I train 5 times a week (one long run (8 miles), one speed work session, one 5/6 mile run, plus swimming and strength work 5 times a week. I'm working up to a half-marathon, and I'm desperately trying to lose weight (I'm 5'4" and about 11 stone) but despite eating less than 1500 calories a day, I'm losing very little weight. I'm permanently hungry, and suffer from low blood sugar if I'm not very careful. Any advice?
Amanda
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Strange sounding advice possibly, but your body may have gone into starvation mode, as you are burning so many more calories than you are eating. You burn approximately 100 calories per mile you run, and burn about 1500 calories per day just existing. This means that on your 8 mile day, you are burning 2300 calories but only taking in 1500 (or less?). This means your "net" intake is only 800 calories. From memory (someone correct me if I'm wrong), the body goes into starvation mode at 1000 net calories or less. It is now holding onto fat stores as it assumes that you cannot find sufficient food.
You are definitely not eating enough. That's jsut about enough to keep your body and organs working correctly. Doesn't cater for all the exercise you are doing. I recently had the same problem. My food intake was upp'd and I started losing weight again.....
You also will start flagging if you don't up your food intake.
This is why I go on and on and on and on about fat burning. Lower the intensity and have more HEALTHY fats (Omega 3& 6) in the diet and you will encourage the body to burn a higher percentage of fat. CLA also helps.
What this then does is lower your requirement of carbs. So you can eat less. Just make sure that you spread your lower amount of carbs t/out the day, but especially in morning, after and during exercise. HCA is VERY helpful as it postpones carb absorption thus making it available to the body for a longer period of time between meals.
This is the ONLY way you can have a lo-cal diet without lowering BMR, IMHO.
4st:1lb and counting... :-)
Amanda
Based on this and an average of 60mins 'Hard' exersize per day gives a requiremnt of 1980kcals per day
Id say eat 500 kcals less than this (1400kcals) per day to loose about 1 lb per week
Amanda
From what I understand, that's why weight-training can help people to lose weight, especially if they've not done something like that before. Muscle requires more cals to just 'be' that fat, so by increaseing the amount of muscle in your body you'll also increase your BMR.
Only skim-read Pantmans bit on the last page (well, I'm at work and s'posed to be busy!), but it's stuck in my head now so I'm off to read it properly now!
Take a read of this report:
HCA-Citrimax
On the subject of BMR (which I know what it means), a sports scientist once told me that BMR was basically pre-set (at birth) and that there wasn't in fact alot you could do to change it.
Amanda
VERY STRANGE RESEARCH!!!!
You say you are losing very little weight - but so long as you are losing some I wouldn't worry. My partner has been trying to shed a stone for the last 18 months - and she just about has - but it has taken that long.
Eat healthily and exercise and you will lose weight - if you are hungry eat something healthy like an apple.
I know when I lived in Hong Kong for a bit all the guys that worked on the docks near where I stayed had phsyiques like Bruce Lee - hard work and not too much junk food does the trick.
0.5kg of muscle burns up to 50kcals per day. So adding 0.5kg of muscle would use up to 350kcals per week
If you loose .5kg of fat and gain .5kg of muscle this is considered a 1kg improvement in body compostion ...
But adding muscle is hard work - ask any body builder
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0452283477/qid=1061675055/026-9994689-1557262
You cant eat like a piggy either!
Also, do your clothes fit better?
Patouka, you could have something there
Clothes deffo different
los 10llb since FLM
But still v overweight by the scales
Not dieting AT ALL, BTW
Amanda
Your body needs food to keep your metabolism up so that it is constantly burning and not sat idol...
This doen't even mean excluding the rubbish food out either - you can eat anything - in moderation...
Breakfast
Mid morning snack - fruit ect
Lunch ( best time to get your carbs in cos then you have the rest of the day to burn them off).
Afternoon snack - yoghurt, fruit
Evening Meal
This should help you lose weight and then maintain a steady loss.
And don't forget your fluids.... plenty of water.
You could have already done damage to your body by doing training with only 1500 cals a day...
good luck with the weight loss. its very sensible going to see a nutritionist. i wish i had seen one when i wanted to loose weight. however i didnt and practically stopped eating, trained too hard and i now have osteoporosis and havent menstruated for 2 years and im only 21. my eating is getting better and i am beginning a nutrition degree in september so i can educate and help people in a similar situation.
whatever happens though amanda keep eating. do not stop as the minute you stop is the minute the problems start!
eat little and often is the best advice i can give you as it stops you bloating up. also eat lots of fruit and veg and eat whole grain foods such as brown rice. also lots of fibre and water and oily fish to ensure you get your essential fatty acids.
good luck and best regards!
It's getting annoying!
I workout everyday. 6 days intensively and 3 of those twice a day!
I eat around 1700-1800 kcal a daty of the right types of wholegrain food what else can I DO!