weight ) and put on weight every week for 3 weeks.  If you dont have much to lose you may need to cut down your portions considerably or consider monitoring your intake in a different way.

  • Would help to know what weight your and your height.  Maybe you're actually at your ideal weight now and you just don't know it.

    I've been told by many people that they eat healthily then i've gradually understood their diet and it's anything but healthy.

    What's a very typical, very normal day for you, food wise?  Be honest with yourself.  Don't just include meals, include drinks and snakcs as well.  If you steal a few crisps from a mate at work, don't dismiss that because you didn't have a bag.  It all adds.

  • Do you do any weight training when in the gym? If not you should add that rather than just do cardio work. Also try HIIT

  • Nose NowtNose Nowt ✭✭✭

     

    Ploddersoftheworldunite wrote (see)

    What are you doing in the gym ? Building up muscle or using the running machine ? Personally I'd get out of the gym and take to the roads. Worked for me as I've taken off two stone.

    She says she runs 10K twice a week and does 2 spin classes... so I guess that is her 4 visits.  Whilst I personally agree that the roads are better than the gym, you have to think that her exercise regime cant be really criticised. 

    The problem is, as others have said, more likely to  be on the intake side.  It's so easy to have an extra Riveta or slice of wholemeal toast...    It it pretty frightening how many calories there are in any bread... including wholemeal.  Often 100 calories a slice - before you put any spread on it.  I admit to often snacking on 3 slices of toast....  and roughly speaking, for every slice of toast I have, it's another mile run needed.  Or for one extra Rivita... it's one extra km that needs to be run.

  • mikasamikasa ✭✭✭

    I heard somewhere that losing weight was about 70% food and 30% exercise. You can lose weight without exercising but you might not lose weight if you think exercise gives you the right to eat normally/what ever you want. Doing exercise 4 times a week for about an hour isn't actually that much. Yes, agreed, more than some/most people do. What about the rest of the time? Is your work sedentary like office work where you sit at a desk all day and hardly move and what do you do in the evenings?

    Good luck with dropping that last bit of weight, I'm sure you'll do it when you find out why you're stuck.

  • Alsoran2Alsoran2 ✭✭✭

    I also don't find running or exercise nearly as effective for weight loss as I once thought. Being extremely careful with your eating must be the main part of it, which must be where I fail. Having said that I'm all for regular exercise for general health; and it's also true that if you build up some muscle by using dumb bells, doing press ups and other work in the gym the muscle you've gained will help to burn off calories.
    Just returned from a 4.4 miles run, but then ate a few crisps that happened to be on a plate because of a visitor. So the calories burnt on my run have probably been cancelled out already!  

  • Two things from my perspective.

    1. Weight loss is broadly a simple calculation. Calories in minus calories burned needs to be a negative number, ideally 1000-3000 per week for someone wishing to lose 'a bit'

    2. Refined carbs (pasta, rice, bread, potatoes, noodles, sugar etc) are bad for you so limit them.

    Read 'The Paleo Diet for Athletes' by Cordain - it's amazing. Having lost 5 stone through running over 8-10 years, I lost another stone on this in 3 months after about 3 years of plateauing. Never felt hungry or tire, and it completely blows the theory of carb oading out of the window.

  • image yeah that pretty much sums it up

  • Dut DF3 if you need 2500 calories ish a day to maintain your weight, you now need 3,600 to maintain given your run. So you can actually eat an 1100 calorie KFC for breakfast, lunch and dinner and still have  a calorie deficit of 300 calories for the day - have that deficit every day and you should lose a bit less than a pound for the week.

    Massively oversimplifying things, of course, but then calories alone is a massive oversimplification. Just one that usually works for me.

  • I think many people under-estimate how sedentary their lives really are.

    As someone mentioned earlier, 4 x 1hour of exercise per week isn't very much at all, if the rest of your day is spent doing an office job and driving to and from work.

    It's great for general fitness, but in the scheme of things, doesn't contribute a huge amount to weight loss unless you're also being pretty strict with food intake.

  • grodergroder ✭✭✭

    Thanks everyone

    Just to clarify I am 40 years old, 5.5 tall and weigh 11 stone 10 pound.

  • Not an expert on this at all, but this worked for me - i started running and lost weight initially and then just sort of reached a plateau. I found that by changing my training to involve interval work at a fairly high intensity shifted stubborn weight rather than running consistantly at a steady pace over a long distance. I found hill sprinting did for me but the obvious downsides are that if you do it too often you are quite likely to injure yourself and secondly it's bloody hard. It seems to give fat nowhere to hide, I managed to shift my love handles doing this.

  • Alsoran2Alsoran2 ✭✭✭

    Demon Barber - do you mean running shortish stretches uphill as fast as you can? Uphill interval training? If you come down carefully I don't think it is all that likely to injure you. Running fast downhill is far more dangerous, I'd say, because of the increased impact on the joints. 
    I'd agree that the body seems to get used to longish steady running, and after a while you hardly seem to lose any weight at all. And of course, a couple of cream buns will cancel the whole thing out anyway! So I believe that extreme care with eating is crucial.

  • Alsoran2Alsoran2 ✭✭✭

    David Falconer - I'm not skinny! I'm only 5' 4.5" but weigh 10 st. 10 lbs. That's not skinny. Sadly, I don't find running is making a blind bit of difference. However, I suppose it must be helping a little bit.
    Adding some muscle mass would help, but that means sticking at dumb bell exercises, etc. very regularly - something which I always fail to do. Muscle burns calories.

  • groder wrote (see)

    Thanks everyone

    Just to clarify I am 40 years old, 5.5 tall and weigh 11 stone 10 pound.


    Ok, so assuming you aren't a body builder, i'd say you probably are a stone or two heavier than you could be.  I'm 6ft 1" and around 11 stone but I have the reverse problem to you.  I struggle to prevent myself losing weight as my miles grow.  This is not down to some magic metabolism I have or being "naturally thin" (no such thing exists) it's because I hate junk food and drink sensible enough levels of booze.  I don't have a monster appetite so 3 "square meals" a day is usually enough for me (so I now force myself to graze on nuts and seeds to keep the weight on). 

    That's why I question whether you really do eat as healthily as you think.  Even then, you may eat healthily but not low in calories.  Nuts, seeds and oily fish are all fabulously good for you and definitely healthy food.  They are all also extraordinarily high in calories.  Healthy does not always mean low calorie.

    The only sure-fire way to do it is to start to properly log approximate calorific values of all food and drink (including snacks of all types) and how much you should expect to burn off for a person of your size and then subtract the rough calories you are burning from exercise.  If you are still in positive calories, do more and eat less/better.  If you are in negative calories, you'll lose weight.  If you are in negative calories and still gaining weight - your calculations are wrong so do even more and eat even less or do the maths work againimage

    Good luck!

     

     

     

     

  • WombleWomble ✭✭✭
    It is possible to eat healthily and over-eat at the same time. I know - it's my excuse! My own recent experience - lost 5kg+ recently by following a STAR programme for improving fitness created by my Polar FT80 hrm. Small adjustment to eating recently, cutting down on snacks. But basically, work hard and watch what you eat.
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