Down 74 pounds. Started running. Hit a plateau.

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LionsFanForLife
LionsFanForLife Posts: 3
in Health and Weight Loss
JUST A HEADS UP, THIS IS GOING TO BE PRETTY LONG......I'm down 74 pounds(245-171) since early March of last year. I lost all of that weight by counting calories and walking 7 miles a day on my treadmill at a pace that got me sweating pretty good. I couldn't run on my treadmill due to the fact that it was a cheap $150 dollar treadmill that I got from WalMart on clearance and whenever I did try running, it sounded like it was going to explode, so I just stuck to walking. So around the 3rd week of December, my treadmill overheated and went up in smoke and melted the circuit board. My treadmill was officially a goner.....My Uncle and Aunt who live right next door have been kind enough to let me use their treadmill. This treadmill is amazing, it has all the sweet gadgets and it's pretty much one of those treadmills you'd find at a nice gym. Unlike my treadmill, you could actually run on this one without it breaking. So that's what I started doing. The past 3 weeks I'd go next door and run 3 miles twice a day. This past week, I've been knocking out all 6 miles at once. Unfortunately my weight has stayed the same(171) since I started running 3 weeks ago.....So basically, my question is why? I'm eating 1,850-2,100 calories a day. I'm staying hydrated. I'm avoiding foods that are high in sodium which from what I read can make you retain water and you'll weigh more than you actually do....The only possible reasons I can think of for my weight staying the same is that maybe 1) I'm not eating enough and giving my body the adequate amount of calories that it needs. But to honest, it's not like I'm starving or at least I don't feel like I am. So I "think" I'm good with the calories. 2) My body is still in shock from switching from walking to running, so maybe I'm just overreacting and soon my body will adjust and i'll start losing weight again. 3) I actually am losing weight regardless of what the scale says. It's just that i'm changing my body composition and what not due to the running.........So any opinion or advice on what's going on would be greatly appreciated...... I'm not to overly concerned with what the scale says right now, I'm just more focused on getting in better shape for the Army. But once again, it would be nice to have some sort of an idea of what's going. THANKS!!

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  • IsaackGMOON
    IsaackGMOON Posts: 3,358 Member
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    Are you weighing all of your foods and accurately?

    How are you getting calorie burns for your running?
  • Chrisparadise579
    Chrisparadise579 Posts: 411 Member
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    Wow! 74lbs that is so fantastic! keep it up! How long have you been at 1800-2100? if you maintained 1800 during your walking then you probably should increase your calories. Another tip would be to pick an actual calorie limit somewhere between 1800-2100 that way your body can get used to that amount and you know you are never overeating. Overall though it sounds like youve have been doing amazing! I cant tell you how awesome it is that you have lost that much weight! Youll kill that Army pt test in no time!
  • bwogilvie
    bwogilvie Posts: 2,130 Member
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    Since you have successfully lost 74 lb., I think that your food logging is accurate enough. What's probably happening is one of two things:

    1. Your muscles are temporarily retaining water as they adapt to the new stresses of running. If that's the case, you'll start losing again in a week or two.

    2. You're overestimating calorie burn for running. You can double-check your estimates with this calorie calculator, though some people say that you should set your treadmill to a 1% incline to simulate the effort of running outside. (I don't know, I don't use a treadmill. I run outside as long as it's not a heavy rainstorm or snowstorm.)
  • wrecktechno
    wrecktechno Posts: 145 Member
    edited January 2015
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    You are effectively walking/running downhill unless the treadmill is on a 2 percent angle.
    Increase the incline and try it for a couple weeks. My personal trainer told me that I need to do a 7x7.
    7speed, 7 incline and for 20 minutes, I run on the treadmill for 30 seconds, then jump my feet to the side for 30seconds and rest, run for 30seconds and rest for 30 seconds until the 20minutes is up. Works a treat
  • jamieleighpent
    jamieleighpent Posts: 4 Member
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    Congrats on your weight loss! That is so inspiring!! As mentioned above the reason for a plateau can vary. Be diligent about eating at consistent times and weigh yourself the same time every week as you adjust your calories up and down that way you can figure out if you need to maintain intake or adjust. I started carb cycling and eating smaller 5-6 meals a day. It's been the only thing that my body has reacted to and I started to see some change on the scale. Good luck & thanks for sharing your story!
  • kdeaux1959
    kdeaux1959 Posts: 2,675 Member
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    wrecktechno wrote: »
    You are effectively walking/running downhill unless the treadmill is on a 2 percent angle.
    Increase the incline and try it for a couple weeks. My personal trainer told me that I need to do a 7x7.
    7speed, 7 incline and for 20 minutes, I run on the treadmill for 30 seconds, then jump my feet to the side for 30seconds and rest, run for 30seconds and rest for 30 seconds until the 20minutes is up. Works a treat

    ^^^This is HIIT training and has been proven effective at weight loss.

    Cardio does not recompose your body -- Resistance training can. Not usually at a calorie deficit though. Contrary to popular belief, running does burn more than walking but the increase in caloric burn may not be as much as you think. It is POSSIBLE, that you just happened to hit a plateau point that was going to happen regardless. As we lose weight, our bodies require fewer calories. Our net caloric intake will need to be reduced accordingly.

    I will say that I think it is possible that you are doing too much cardio. Cardio twice a day is probably not your best plan of action and your body may be adapting to this level of cardio. Cardio is great for the heart and will help in caloric burn BUT it is not everything. I would suggest converting one of these sessions to a resistance training session. This will help tone the muscles that will soon be out from under the cover of the layer of fat that was once upon them. Resistance training has shown to increase caloric burn for up to 48 hours post workout. Mixing things up often helps.

    Another consideration though is how do your clothes feel? Are they looser? Are the tighter? Are they the same? That is a greater indicator of true progress than the scale ever is.

    Best wishes on every success.

  • coraborealis80
    coraborealis80 Posts: 53 Member
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    A couple of things I've learned along the way. 1) A jump from 3 miles to 6 puts a lot of strain on your body. Your muscles are swelling from the tiny tears that occur. How much this swelling adds to your weight can vary from person to person. For me, when I upped my workouts, I plateaued for 4 weeks about 2 weeks in. 2) Check your BMR. In all likelihood, your BMR has dropped recently, and those 18-2000 calories may be too many for weight loss. My BMR at that weight would be a little over 1500. Generally, they say shave 100 calories from your BMR, ignoring exercise, for weight loss. My doctor told me flat out to ignore the calories that exercises supposedly "burn." 3) Screw the scale. Take your measurements instead. At this point, that may be more accurate. As long as you keep losing inches, don't concern yourself with what the scale says. 4)If you're female, you may want to consider something besides long distance running. In some women, LDR triggers fat retention.
  • TimothyFish
    TimothyFish Posts: 4,925 Member
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    Since the other treadmill wasn't working right, it is possible that you were burning more calories on it than the one you're using now.
  • LionsFanForLife
    LionsFanForLife Posts: 3
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    Thanks for all the great advice. I really appreciate it. It's nice knowing that there are people out there willing to help others out even if they don't know them on a personal level.

    I just have one more question regarding how many calories I should be eating. It seems like every other person or calculator gives a different recommendation and I know there are many different factors that go into it.... I'm a 5'9 171 pound 22 year old male.

    I dropped those 74 pounds by walking which is considered a light exercise(obviously) and eating 1,800 calories a day. Now this is where some people said I should eat less because I weigh less. Then there are those that say since you have now increased your workout intensity and are now running, that you should increase your calorie intake or you're going to mess up your metabolism. It's like which one should I do? They both sound logical. I mean, I'm sure if I was still walking, that I would have to cut down on the calories, but since I'm running don't I have to give my body the proper amount of calories to make up for how much harder it's working?
  • bwogilvie
    bwogilvie Posts: 2,130 Member
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    LionsFanForLife wrote: »
    I dropped those 74 pounds by walking which is considered a light exercise(obviously) and eating 1,800 calories a day. Now this is where some people said I should eat less because I weigh less. Then there are those that say since you have now increased your workout intensity and are now running, that you should increase your calorie intake or you're going to mess up your metabolism. It's like which one should I do? They both sound logical. I mean, I'm sure if I was still walking, that I would have to cut down on the calories, but since I'm running don't I have to give my body the proper amount of calories to make up for how much harder it's working?

    The two aren't mutually exclusive.

    As you lose weight, you use less energy to perform daily activities. Your TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) consists of the following:

    BMR (basal metabolic rate): the amount of food you would need in a coma
    TEF (thermic effect of food): energy required to digest and metabolize food (not very much, unfortunately)
    NEAT (non-exercise activity thermogenesis): energy consumed in standing, moving around, brushing teeth, practicing your cool dance moves, etc.
    EAT (exercise activity thermogenesis): energy consumed when deliberately exercising.

    As you have lost weight, your BMR and NEAT will decrease (presuming you haven't become more or less active, outside of exercise, due to changes in work or lifestyle). That means you need to eat less for those components. I don't know your height or age, but a sedentary 30-year-old who is 5'10" would need about 2093 calories to maintain weight at 171 lb., vs. 2497 calories at 245 lb. So your maintenance calories will have dropped by about 400 calories a day.

    However, by switching to running from walking, and upping the exercise, you are increasing EAT. At 245 pounds, walking 7 miles at 3 mph should burn about 856 calories (per MFP's database, which is reasonably accurate for walking and running). At 171 pounds, running 6 miles at 6 mph (10:00/mile) should burn about 1241 calories. That's nearly 400 calories more.

    So that more or less compensates for your decline in BMR+NEAT.
  • bwogilvie
    bwogilvie Posts: 2,130 Member
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    LionsFanForLife wrote: »
    The past 3 weeks I'd go next door and run 3 miles twice a day. This past week, I've been knocking out all 6 miles at once.

    By the way, I didn't catch this earlier, but if you have moved from walking 7 miles every day to running 6 miles every day, you are setting yourself up for injury. Running takes a much heavier toll on your body than walking; your joints sustain up to five times your weight in force when you're running.

    Beginning runners using a plan such as Couch to 5K are advised to run at most 3 days a week, and to gradually build up to longer distances and more frequent runs. If you have avoided injury thus far, more power to you, but I think you're tempting fate to continue without at least a couple of rest days a week.
  • mulecanter
    mulecanter Posts: 1,792 Member
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    I agree with someone that said you hit a plateau coincidental with the running. You are down near the "lard" that is really tough to lose-I've been there forever. Check your measurements on both sides of the equation. Keeping drinking water. Add weight training. Be patient, you are a success already, now you are just working on fitness and fine tuning.
  • silentKayak
    silentKayak Posts: 658 Member
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    When you report your calories, is that your TOTAL calories eaten? Or your NET calories (e.g. calories eaten - calories burned from running)?

    If it's your NET, then you're overestimating the burns from running, or you were underestimating the burns from walking. You're eating more now than you were when you were walking, relative to the calories burnt.
  • blues4miles
    blues4miles Posts: 1,481 Member
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    3 weeks isn't much time to worry considering like others have said you changes activities and muscles tear and retain water.

    How are you calculating calorie burn? I find treadmills way overestimate. And I don't use MFP to calculate calories burnt running because the slowest it gets is 5 mph and unfortunately for me I average slower than that. A heart rate monitor might help for more accuracy. Also agree with the others that no incline is sort of downhill. But honestly you could just be retaining water. And if you haven't adjusted your MFP calorie goals over those 74 lbs maybe time to do that. I have a theory you are eating too much (not saying you are lying) but that you had more margin at a heavier weight. Now the numbers (what you eat, your real BMR and exercise calories) all need to be more precise as you go on.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    3 weeks isn't a plateau.
  • PollyPickpocket5
    PollyPickpocket5 Posts: 5 Member
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    Since you just changed to running, you could also be gaining muscle. Honestly, I would give it time (2-3 weeks) and see how your clothes are fitting you. When I started running, I didn't lose pounds right away BUT I did go do in clothing size. It took a few months to see the scale change, but only about a month or less to see a visible change in inches.
  • jakichan
    jakichan Posts: 109 Member
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    If you have started eating more you may be overestimating your exercise calories. I ride a bike and used to use heart rate monitor calories. Then I got a power meter and found out how exaggerated heart rate monitor calories are...

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