Long Workouts

LeanButNotMean44

One thing to look at is the efficiency of your workouts. Is there a lot of rest time between exercises waiting to get on machines? A lot of the weight lifting programs that I've seen tend to have 6-8 exercises that are done as sets of 2-4 with 8-12 reps each with 30 seconds to 2 minutes rest in between sets depending on if it's compound moves or not. At the max that is 288 reps! That is a good workout.

This. The only time I am at the gym for more than 45 minutes (and I LOOOVE the gym!) is on a weekend if I lift and do cardio. Otherwise, is not more than 45-60 minutes.

OP - you mentioned your increased heart rate, let me also ask if you are sleeping well? Are you moody? These are also signs of overtraining.

lj5109

There are some people at my gym who might <claim> to be there for 3 hours also, but if you took away the time they spent chatting, drifting, looking at themselves or staring at their phones, they are actually doing about 15 minutes of exercise...!

You're not one of..."them"...are you?

No I'm not, I go alone and I check my phone out when I am taking a quick break.

lj5109

OP, you still haven't anwerered the main question, which is:

Are you eating your exercise calories back?

If not, you should be. If you're not eating those calories, you're not doing your body any favors.

Heybales has given you alot of good information and maths. Slow it down (don't go balls to the wall), eat right.


As for the original question, The most I've 'worked out' is about 2 1/2 hours, but that's from hiking. Some days I do have high days, like doing treadmill walking + Zumba, BUT my exercise is accounted for in my calories. If you continue to overtrain your body, not only are you going to make yourself sick again, you're leaving yourself open to injury.

No, I usually do not eat my calories back.

rosebette

Then you may be experiencing some of these symptoms because you're putting your body into starvation mode and under acute stress. For instance, your heart rate exceeds the 80% target rate for someone exercising at your age. Also, losing 7 lbs. in 11 days would also stress your body. Perhaps you should stick to an hour to an hour and a half workout at 80% heart rate and eat back your exercise calories, or at least eat back enough so your net is 1000-1200.

JoRocka

No, I usually do not eat my calories back.

if you are working out that much- you should be eating back at least a percentage.

Then you may be experiencing some of these symptoms because you're putting your body into starvation mode and under acute stress.

starvation mode is not a thing.



OP- I often am at the gym for several hours- but I lift- and have longer breaks- and do no cardio- a heavy stretching/mobility sessions and then I go do dance training. Can be upwards of 2 hrs- rarely 3.

It's doable- but you have to moderate yourself.

First of all you are doing high intensity wrong if you do 30-45 minutes of it. High intensity is sprints- or intervals and if you are doing them for 30 minutes- you aren't doing high intensity.

Secondly- Unless you are training for an event- doing 2 sessions of long cardio multiple times through the week is over kill- unless you REALLY love it. But it's over kill for training.

Relax- slow down a little- lift heavier- and do less cardio. And if you drink caffeine sounds like you should back off that as well- and also- you know- go see a physician about some of this.

MB2MN

It was 7 pounds in almost 11 days. I had plateaued for several weeks and this was my first loss since.

My heart rate is high, I know. But it is consistently that high. I have been working out with that level heart rate for months. I am not sure what I should do about it. I have done my research and some people just have a higher hr during exercises. I have considered seeing a doctor about it but I am not sure.

Some people have a high HR during exercise because they push themselves so intensely right up next to anaerobic HR zone, totally training their carb burning system.

And the body is trained to go straight up there too.
That type of intense workout is a huge stress on the body.
Perhaps you consistently have a falsely-elevated HR because of being dehydrated, or body being under so much stress (that sounds very likely), so the workout wasn't really as intense as the HR might otherwise indicate.

You slow down, that's what you do about it. Perhaps you are of the thought the harder you go, the better.
Incorrect, except for smart training programs.

The other question I and at least one other asked - are you eating back those exercise calories - or creating a ridiculous deficit?
Which would also be the cause for sickness very easily.

7 lbs lost in 11 days. Did you do the math given if you think this is all fat?

7 x 3500 = 24500 / 11 = 2227

So you think you caused each and every of those 11 days a deficit of 2227 calories between what you ate, and what you burned in total?
And mind you, your daily life outside exercise may have burned 2000.
If you indeed ate 1500 and that is it in total, that's 500 of the deficit there.

So that leaves creating extra deficit by exercise of 1727 calories each and every day of those 11 days - if you think that was all fat weight.

Did you do that?

Now I can do that during summer training easy enough with long bike rides and runs and swims, but I am sure going to benefit from all that exercise by eating correctly for that level of training. Otherwise just a big waste of time and energy, with negative effects.

I understand that not all the weight loss was fat. I need to change my diet because I know I am not getting enough protein and it has been affecting me. My heart tends to race while I'm just sitting on and off the past couple days and it's pretty unsettling. I've never had that happen before. I'm not really sure why or what's going on

You need to see your doctor about this before you continue high intensity exercise. It might just be stress related, but it could be physical.

Honestly, there is absolutely no need to be lifting for 2 hours. 1/2 hour cardio sessions and shorter lifting workouts that focus on compound exercises will give you the most "bang for your buck" and you can be in and out of the gym much more quickly.

heybales

OP, you still haven't anwerered the main question, which is:

Are you eating your exercise calories back?

If not, you should be. If you're not eating those calories, you're not doing your body any favors.

Heybales has given you alot of good information and maths. Slow it down (don't go balls to the wall), eat right.

No, I usually do not eat my calories back.

So in merely trying to answer your question as to longer workouts being negative, all the questions from folks and all the answers pulled out of you (which tells me you knew what was good and bad idea or you would have innocently answered faster) you've gotten a lot of similar good advice.

It goes beyond your original question, but it should also point out that you are doing a whole lot to your body that you have no clue about.

Would you start taking out and moving wires and hoses in your car's engine compartment without having a clue as to what's going on in there?

Don't start screwing around with your body when you don't know much about it either. And hopefully these responses have helped you to see you don't.

I know teenager and all - you know it all and really only needed answer to your original question, you got the rest covered just fine.

But ask many of the 50-60 yr old women on MFP that have spent a lifetime yo-yo dieting their lives away always doing it wrong, having a terrible relationship with food and their bodies, repeating the same mistakes over and over, until finally realizing there has to be a more reasonable realistic sustainable way of doing it.

But answer just one question with the way you are going about this so far.

If bigger deficit was better to lose weight faster - why don't you just stop eating and lose the weight even faster, with or without exercise?


Do you have a enough knowledge of the body to answer that question. Yes, I'm trying to help you get your mind in a new place, one of listening to advice, at least enough to go check out more info, one of discerning what point a question is getting to, ect.

MeanderingMammal

Is exercising for long periods of time a negative thing? I workout for 3 hours, sometimes up to 4 days a week.
Lately I've been feeling symptoms of overreaching and I did slow down last week.

Based on the discussion you're significantly overtraining, and your plan isn't condusive to any realistic outcome.

Your volume of CV seems a bit high as there doesn't seem to be a reason for it. You should be able to see benefit from 30-40 minutes, three to four times per week. I'd suggest constraining your durations unless you have some good reason for longer sessions. You may also want to vary the intensities; long duration session, shorter higher intensity session and short interval session. You get different benefts from each.

Avoid significant volumes of CV on our resistance traiin days. By mixing both you dilute the effect of each. I'd suggest a short warm up, then do your resistance session.

To put things in perspective, I do five CV sessions per week reaching a distance of 35-40 km, and two bodyweight resistance sessions with the main objective being injury prevention in the running and optimising my form.

I trust that's useful to you

Ninkyou

OP, you still haven't anwerered the main question, which is:

Are you eating your exercise calories back?

If not, you should be. If you're not eating those calories, you're not doing your body any favors.

Heybales has given you alot of good information and maths. Slow it down (don't go balls to the wall), eat right.


As for the original question, The most I've 'worked out' is about 2 1/2 hours, but that's from hiking. Some days I do have high days, like doing treadmill walking + Zumba, BUT my exercise is accounted for in my calories. If you continue to overtrain your body, not only are you going to make yourself sick again, you're leaving yourself open to injury.

No, I usually do not eat my calories back.

Then you should start. Your body is telling you you're doing too much and not giving it enough. Listen to it.

MB2MN

My other question is whether a brisk walk in cold weather burns more calories than walking in temperate weather. MFP says I'm only burning between 60 and 90 calories, which doesn't seem worth it when my fingers are blue under two pairs of gloves.

60-90 calories for a 30 minute walk...could be perfectly accurate depending on your size and pace. For a moderate 3.0 mph walk I burn about 90 cals per 30 minutes and I'm 130lbs. It's not a lot but it's also not very strenuous. And NO the cold does not affect the number of calories you burn...while the temperature makes it less pleasant, it does not make for a higher burn. If your fingers are actually turning blue while you're walking for a shortish amount of time, while wearing 2 pair of gloves, I would wait until it warms up. I can be outside walking for about an hour in below zero (fahrenheit) temps without the happening, but I wouldn't do it if I couldn't.

cwolfman13

Is exercising for long periods of time a negative thing? I workout for 3 hours, sometimes up to 4 days a week.
Lately I've been feeling symptoms of overreaching and I did slow down last week.
Let me know your thoughts and experiences.
Thank you!

It's pretty excessive if you're not actually training for something. To boot, you also need to understand the relationship between all of that activity and your calorie requirements.

Even when I'm training for an event like I am now, I will generally only have one session per week that goes beyond 60 minutes...that would be my long ride which will eventually get into the neighborhood of 4-5 hours on a Sunday morning. But I also eat around 4000 calories on those days and still lose weight. As it is, I'm eating around 3,000 calories on a given Sunday to accommodate those rides and I'm losing.

If you're training hard you have to provide your body appropriate energy (calories) and nutrients for recovery and repair...otherwise your body is just ultimately going to go to waste.

lisalsd1

Yeah, I personally think 3 hours at a time is too much. I think you run the risk of just flat out burning out. It's not likely you are going to be able to keep up that pace for the long haul.

I do weights + cardio 3 days a week...usually takes me about an hour to get through the weight...and then I do about 20-30 mins of cardio. I do 2 just cardio days, and that;s usually less than an hour those days.

I think it would be better to split up your workouts and spread it over 6 days vs 3-4.

ucabucca

Bump

rosebette

Well it sure is disappointing that I don't burn more calories walking in the cold. 60 to 90 is hardly worth it. I might as well just spend another 20 minutes doing cardio in the gym. I thought there was some kind of extra benefit. Also, I am wearing 2 pairs of gloves -- one knit and one pair suede lined with sheepskin. Of course, we've hand windchills so the actual temp is in the teens or single digits. I think I might have Raynaud's syndrome. My sister has it, too.

lj5109

Is exercising for long periods of time a negative thing? I workout for 3 hours, sometimes up to 4 days a week.
Lately I've been feeling symptoms of overreaching and I did slow down last week.
Let me know your thoughts and experiences.
Thank you!

It's pretty excessive if you're not actually training for something. To boot, you also need to understand the relationship between all of that activity and your calorie requirements.

Even when I'm training for an event like I am now, I will generally only have one session per week that goes beyond 60 minutes...that would be my long ride which will eventually get into the neighborhood of 4-5 hours on a Sunday morning. But I also eat around 4000 calories on those days and still lose weight. As it is, I'm eating around 3,000 calories on a given Sunday to accommodate those rides and I'm losing.

If you're training hard you have to provide your body appropriate energy (calories) and nutrients for recovery and repair...otherwise your body is just ultimately going to go to waste.

You've said some of the same things others on this thread have said, but I really appreciate the way you put it. For some reason, the way you explained it makes more sense to me.
I've heard a lot about eating the calories from workouts back and still losing, any idea why?
As someone who's trying to lose a lot of weight, it just feels like taking a step back, mentally anyway.

No_Finish_Line

if you feel like your doing too much, and your actually working out a lot (hr + or even less 6 days a week) then you probably are.

you can back off for a month and then attack again

heybales

I've heard a lot about eating the calories from workouts back and still losing, any idea why?
As someone who's trying to lose a lot of weight, it just feels like taking a step back, mentally anyway.

MFP uses your BMR and your self-selected non-exercise daily life activity level (sedentary?) to calculate a maintenance figure.

Maintenance - what you could eat and not lose or gain - obviously an estimate. No exercise included in it. Say 2000.

Your weight loss goal is then subtracted from that, 1 lb weekly is 500 calories. So 2000 - 500 = 1500 eating goal non-exercise days.

You workout and burn 600 calories and log it.
Your maintenance is now 2000 + 600 = 2600.
2600 - 500 same deficit = 2100 eating goal now.

Same deficit in place. Exercise or not. In essence, you are eating back your exercise calories. In reality, your daily maintenance went up, and the same deficit leaves more to eat.

Contrary to some popular beliefs, bigger deficit is not better, or else why not just stop eating until you have lost the weight?

Besides, that 600 cal burn was merely for mechanical movement during the exercise. If it was a good workout, and why waste time and energy if it isn't, your body needs to make some repairs and recover from it - that takes extra energy.

So keeping reasonable deficit, and for some, 1 lb weekly may not be reasonable, 2 lb is not for vast majority that select it because they want fast weight loss, is better for sustainable hopefully fat-only weight loss.

shq86

I was thinking of doing a 2 hour long (continuous cardio) workout but after reading comments by all the sifu here; I changed my mind. The longest be a 90min workout. I'm gonna stick to my formula of cardio day and strength training day. Perhaps gonna up with the weight training to break the plateau. Do not want to overtrain and eventually quit.

Maybe you could break it up into different times in a day so that you won't workout 3 hours straight. I'm planning to do that.
My weight loss prog:
6 days a week
Morning = 10-20min Low intensity/impact
Alternate days:
Evening; Cardio day = 20min HIIT+30min Full body workout
Evening; Strength day = 60min Full Body Free weights+10-20min low/moderate cardio

So total is approximately 1 and half hour of workout. At the end I do 20-30min stretching which I love most. Cured my back pain.
*Note: I don't go to the gym cos I hate people looking at me especially when I try jogging on the treadmill)

I tried Insanity thinking I can break plateau and in the second week I lost a huge amount-4.5kgs. I was ecstatic. I thought if I can lose like this every week I can lose weight faster. Problem arises on the third week. I fell sick. Had a fever and serious coughing. The cough so bad (it lasted for more than a month before I fully recovered) that I can't do Insanity because I could not breathe. And due to cough I felt twice fatigued at the end of the day. I realised my body is telling me to quit it. So now I decided to go back to my usual workout regime.

You should listen to your body. It is telling you to stop. Try HIIT and do some weight supersets. Build some muscles. Use a measurement tape to measure your weight loss success. You can do it!

MeanderingMammal

I was thinking of doing a 2 hour long workout but after reading comments from all the sifu here; I changed my mind. The longest be a 90min workout. I'm gonna stick to my formula of cardio day and strength training day. Perhaps gonna up with the weight training to break the plateau. Do not want to overtrain and eventually quit.

The value really depends on what outcomes you're looking for. For me, long run days are reaching 3 hours with another session in the week now approaching 2 hours with the other sessions around an hour. If a long session doesn't suit your training goals, then thre seems litle point.

JoRocka

I was thinking of doing a 2 hour long workout but after reading comments from all the sifu here; I changed my mind. The longest be a 90min workout. I'm gonna stick to my formula of cardio day and strength training day. Perhaps gonna up with the weight training to break the plateau. Do not want to overtrain and eventually quit.

The value really depends on what outcomes you're looking for. For me, long run days are reaching 3 hours with another session in the week now approaching 2 hours with the other sessions around an hour. If a long session doesn't suit your training goals, then thre seems litle point.

QFT.

2 continuous "cardio" hours is normal and fine if you are training for an endurance event. It is non-sensical for those just trying to get their cardio in for the sake of cardio.

cwolfman13

It can be a negative thing, particularly if you do not understand the relationship between your fitness and your nutritional requirements which a lot of people around MFP land definitely don't.

If you are having long bouts of training you should have some purpose for that other than burning calories...if you're just doing it for the burn then it is highly likely that you do not understand the relationship between your fitness and nutritional requirements.