calories while training

yoplait311

Hi All,
I'm new to the group and have a question regarding running/training and CICO.
I'm working hard to drop some excess weight (10lbs or so). I'm a competitive runner, and want to be lean for racing in the spring.
Anyhow... I often struggle with wanting to restrict calories too much too soon, and create huge energy deficits - setting myself up to struggle during training and/or recovery. Worse yet, too large a deficit can create binge tendencies, which are no good!
I'm curious if anyone would like to open my diary and check out the past few days or so. I'm losing weight slowly, much slower than MFP predicts, which is OK - but I'm wondering if I should be fueling more.
I run around 40-50 miles per week, in addition to a few swims and strength training.
I set up MFP as "sedentary" with a goal to drop 1 lb a week. From this, I have a daily calorie goal of 1250. I usually eat back most (75%) of my exercise calories.

Regardless, any feedback or suggestions are appreciated.
Thanks and happy running!

lporter229

Weight loss in conjunction with training can be a tricky thing. I have found that I do much better with a TDEE approach because it gives me a more consistent supply of fuel throughout the week and I tend to eat healthier because I am not filling up on junk food if I have a huge calorie surplus. But that 's just personal preference.

Even if you are eating back most of your calories, dropping a pound per week may just be too ambitious. If you haven't already done so, I would suggest checking out Matt Fitzgerald's "Racing Weight". It specifically focuses on weight loss for maximum performance.

KathleenKP

MFP is probably VERY overcalculating your calorie burn, which is why you are losing slower than they suggest you should. Garmin does it, too. TDEE doesn't work for me. (It overestimates.) For me, I simply don't burn what those calculators think I should. Which makes sense - how can my body use 600-800 calories in an hour of movement, but only need 1200 calories for the other 23 hours of a day?

I have struggled with this for a couple years now. And I gained weight while training for a Half-Ironman. I was eating less than TDEE based on BodPod measurements. Less than what Garmin thought I was burning. (Actually, significantly less than any of the calculators told me.) I'm meticulous on weighing and logging and I have professionally calibrated my scale.

I'm trying now to learn how to eat by hunger. The problem is that I can tell my calorie burn is different on different days, so it's hard to predict. But when I start getting really hungry, regardless of what I am logging, I'm going to lose weight.

I ran across this today from a cookbook for athletes by Biju Thomas and Allen Lim:

"As a general rule of thumb, when you're in a period when you're not training or are training very little, it's okay to be hungry. When you are training, be a little hungry. And when you're getting close to a major competition or even when you are competing, make sure that you aren't hungry."

It sounds like you are already doing a lot of training, so you should only be a "little hungry" = where you currently are since you are losing (but slowly)?? If you want to lose weight faster, you probably need to cut back on the training. It might be only an hour or two that you need to cut back. (It looks like you have 10+ hours per week now.)

MobyCarp

KathleenKP wrote: »

MFP is probably VERY overcalculating your calorie burn, which is why you are losing slower than they suggest you should. Garmin does it, too. TDEE doesn't work for me. (It overestimates.) For me, I simply don't burn what those calculators think I should. Which makes sense - how can my body use 600-800 calories in an hour of movement, but only need 1200 calories for the other 23 hours of a day?

I agree that practically all calorie burn estimates are high; that is the financial incentive the people who design the estimates have. But the more important concept is, they're *estimates*. And your base metabolism rate calories burn number is an estimate, too. Even the best estimates will be based on broad averages, and you may not be close to the average.

That's fine for weight loss, if you're close enough to the estimate. If you're targeting a 500 calorie deficit per day, and the figures are off by 250 calories, your planned loss of 1 lb. per week becomes 0.5 or 1.5 lbs. in practice. No big deal, you get there. Then you go into maintenance, and the game changes. Being persistently off by 250 calories per day when you're targeting a net zero means you're trending up or down by a half pound per week. That's a 26 lb. per year change, which doesn't look like maintenance.

As it turns out, I burn more calories than the canned estimates. When I eat the calories I know I need to eat to maintain, MFP tells me I'm going to gain weight in 5 weeks. If I eat what MFP says I need to eat to maintain, I will lose weight. So, what to do? I ignore what MFP says, weigh myself daily, and watch the trend. If my weight starts trending down, I adjust my calories up and vice versa.

I don't directly eat the calories back. I would never be comfortable eating an extra 1200 calories on a long run day. But I do need to eat more when I run distances. I settled, for now, on eating an extra 100 calories per 5 miles I run. That essentially lets me take a gel every 5 miles and still eat as much real food as I would on a day off running, plus a kicker if I don't use that many gels. I still periodically need to adjust my base calories up or down. Sometimes I can see a reason, like when a stress fracture moved me from running 30 miles a week to not running at all between one day and the next. Other times, I see a need to adjust but can't identify anything about what I'm doing that caused that need to adjust. I deal with it.

I know I'm eating more on rest days than those particular days burn, and less on long run days than those days burn. I don't know precisely how much more or less, and I'm okay with that as long as I can keep the weight trending sideways.

I'm pretty sure I could use the same methods to make my weight trend down slowly, but I don't really want to weigh a whole lot less than I do right now.

yoplait311

I use a Garmin HRM to calculate calorie burn and it seems accurate to me. For example, an easy 5 mile run will burn around 450 calories. A hard 5 mile run, with tempo or speed work, will burn 550. I'm not sure that I should be eating less than 1400 calories a day while running 50 miles a week.

yoplait311

Also, my last BodPod test analyzed my BMR at 1850.

From the reply's so far, it seems as thought dropping weight while training is highly individual.

3dogsrunning

@yoplait311 - you may be interested in the book Racing Weight. it is targeted towards competitive distance athletes and how to eat/reaching ideal racing weight.

The_Enginerd

yoplait311 wrote: »

I use a Garmin HRM to calculate calorie burn and it seems accurate to me. For example, an easy 5 mile run will burn around 450 calories. A hard 5 mile run, with tempo or speed work, will burn 550. I'm not sure that I should be eating less than 1400 calories a day while running 50 miles a week.

Any HRM, even a higher quality one where you can customize you VO2MAX and resting and max HR, is basing it's calorie burns off of an algorithm that correlates calories burned to HR. Your HR can be affected by other reasons not accounted for by the HRM, such as weather, recovery, etc., that will thrown that correlation off. I've had calorie burns be 40% high when running in high temperatures in sun versus the same exact run in cool temperatures in the evening. Regardless of speed, calories burned/distance is pretty constant during a run. The formula: Net Calories Burned = (weight in lbs) x (distance in miles) x 0.63 should be pretty close.

I also noticed you have a Garmin Connect calories adjustment, so I'm guessing your Garmin has an activity tracker built into it and gives you daily adjustments based on that. I've seen those be problematic as well.

yoplait311 wrote: »

Also, my last BodPod test analyzed my BMR at 1850.

From the reply's so far, it seems as thought dropping weight while training is highly individual.

The BodPod does not measure your BMR. It estimates your BF% and then estimates your BMR based on your weight and BF%. It's a better estimate than the one MFP uses that is based off of just your weight/sex/age, but it is an estimate based off of population averages as well. Only a direct measure of your BMR using a mask/hood will get you your actual BMR. And even with this, you still are estimating your activity level to get your daily calorie needs.

If you have been accurate and consistent in your food and exercise logging, and track your weight over time, you have the data you need to figure out your ACTUAL calorie needs. Over the long term, the 1 lb/week of weight loss for every 500 calories/day below you calorie needs pretty much holds.

This tool is pretty awesome for doing the data import from MFP and calculations for you: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/EvgeniZyntx/view/mfp-data-export-tool-the-overview-659927

yoplait311

I did the mask/hood method as well for BMR, and also got 1850. (Both tests were performed by professionals, of course).

Racing weight - I have that book. Didn't find it all that helpful actually.

Thanks for the link - I'll download it and check it out.

My original question - if I'm fueling enough, not enough, or properly I guess will require more time.

The_Enginerd

What has been your actual long term weight loss with the approach you are currently taking? I did a slow 1/2 lb/week weight loss to get down to my racing weight while I was in the 25 MPW range BEFORE I started moving my mileage up for a marathon training cycle. Training definitely felt easier when I upped my calories back to maintenance. If you are losing weight slowly, I would say you are on the right track in terms of fueling. Fueling any more will just stall your weight loss. I did find eating more the day before/earlier in the day to fuel for a run worked better for me, so I would be "over" calories one day, but "under" calories on a big run day. It all evened out over the week.

I'm a bigger fan of watching calories/macros/micros using a food diary than the Racing Weight DQS approach, personally.

Stoshew71

One thing nobody covered so far is recovery meals. Many times we don't eat right away after getting done with a workout, especially an intense workout. The body is actually primed the best to actually receive nutrients immediately after a workout. After 30 minutes after we get done with the workout, we lose this advantage. When we get done with a workout, the body is in a chemical and catabolic-anabolic transition state where it is in a high glucose and protein uptake state. The body needs nutrients to recover and this is the best time to take it. As soon as we get done. So eating a small meal high in quick carbs and protein will make very efficient use of those nutrients. This not only speeds up the recovery process but it allows our body to be satisfied. Therefore, this reduces the urge to binge later on in the day. The same goes for eating breakfast. You skip breakfast and lunch? You end up binging at dinner and just before you go to bed.

So make sure that within 30 minutes after completing your workout you have a small meal of quick carbs and easy to absorb protein. You take in 3-4 grams of carbs for every gram of protein. You only need 10-20 grams of protein in this recovery meal. The more intense your run, the more protein you need. The longer you ran, the more carbs you will need in this recovery meal. You also need fluids and electrolytes as well. Hydration is important part of recovery as well.

One more note: I know many of you are not used to eating as soon as you are done with a workout and may even feel a little sick in your stomach. Try and get used to this. Start with an even smaller meal and build up. A protein shake with a piece of fruit would be fine too.

GiddyupTim

Can't you just follow your performance, and trust that? I know you want to lose weight, which makes things a bit complicated, but it seems to me that I am pretty good at knowing when I am hungry and not over-eating, and I know when my performance suffers because I am not eating enough.
I'd trust my body and my instincts more than a watch or a website!

Robbnva

So I'm struggling with this also. I've got about 15-20 lbs to lose so I can fit into my summer clothes but I need to eat enough to be fueled for my upcoming races. I kee trying to look at diaries of other runners on here but everyone has theirs closed. I've just set my goal to 1/2 lb per week but not sure how that will work.

STrooper

Robbnva wrote: »

So I'm struggling with this also. I've got about 15-20 lbs to lose so I can fit into my summer clothes but I need to eat enough to be fueled for my upcoming races. I kee trying to look at diaries of other runners on here but everyone has theirs closed. I've just set my goal to 1/2 lb per week but not sure how that will work.

Well, mine is open if you wish to take a look. I have been weighing myself daily, same time, same general conditions every day since the beginning of the year. I started at 180.4 pounds. Today I am at 172.2 pounds. Yes, there can be a lot of daily variation (yesterday my weight was 171.6 pounds) , but the general trend is reducing weight. I could go back to once per week weight values, but I'm looking a less granular set of data. Although I did a better job with the macros earlier on when I first signed up for MFP and worked on getting down into the 175 pound range (my macros are set to 60, 20, 20), I am still producing the weight loss results as I shoot for a racing weight of 165.

I use the Weight Loss Calculator that Heybales maintains to give general settings and my current settings are based upon that spreadsheet. He also has a number of tools if you go to his profile page. I am working on a calorie deficit even though my profile says "very active" and "maintaining weight." So far, by reviewing the numbers each month, the calculations seem to be spot on. My current weight loss trend since January 1 is -0.1495 pounds per day (or about 1 pound per week) which is just about the right amount for me. There are some days when I am quite hungry but very few where I few like I'm really energy deprived.

I've linked to that spreadsheet. It takes time to fill out but it can give a quick group of settings to start. I've added a couple of tabs to his spreadsheet to do a longer term analysis of the trend.


https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Amt7QBR9-c6MdGVTbGswLUUzUHNVVUlNSW9wZWloeUE

I'm reasonably accurate on my food intake (i.e., I weigh most of my food or follow a standard formula for things I eat routinely, like my morning fruit smoothie). If I need to adjust an individual item or add something (e.g., the other morning I mixed my smoothie with uncooked oatmeal), I will add it. If I eat it, I log it (because my body sure will). No sense in not putting it down. If I'm off by a consistent amount, it will eventually be reflected in the data. My wife says I'm running a science experiment with my body and my running.

I use a Fitbit for step counts and it is reasonably accurate on steps and distance. It will also attempt a guess at running energy expenditure, but I use a heart rate monitor for that. I don't use the MFP default values.

When I run, I usually am tracking with two programs. One is Digifit by iCardio. The other is MapMyFitness. Both will read off my Bluetooth Low Energy heart rate monitor at the same time (different channels). They give comparable calorie expenditure (usually within 10-15%). I know the formula and the source of the formula for the Digifit program. I'm not sure about the MapMyFitness (also MapMyRun) calorie calculation. I do allow them to add back to the MFP calculation along with the Fitbit adjustment. However, at the end of a month, I have enough data from the daily calorie consumption and whatever the 4 week weight change value is to have a good handle on my contemporaneous TDEE.

One other thing. I limit my high intensity workouts to no more than two per week (usually only one, but in the current marathon training sequence, two per week is more common). The other times, I am running extremely easily (guided by my heart rate monitor), working to build endurance, burn more fat and less carbs/sugar.

ATT949

Stoshew71 wrote: »

One thing nobody covered so far is recovery meals. Many times we don't eat right away after getting done with a workout, especially an intense workout. The body is actually primed the best to actually receive nutrients immediately after a workout. After 30 minutes after we get done with the workout, we lose this advantage. When we get done with a workout, the body is in a chemical and catabolic-anabolic transition state where it is in a high glucose and protein uptake state. The body needs nutrients to recover and this is the best time to take it. As soon as we get done. So eating a small meal high in quick carbs and protein will make very efficient use of those nutrients. This not only speeds up the recovery process but it allows our body to be satisfied. Therefore, this reduces the urge to binge later on in the day. The same goes for eating breakfast. You skip breakfast and lunch? You end up binging at dinner and just before you go to bed.

So make sure that within 30 minutes after completing your workout you have a small meal of quick carbs and easy to absorb protein. You take in 3-4 grams of carbs for every gram of protein. You only need 10-20 grams of protein in this recovery meal. The more intense your run, the more protein you need. The longer you ran, the more carbs you will need in this recovery meal. You also need fluids and electrolytes as well. Hydration is important part of recovery as well.

One more note: I know many of you are not used to eating as soon as you are done with a workout and may even feel a little sick in your stomach. Try and get used to this. Start with an even smaller meal and build up. A protein shake with a piece of fruit would be fine too.

Read all of that, too, and, after following it for a while, I concluded that it's just good reading.
If you're doing "two a days", there's value in it. Other than that, we just don't burn that much, that quickly so as to benefit.
I can't cite you a source for this off the top of my head (I've been away from running due to osteoarthritis + a new hip) but I can try to dredge them up, if needed.
Hydration? Forget Runner's World and read Noakes' work. Hydration just isn't a significant issue unless you drink too much water and that just kills you so, problem solved.
A lot of what we read is not aimed at anyone who's every even heard of MFP, much less signed on here. Yes, Galen Rupp et. al. heeds that advice but there are so many other confounders for most of us that, while I enjoy the intellectual exercise of learning all of this, I also am comfortable with my thinking that if you're not well known at the start line when you line up for a race, that's exactly what it is - an intellectual exercise.

Robbnva

Thanks Strooper but it says your diary is private. I'll read your whole post when I get home.

STrooper

Robbnva wrote: »

Thanks Strooper but it says your diary is private. I'll read your whole post when I get home.

Interesting. It says (on my privacy setting) my profile is open to MFP members only. And on the food diary is says "public." I've saved them again in case there is something that defaulted during recent upgrades.

I copied the link to my diary http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/STrooper

Logged out and then pasted the link into my browser and the diary appeared. I also had to login to do anything beyond looking at the diary.

Let me know if it still doesn't work because I couldn't tell until you wrote something. Thanks.

Robbnva

Seems to be an app issue. The link worked. Thanks