To Eat or Not To Eat - calorie deficit

phantasmagical

Hello...

I'm training for my first half-marathon, and just started logging food and exercise on MFP consistently about a week ago. I'm really trying to lose about 20 pounds, and am wondering what the general consensus is on eating those "extra" calories you get when you exercise. Thoughts? Experience?

Francl27

With MFP you're supposed to. If you don't want to bother, use the TDEE method (http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/). Either way, you need fuel to run, and that's not going to happen if you starve yourself.

diannethegeek

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/818082-exercise-calories-again-wtf

Eat them, with the caveat that MFP or gym machines may overestimate certain activities. Some people only eat back 50-75% of their estimated exercise calories if they can't be sure of their burn.

geebusuk

For me, it would depend on my deficit and overall goals.

Low deficit - sure, bigger deficit won't hurt. Unless I was really looking to maintain muscle mass with that low deficit.
High deficit, as I am on - I do tend to eat them all back. Partly because I like eating, but also because I'm already losing a bit of muscle/strength as it is, so don't want to make that worse.

I use a GPS HRM to calculate calories burnt (include speed/cadence sensor on push bike.)

dtimedwards

When my goal was strictly weight loss, I would eat back about 60%-70% of my exercise calories. The results on the scale generally jived perfectly with the expected loss figured out through math.

I'm much closer to my goal weight now, so the margin of error is smaller, and I've noticed the results aren't nearly as predictable. I considered cutting the percentage of calories I eat back, but I started doing strength training and I'm also training for a full marathon. I've got about 7 weeks until my race, so I've decided to eat most of the calories. I'm not too concerend with what my weight will be on race day, I'm more concerned that my body is in optimal condition.

I ran a 26mile training run in early March and my weightloss has been stalled since then, plus I've been lethargic and super hungry. I actually gained a few pounds while strictly following my calorie goals. Once I said, "screw this I'm eating until race day" I actually started losing weight again.

tl,dr: What's more important right now? Weight or race results?

geebusuk

tl,dr: What's more important right now? Weight or race results?

Also; how much will lower weight help race results?

I believe (I haven't looked in to it massively), there is some argument for training with lowered glycogen levels (I suspect a lot of my running has been due to deficit) - as your body may then feel it has an extra boost if you ensure they're topped off for the actual event.

Generally you don't need to put extra effort in to 'carb loading' for a 1/2 marathon I believe; unless your pace is stretching up to 3 hours, anyway. For my 32 mile ultramarathon I did carb load the day before - over 800g of carbs after brief exercise in the morning.

bheili

I just ran my first Half Marathon about two weeks ago. I found it very difficult to lose weight while training. Most of the time I would eat back close to all of my exercise calories, but on my long run days I usually would not be able to eat all of those calories back. I was way too full by the end of the day! For whatever reason, my weight loss stalled the more when I was training harder. I do not know if this was because I was gaining muscle (I definitely noticed more definition in my legs especially), because I am not far from my goal weight, or if my body was just tired from all the stress of those long miles. I am curious whether other long distance runners have had similar experiences in training.