Any runners out there training for half-marathon or marathon

lucky1304

I am about to start a 90-day training cycle for an upcoming half-marathon but have basically been training for a HM for the past several weeks (we just changed our target race, so we had been training for a September race and are now shifting to an October race). I am on 1200 calories a day and am starving ALL the time. If I manage to stay within my calorie budget for a day, it's basically because I've just gone hungry all day. I AM eating all of my exercise calories, and I'm also training with a Garmin, so I'd imagine the "calories burned" that I'm logging are fairly accurate.

I'm wondering if I need to change my activity level from sedenary to lightly active or moderately active? I set it at sedentary because I have a desk job, though the truth is that two days a week, I work from home, which also means taking care of the kids, the dog, the house, the laundry, etc. I figured that setting it potentially too low would be better than setting it too high, but I'm at a loss as to how to maintain this calorie budget and get through HM training.

This will be my fourth HM but the first where I'll be trying to train while counting calories. I'm currently running five days a week, minimum of three miles, long run of seven miles. Probably averaging 20-mile weeks currently, but that will be going up as training heats up. Any runners want to chime in with how they manage to fuel their running while staying within a calorie budget? Maybe I'm just supposed to be hungry all the time?

TIA!

rybo

I would NOT try and train while holding too large a calorie deficit. When I 1st got here over a year ago, I set up and was training for a half, while holding a deficit. That lasted a week. There was just no energy to run.

iplayoutside19

If you're eating properly, training that much, and are constantly hungry I think you're beyond the craving stage. Eat!

In fact, I purposly go over my goal about 100 calories on my non-running days because there is no way I can eat everything back on running days.

helenium

Let's see, given that you'll be doing training runs (like me, I'm training for a half) that last 5/6+ miles, you should be eating 500 - 600 extra calories on these days, approximately (1 mile = 100ish calories). On days you run 9/10 miles near the end of your training, you should eat an extra 1000 calories.

I'd definitely consider upping your base level of calories - I tend to go by the rule that if you're constantly ravenous, you're likely to be eating too few calories. I'm training for a half marathon and eat 1300 calories a day, + exercise calories. That's on 1 pound / week loss, too. When I get closer to the half-marathon I'll drop it down to 1/2 pound a week loss. I don't know what your calorie deficit is, but I wouldn't recommend highly intense training at more than a 500 calorie deficit.

Hope this was helpful... (sorry if this was a pointless post)

lucky1304

Okay, thanks, guys. That helps.

I'm doing a 500-calorie deficit with 1200 calories a day and eating back every single exercise calorie most days. On long run days, I'm sometimes leaving as many as 200 or 300 in the bank though. I had been averaging a pound per week loss, but I've had a tricky few weeks with family in town, so I haven't logged a loss in two weeks.

You know, I hadn't really thought about it for any length of time, but I have been struggling on my long runs. Six miles, seven miles--both killed me. I ran a marathon last fall (and haven't stopped running for any length of time in between), so those distances shouldn't be hard. Now I'm wondering if trying to stick to 1200 calories is just not enough fuel. Hadn't put two and two together before now.

The one thing that gives me pause about the hunger though is that some days, I'll eat a pretty decent lunch and still be starving. I just finsihed a wrap with turkey, cheese, and cucumber and am almost hungry again. It hasn't even been an hour since I finished eating. And I had a good breakfast (Kashi with milk and fruit) and a snack (low-cal string cheese and crackers). It feels impossible to me that I've only got about 500 calories left today as hungry as I am. The only thing that will keep me from going over today at this point is a run, which I've got planned anyway.