150 pounds, 5ft7 girl: losing weight for my first race

cocoacurls

Hello guys,

I just signed up on this site, I like it a lot, but I have a tinyyy question...

SO I am quiet good at running or at least have the potential to KICK *kitten* on the next half marathon in oktober 2014. My 10 km time is around 50 min. For my weight : 150 pounds, 5 ft 7 this is VERY good. The problem is, that I gained 10 pounds in the last 2 months (due to break up and a lot of stress, excessive eating) and am carrying another 20 pounds for about 2 years that I want to lose. It is not just the wish to be freakin skinny, I actually like curves. But I calculated that this is my optimal race weight for a marathon, so I can improve my 21 km time in about 10-15 min. or more if I lose weight.

So.... I am counting calories now. Ops, and I forgot to tell I am paleo (PHD) for almost 2 years now. I had slip ups, but they are so small, that I just dont know the taste of bread or candy. I can get fat on rice, potatoes in ENORMOUS amounts, but my diet is pretty good now.

I wanted to ask you what do you think of my plan, as most of you have left 20-100-200 pounds behind and have more experience

I work out 5 to 6 times a week (not every workout is hard), about 300-800 cal. burned each.

The first week of WeightLoss: I ate 1800-2300 cals a day net (around maintainance) and lost some weight, mostly measurments

Tomorrow will be my second week : I will eat 1200-1300 net (eating back half to 80% ex. calories)

ANd I will continue it for 12 weeks to lose around 15 pounds.

The last 12 weeks before my race I will move to 1000-1200 net to lose another 15 pounds.

Is this sustainable?

jenilla1

...The last 12 weeks before my race I will move to 1000-1200 net to lose another 15 pounds.

Is this sustainable?

I can't imagine training for a race with a deficit like that. My body would totally break down. I am 5'7" and 130 pounds and the two things that most improved my race times have been weight training (believe it or not - it strengthens my muscles and helps prevent injury) and interval training. I would not suggest an aggressive weight loss plan during training. It's not sustainable. You will most likely burn out or become injured. Good luck with your first race! It's a lot of fun. :flowerforyou:

susannamarie

Seems to me you might be better off leaving yourself more energy for training harder instead of heading into a race on a hard cut just to drop an extra couple of pounds.

heybales

Bigger deficit with less to lose is asking for failure, or muscle mass loss - which is failure too.

No, you won't be able to sustain that much loss the whole time, body won't allow it. It'll adapt and slow down and whatever deficit you thought you had in place - won't be there.

With 30 lbs to lose, a reasonable deficit to allow your workouts to excel and help body improve, would be 1.5 lb weekly down to 20 lbs left.
Then 1 lb weekly down to 10 lbs.
Then 1/2 lb weekly.
Between those weeks, you can also do your body the favor of taking a diet break, no deficit for a whole week.

And as you plan, don't make the deficit bigger by not eating back exercise calories, good 80-85% of them.

Also, glad to hear you aren't making every day hard. Because in a diet, your body is slower to recover anyway. Great chance to get injured and really ruin it all, big deficit and lots of training. Eat low protein during that time and really lose some muscle mass! Joking, don't.

Good job on losing fat while your body made some improvements.

While you are setting the weight loss goals - were you honest on non-exercise activity level too - really sedentary desk job/commute for 45 hrs weekly, nothing besides exercise for activity, no kids, ect? That's sedentary.
Don't create bigger deficit thinking it's better if you are really Lightly Active with on your feet decent part of the day.

5 months - 20 weeks, could be 1 lb weekly on average if you make smart purposeful choices. Unwise choices could force it to 1lb or less weekly.

Vigilance88

^agree

It's sustainable by will alone, but I doubt it's gonna help you perform or feel better.

Why the big drop: from your current 1800-2400 to the magic 1200?
Your BMR is about 1580 plus you are excercising 5-6 times per week for at least 300cal.
On easy workout days you burn 1880, on hard days 2380. And that is only BMR and excercise, not even your average daily movement/work.
With these burns there is no NEED to go that low.

Just create a 500-600 cal deficit

cocoacurls

hey, I know I made the right decision when I asked you! Great answers, thanks

Ok, ok, intuitively I knew I am a bit hard on myself, I will slow it down.

heybales, I will take your advice to the letter, sounds pretty logical.

I wrote 1000-1200 net, because that means most days 1600-2000 total and seems a lot of food. I really cant trust any calculations how much I burned, so 1000-1200 net seemed to be normal. I also have problems to believe that 1200 net with exercise is the same as 1200 net and total without exercise. Somehow in the first case it is more food that you didnt ''take out'', or? Sorry, I am a newbie on counting strictly, just wondering.

I will aim to lose 20 pounds for the 5 months, this is 1370 net than I will move to 1500-1600 net.

My workouts consist of bodyweight training (find it much more effective than weights), running and stretching (do not like yoga),

Thanks one more time and be free to tell me more about what do you think



P.S. I go to a law school in Germany, so I move a bit... but it is not as ''a teacher or salesman'', as MFP suggests on light activity. I sit most of the time 8.30 am till 20.30 pm or even 21.30 pm in the library learning. Every 2-3 hours I go outside for a 10-30 min. break and walk to the supermarket to buy some fruits or just to move around. There are some stairs in the library. Also I walk around 40-60 min. a day to pay my bills to the bank and when going home. So it is some movement with 60 min. walking a day.

Is this light?

chiccam

Wow! Great feedback.

cocoacurls

P.S. I go to a law school in Germany, so I move a bit... but it is not as ''a teacher or salesman'', as MFP suggests on light activity. I sit most of the time 8.30 am till 20.30 pm or even 21.30 pm in the library learning. Every 2-3 hours I go outside for a 10-30 min. break and walk to the supermarket to buy some fruits or just to move around. There are some stairs in the library. Also I walk around 40-60 min. a day to pay my bills to the bank and when going home. So it is some movement with 60 min. walking a day.

Is this light?

heybales

heybales, I will take your advice to the letter, sounds pretty logical.

I wrote 1000-1200 net, because that means most days 1600-2000 total and seems a lot of food. I really cant trust any calculations how much I burned, so 1000-1200 net seemed to be normal. I also have problems to believe that 1200 net with exercise is the same as 1200 net and total without exercise. Somehow in the first case it is more food that you didnt ''take out'', or? Sorry, I am a newbie on counting strictly, just wondering.

I will aim to lose 20 pounds for the 5 months, this is 1370 net than I will move to 1500-1600 net.

My workouts consist of bodyweight training (find it much more effective than weights), running and stretching (do not like yoga),

Thanks one more time and be free to tell me more about what do you think



P.S. I go to a law school in Germany, so I move a bit... but it is not as ''a teacher or salesman'', as MFP suggests on light activity. I sit most of the time 8.30 am till 20.30 pm or even 21.30 pm in the library learning. Every 2-3 hours I go outside for a 10-30 min. break and walk to the supermarket to buy some fruits or just to move around. There are some stairs in the library. Also I walk around 40-60 min. a day to pay my bills to the bank and when going home. So it is some movement with 60 min. walking a day.

Is this light?

Oh, that is big time Lightly Active.

People that get the activity monitors with sedentary desk jobs are usually surprised they are Lightly Active, even before they start moving more.

Remember, you ate 2200 up and lost weight, think what you could have eaten at to maintain!
And you didn't gain weight eating that low either - you had the ability to eat more. Don't think you should be cutting fat out, or too many carbs.

Have you read the special Paleo site pages on endurance training?
Because of course they describe it as "killer cardio" and "chronic cardio" and speak out against it usually.
But they also recognized some wanted to do it - so they have other considerations for those doing endurance training to eat more carbs. Which you need if going for speed.

Yes, the net will seem low, but it sounds like you'll rarely eat that low, your goal is always higher. And with more truthful Lightly Active, it won't be that low either.
And hey, marathon training requires a lot of calories - imagine if you weren't in a diet, it would be a tad less because you weighed less - but you'd likely run faster so you'd still be burning the same.

More accurate than HRM if incline is 0-2 %, and you really got the pace right.
Weight and time you should know. Set to NET and that is your total eatback. Set to Gross to compare to treadmill, or HRM, or database. If outside running with varied terrain, at least 2% incline, unless you know a hilly course and should be more.
http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/WalkRunMETs.html