4 weeks of running and NO results?!

zipperfall

Hey all!
I've done a bit of research, but I can't seem to find a solid answer to my question. You guys are the experienced ones, so I thought I'd bring it to the boards
So, I've been running (er, attempting!) 5 days a week for the past month and I've seen NO results (well, physically speaking). I started out only being able to run for only 30 seconds, and now I run for 1 n 1/2 minutes, walk for 1 n 1/2 minutes, repeat for 30 minutes. I've opened my diary, so it's very public, but basically…
breakfast: small bowl of special k red berries + cup of cantaloupe
snack: banana
lunch: tuna wrap + 10 baby carrots plus hummus
snack: small handful of almonds
dinner: salad w/ balsamic vinaigrette
1 chocolate chip cookie
1 grean apple

I pretty much eat the same thing every day with a little bit of variation. I have approximately 2 cups of green tea, and also do some calesthenics. I'm really not sure why I'm gaining weight though!! I'm a student at college, so I don't have a high activity level, but still…

I'm 5'7"
SW: 137
CW: 143

Help? Thank you! Like I said, my food diary is open for those who feel like adding some thoughts. Thank you!

yarwell

Ugh, carbs.

Try to get your protein in every day, and avoid the low fat / diet stuff. You might even want to shoot for more protein like 70g per day.

jacksonpt

My first thought was that you are probably eating more than you think. Portion sizes are larger than you think, you're not logging everything you eat/drink, something along those lines. Assuming your intake over the last few days is indicative of your intake during this last month or so, you should be seeing some loss.

cwolfman13

In addition to the other comments, it would appear that you have about 5-6 Lbs of cosmetic weight to lose...it isn't going to just fall off of you...you don't have the fat stores to go fast. It takes a long time to lose just a little weight...people with massive fat stores can make big drops in weight fast...when you're already fairly lean, it isn't going to happen.

QuietBloom

Invest in a food scale. Much more accurate for measuring solid foods. Meet your protein requirements. Eat back your exercise calories, but be sure and use a more accurate calorie estimator than MFP.

Katieaholloway

when i started running i couldn't reach the end of my street, it took me a good 4 months to hit a couple of miles, a year on enjoy frequent 5 k runs, i didnt notice any weight loss until about 5/6 months, and real results only recently.. be patient but make sure you eat back calories and dont limit yourself to low calorie foods like mounds of just fruit and vegetables. i did this and lost all my body muscle and healthy fat and am now struggling to gain weight back.

good luck

ThickMcRunFast

You're eating very little, if your diary is correct. With so little to lose, you should set your goals to .5lb/week. It will come off slowly.

at 5'9 145, I maintain just fine on 2200-2400 a day (this includes running about 20 miles a week, I up my calories to account for more miles). But you have to measure everything, with a scale, not by dry measure.

zipperfall

My problem in the protein department is as follows:
1) My college thinks it's cool to cook eggs in large amounts of margarine, making one egg worth 170 calories.
2) I'm a pescatarian, sort of. I won't eat anything besides fish unless it was pastured / farm raised. Therefore, while away at school, I'm very limited in the protein available to me.

Also, I actually am logging everything. Since I'm living on campus, I keep nearly no snack foods in my dorm in order to not binge. So, I make sure that I log absolutely everything I eat. My college is also really good about labeling how much every food is in calories.

SLLRunner

If you are gaining weight, you are eating more than you think. This often happens due to not logging every single thing we put in our mouth, not weighing solids, and not measuring liquids, as well as not accurately logging calories burned (often overestimating).

If you have few pounds to lose, then you don't want to lose it fast.

trickduffin

While you didn't say what results you are looking for, I'm guessing that you're looking to lose fat.

If that's the case, here's an excellent site (free), and article.

http://www.acaloriecounter.com/blog/why-am-i-not-losing-weight/

I promise that if you follow what it says, you WILL lose fat!!

Good Luck.

SLLRunner

Zipperfall,

Your ticker on your profile page seems to indicate you are trying to lose 37 pounds. Am I misreading that? If your current weight is 147, you would be 117 at 5 ft.7. That sounds underweight for your height.

jonnythan

NO results...

I started out only being able to run for only 30 seconds, and now I run for 1 n 1/2 minutes, walk for 1 n 1/2 minutes, repeat for 30 minutes.

Derp.

Are you weighing your portions?

trevnem

While you didn't say what results you are looking for, I'm guessing that you're looking to lose fat.

If that's the case, here's an excellent site (free), and article.

http://www.acaloriecounter.com/blog/why-am-i-not-losing-weight/

I promise that if you follow what it says, you WILL lose fat!!

Good Luck.

GREAT ARTICLE!

zipperfall

Zipperfall,

Your ticker on your profile page seems to indicate you are trying to lose 37 pounds. Am I misreading that? If your current weight is 147, you would be 117 at 5 ft.7. That sounds underweight for your height.

It's just under the weight limit, but I've been down to 120 before and it's not been too skinny. My doctor was completely fine with it…

mkakids

It is VERY easy to eat more/less than you think when you dont weigh everything. I work in a school cafeteria kitchen and the same 1/2cup scoop can actually deliver between 1/3cup and 1cup depending on the person serving. I know you said they are good about putting nutrition info out, but that is all based on an exact weight for the proper serving size.

Either the serving sizes are off in the cafeteria due to human error or you arent recording every mouthful you eat.

trickduffin

Trevnem,

Yea, he really has a way of making it all sound so very easy!!

Be sure to check out the rest of the site too.

Good Luck!

generallyme2

You ARE seeing results. You're able to run longer and probably faster. Besides, for weight loss 4 weeks of running isn't very much, especially when you aren't very heavy to begin with. Keep at it, really measure your portions- even if that means purchasing some of your own protein sources and keeping them in a small fridge in your dorm, and add in some other exercise, specifically strength training. Measure your body and you might notice a change there before you do on the scale.

D8vidFitness

The issue with running is, as your body becomes more familiar with the exercise, your performance level-peak rises, so you really have to push yourself harder and harder to see additional weight lost. Take notes of this because I have a friend who has the same issue as you.

My buddy is in the military, but have always had issue with being on the heavy side, I would always ask what he did at the gym on a daily basis, and he would tell me he'd spend 1hr or more on a thread mill everyday. He'd tell me he isn't eating poorly.

I told him this, your body adapts to longer duration workouts such as running for an hour at high speed, so your body holds onto extra fats and calories to sustain the daily runs.

When you're on your rest / off days, your body will continue to store up extra fats and calories because it is so used to the frequency of running, which equals to you either not seeing results, or even potentially gaining weights.

So long story short, change your work outs, work on your fast-twitch fibers with maybe sprints.

Hope this helped, good luck.

P.S - I haven't ran a mile in almost 2 months, all I do is cross fit and intervals training, I feel more fit than ever.

zipperfall

Thank you so much! I generally do a little strength training, but not much. I'll try and put more of an emphasis on that from now on. I really appreciate the solid answer!

jonnythan

You don't have to push yourself harder and harder to see weight loss, nor do you have to push yourself harder and harder to keep burning the same number of calories. Your ability to consume oxygen - and therefore burn calories - increases with training. So as you push yourself harder and harder you burn more and more calories.

Weight loss is about calorie deficit, not how hard you push yourself while running. If you're not losing weight, you are *eating* too much.

toscarthearmada

BUMP for later

jacksonpt

You don't have to push yourself harder and harder to see weight loss, nor do you have to push yourself harder and harder to burn more calories. Your ability to consume oxygen - and therefore burn calories - increases with training. So as you push yourself harder and harder you burn more and more calories.

Weight loss is about calorie deficit, not how hard you push yourself while running. If you're not losing weight, you are *eating* too much.

I assume there's a type-o in there?

First you say:
nor do you have to push yourself harder and harder to burn more calories

Then you say:
So as you push yourself harder and harder you burn more and more calories

jonnythan

You don't have to push yourself harder and harder to see weight loss, nor do you have to push yourself harder and harder to burn more calories. Your ability to consume oxygen - and therefore burn calories - increases with training. So as you push yourself harder and harder you burn more and more calories.

Weight loss is about calorie deficit, not how hard you push yourself while running. If you're not losing weight, you are *eating* too much.

I assume there's a type-o in there?

First you say:
nor do you have to push yourself harder and harder to burn more calories

Then you say:
So as you push yourself harder and harder you burn more and more calories

Whoops, my bad. I meant to say that you don't have to push yourself harder and harder to keep burning just as many calories. It's early.

Holly_Roman_Empire

In my opinion, running is not a very good exercise to change your body composition (assuming you're already at a reasonable weight). If that is your REAL goal, instead of losing weight, do some weight training.

Mischievous_Rascal

You're eating very little, if your diary is correct. With so little to lose, you should set your goals to .5lb/week. It will come off slowly.

at 5'9 145, I maintain just fine on 2200-2400 a day (this includes running about 20 miles a week, I up my calories to account for more miles). But you have to measure everything, with a scale, not by dry measure.

Very good advice.

michellekicks

OP is doing walk/run intervals... certainly not the kind of endurance cardio that can produce negative results like muscle catabolism so for those saying running isn't good for weight loss... that notion comes from regular long-distance steady-state cardio, not this.

OP, get more accurate with your tracking. You could be eating right near maintenance and/or this new activity still has you maintaining some water weight. But if you do eat too little, you will lose lean mass without any cardio at all, too... so you have to balance things out. If you only have a little to lose, as others have said, you need to go slow.

D8vidFitness

You don't have to push yourself harder and harder to see weight loss, nor do you have to push yourself harder and harder to keep burning the same number of calories. Your ability to consume oxygen - and therefore burn calories - increases with training. So as you push yourself harder and harder you burn more and more calories.

Weight loss is about calorie deficit, not how hard you push yourself while running. If you're not losing weight, you are *eating* too much.

Sorry but, intensity DOES have a huge factor correlating with calories being burned. Each person burns calories at a different rate. I will burn more calories doing the same workout comparing to someone who is more fit than I'm doing the same workout because what may be moderate intensity for him, is considered higher intensity for me.

You will not burn the same calories doing the same thing over and over because your body adapts and increases aerobic capacity. This is call plateau, you will initially lose more weight, make more gains, etc. in the beginning, progress diminishes as time goes on, people either have to push extra hard to see result, or those who are in the bodybuilding industry who've been lifting for years, result to steroids.

If you can do the same thing over and over to gain result, you will see everybody in the gym, lifting the same weight, and people on treadmills, running the same duration, day-to-day.

Best wishes.

jonnythan

Nope. The adaptation allows you to burn more calories by increasing your VO2max and allowing you to go harder, faster, longer.

NoxDineen

Zipperfall,

Your ticker on your profile page seems to indicate you are trying to lose 37 pounds. Am I misreading that? If your current weight is 147, you would be 117 at 5 ft.7. That sounds underweight for your height.

I'm 117 at 5'8" and on paper it's a bit too low, but it's just my body type (although I did drop to an alarming weight right when I went vegan, but learning how to actually cook fixed that). It's possible it's a healthy goal for Zipperfall too.

accendo

I'd be trying some free weight training, there are a lot of programs around for beginners. I have a lot more weight to lose than you and I started the stronglifts 5x5 a couple of weeks ago, I'm really enjoying it and seeing some nice strength and muscle gains.

angie007az

Dump anything with sugar in it. Sugar will stop weight loss in it's tracks. Lower carbs.
Eat more veges and lean meat or fish. It's 85% diet. Exercise is good but it really is secondary to your diet. Good luck.