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Timing and rate of weight loss

4K views 63 replies 17 participants last post by  party_wagon 
#1 ·
I am trying to get down to racing weight of 60-61kg this season. If I am not drinking (sorry party_wagon) and avoid binging on brownies and ice cream, my training weight hovers around 66kg. I have the discipline to drop weight fast if need be, but I can't go below 63kg for very long. So my questions are:
1. How fast is too fast for weight loss? I know there are hormonal adaptations that happen when you drop weight, and also rapid weight loss runs the risk of burning lean body mass and excess fat. Thoughts?
2. What about settling in? As in, how is performance impacted by hitting weight the night before a race, vs hitting it a week early and maintaining it? How do you time your targets?
3. For those of you coaches: do your athletes cycle through racing weight and rebound for every event, or do you 'peak' weight-wise (in a reverse way, I suppose) the same way you peak fitness-wise?
 
#2 ·
1. For a fit athlete, drop 1/2-1 lb per week. Do it by managing your calorie intake, first and foremost, and mix of calories/macros, secondarily.
2. Hit it and maintain it for a bit to make sure it's sustainable. Cutting like a wrestler or boxer is a recipe for bonking.
3. I'm not a coach, I strongly believe the latter. "Peak" down into a racing weight for race season, and trend back up as it winds down.

Great call on no alcohol; IMO, that's one of the top factors in, A. Excess calories, and B. Sugar carbs that spike your insulin and cause fat gain. I did Dry January this year, and stayed dry til mid-March, and I got leaner than ever, and feel better than ever. Have had a few light beers since then, but only a few, and no IPA's, which are essentially Cinnabons.

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#3 ·
Great call on no alcohol; IMO, that's one of the top factors in, A. Excess calories, and B. Sugar carbs that spike your insulin and cause fat gain.
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I cut alcohol for the reasons you cite above, but also because if I start drinking I tend to lose willpower to avoid excess calories in general, brownies and ice cream in specific. It's embarrassing how jekyll-and-hyde I can become after a couple of drinks.
 
#5 ·
Follow this and set the calories to your target weight. https ://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/nutrition-101-eat-to-build-lean-muscle.html
I try to listen to my body and focus more on recovery and repetitive performance. When my calories are fine I can easily ride 2 hours a day. I use the cheat day around my long rides and have it friday and saturday once I am lean. If I skip it I notice a big difference. It also goes into depth about fruit and what to eat when. As far as eating like that all the time I will mix quinoa, brown rice, kale, spinach, shredded brocoli, spaghetti sauce, grass fed beef, and parm cheese in a huge pan and bake it in the oven. I measure out how much I need for like 5 days of food and eat on that. It is also pretty good with taco seasoning instead of spaghetti sauce. I pretty much have to force myself to eat enough of the stuff because there is soo much to eat.
 
#9 ·
Based on the advice I've gotten over the years, at the amateur level, as long as you are eating clean without excess, weight is not really a factor. Of course that is assuming you are fit.

It's really tough to a) live life and b) have enough time to focus on running that caloric knife edge to continue to ride strong. Unless you are constantly monitoring your power output, not sure what losing a few lbs is going to make.

Everybody's ideal weight is different, but losing weight in a lot of cases reduces power and performance. Some guys can get away with more than others.

Tread lightly.

I range anywhere from low 170 to 182, I tend to ride strongest in the high 170's. Dipping into the 160's I really feel like &$&#. Maybe if I had a nutritionist available.

On thing that I read recently which I thought was good...."eat twice as much on the bike as 1/2 as much off", sums it up pretty good.
 
#10 ·
How tall are you?
How old?
How many hours per week do you train?
Do you know your BF % at 63 kg?
How much climbing is in the events where you desire to be 61 kg?
What is the lightest weight you have maintained? Did you have good power at this weight?

I am not far off the same weight as yourself. I hover between 64-65 kg, sometimes as high as 66-
I find that if I go below 64 kg my power on flat tends to drop, and I have to be more careful with recovery.

Find your sweetspot.
 
#11 ·
179/180cm
40 yrs old
10-12hrs during intensity blocks, 15-20 during volume blocks
Depends on LBM, but usually 10-11%
Climbing is decisive in my target events
I've maintained 65kg with moderate diet interventions. Below that and it takes a lot more effort.
This will be the first time in about 2 decades where I try to dip below 63 for any length of time, which is why I'm looking for guidance. My training has been strong and consistent for a few years now, and I want to see what kind of damage I can do racing lighter than normal.
 
#12 ·
Plan your cheat meals around a long ride. If your light headed and lacking nutrients during the week after skipping your cheat meal quit skipping cheat meals. I operate at sub calories during the week. I can always make my rides but it affects my work and other stuff the week after if I skip a cheat day.
 
#13 ·
Those last kilos/pounds are difficult. I don't believe it is possible to lose those in a linear fashion and still be a high performer. Those intense training blocks need >=100% refulling.

I actually like what this guy has to say on this. As usual, everything that comes out of Team Sky has to be taken with a grain of salt and one has to ingnore the SiS advertisement, but it is an interesting approach to really go from workout to workout and slowly build a deficit.

Morton has been a key author of some really interesting peer-reviewed papers on periodized nutrition, the man has to say something.

 
#15 ·
It has a good intuitive ring to it - fuel when you need it, don't when you don't. Lyle McDonald has been a consistent adherent to the more protein principle; that no matter the sport or outcome, getting protein levels correct is going to be key.

One thing Morton alluded to is protein intake on the bike. I have never intentionally incorporated protein in my training or racing. Any of the rest of you tried this?
 
#14 ·
Sounds like you're focussed pretty intently on the Butte 100, IIRC. A good event to take seriously.

My two cents, based on 15 years of amateur endurance insanity:

1. One pound a week feels good, when you're getting close (two a week is fine for me coming out of the winter "fun" season). More than that impacts how I feel on long, hard rides. At least in my head.

2. I always shot for peak (valley?) weight 10 days before my main target event, mostly because of the old maxim that the last week before a major event is too late to gain much, but leaves plenty of time to screw things up.
 
#19 ·
So, I’m in the same situation. Although I’m a bit shorter and stockier than you are.

I’m 33, 165cm and 65-66kg coming out of the winter. Been doing 10hrs a week on average, between 5-6 rides, with a good amount of dog walking and hiking in the mountains next door.

Last year I got down to 63kg and felt fine. Due to moving several times I only raced a handful of times, but I knocked out some KOMs in training that won’t be touched for a while. Tried to keep going, got down to 62kg for a couple of days, and I’m not sure where I went wrong, but the power plummeted. Not a dehydration thing, although I suspected that at first.

IIRC, it was around the third week at that weight (63kg or below) where the wheels fell off. Motivation died, energy was low. I didn’t closely monitor my diet or body fat, so I don’t know if I was deficient somewhere, or if my body just said “enough”. The only thing I consciously removed from my diet was Coca-Cola; I have a pretty serious problem with high fructose corn syrup.

Now, I DO have prior experience with forced starvation (military), but it’s not the same. I was trying to trudge along carrying 80lbs, think semi-coherently and sleep two or three hours a day. Getting down to 125lbs then was easy; I had no choice in the matter, despite eating every calorie I could find.


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#20 ·
You just need to get used to the weight over time and feed well. Cutting too much too soon will make you feel bad and without energy, best approach is to have it slow and steady.

Losing weight when already fit means sometimes losing some muscle that will reduce your top end power, but your steady power should be unaffected for the most part. This is the power you want to raise anyway.

Le duke, I'm your same height and pardon me for saying this, but you at 66kg are on the heavy side for a cyclist. I weight 58kg at 12% fat, so you must have ample room for improvement with no bad side effects at all. Same as OP, for my main race I'm looking to cut 2kg more with calorie restriction diet.
 
#21 ·
You just need to get used to the weight over time and feed well. Cutting too much too soon will make you feel bad and without energy, best approach is to have it slow and steady.

Losing weight when already fit means sometimes losing some muscle that will reduce your top end power, but your steady power should be unaffected for the most part. This is the power you want to raise anyway.

Le duke, I'm your same height and pardon me for saying this, but you at 66kg are on the heavy side for a cyclist. I weight 58kg at 12% fat, so you must have ample room for improvement with no bad side effects at all. Same as OP, for my main race I'm looking to cut 2kg more with calorie restriction diet.
I'm a bit more muscular than the average cyclist. Genetics and background. My DEXA scan last winter had me at 10% BF.

As an example, despite intentionally avoiding upper body exercise, I can step outside and do 20 pull ups right now. When I was an Army infantry platoon leader, I could do that while wearing a plate carrier, ammunition, radios, etc. Despite my body, I've always been pretty good at aerobic sports; 1:56/4:23/9:4x in the 800/1600/3200, CAT1/Pro on the road and MTB.

If someone can figure out how to do it, I'd gladly transfer 5lbs of meat to a struggling body builder at the local Gold's Gym. Hell, I'll pay.

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#23 ·
I’ve thought about that before. Like I said, I’ve been forced to endure semi-starvation previously. Not the 400 calories a day debt people talk about, but eating 2000 while burning 5-6000.

It’s unpleasant.

One thing I’ve thought about is significantly reducing protein intake. My wife is a former vegetarian, and we only eat meat three times a week or so, but I could still reduce protein and increase carbs in an effort to inhibit muscle repair/maintenance.


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#25 ·
Yeah, I don't worry about it much anymore. When I first started out and saw all the string beans I was racing against it was a bigger deal. I certainly don't "look" like a cyclist in normal clothes.

And, re: strength and bike handling. Yeah. I've saved quite a few front end slides over the years with back/shoulder strength. Also, when a taller/skinnier dude tries to lean in on me through a corner in a STXC race, it generally works out in my favor.

Like some tribes in the Amazon, I'm rarely captured on film. These are the only two bike shots of me from the last few years.





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#27 ·
I think it's pretty clear that each person's ideal racing weight is going to vary, even among those with similar overall body compositions. Also the rate at which someone can lose weight, keep it off and maintain performance will vary.

I don't know my ideal racing weight, nor do I know the ideal rates or 'valley' period, that's part of the reason I'm doing this experiment.

So here goes. I'm going to drop at about 500-700g per week as a start, try to hold at 63kg. If I'm pooped out, I'll move up by 500g until I get my energy back.
 
#28 ·
FWIW @winter.benjamin I am pretty much the same height as you (181cm) and my race day weight is generally 63-64kg and I really don't have to make any effort to maintain this weight. I train about 10h a week and basically eat whatever I feel like but then I have a very fast metabolism. If I do go much below that for an extended period I start to get sick and my recovery suffers so if anything I have to be cautious and make sure I eat enough during periods of heavy training load.

I think this season I'll try and drop another 1-2kg during my taper a few days before the race as this is unlikely to effect my performance and recovery is less of an issue after the event as I will normally have a few easy days before getting back to the training. not sure how that will go over the course of a 6 month XCO season but I think it can work. I don't think it would be a good idea to try and train over a period of weeks/months at this weight though.
 
#29 ·
See a sports doctor to determine your target weight. They can calculate your body fat %, muscle, bone, and ect. Get on a diet like this one, it works great for recovery at the calories intake. https ://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/nutrition-101-eat-to-build-lean-muscle.html. Then set your calories to your target weight.
 
#30 ·
At 181cm and 65kg you are already a very skinny dude. Even by Pro-cycling standards you are skinny.

I don’t know your power numbers, but someone with your build will probably get more from pursueing the watts then kgs. There is probably a lot more power that you extract from your frame then there is kgs to lose. I would be surprised to see you get a significant gain in power with a bit more muscle mass.

Just to give context, a Pro-cyclist your height is usually 68-72kgs.
 
#32 ·
At 181cm and 65kg you are already a very skinny dude. Even by Pro-cycling standards you are skinny.

I don't know your power numbers, but someone with your build will probably get more from pursueing the watts then kgs. There is probably a lot more power that you extract from your frame then there is kgs to lose. I would be surprised to see you get a significant gain in power with a bit more muscle mass.

Just to give context, a Pro-cyclist your height is usually 68-72kgs.
Agreed. I'm ~180cm and my goal is 68kg. If I was 65kg, I'd probably be underweight and be sacrificing significant amounts of power to get there.
 
#31 ·
181cm and 63-64kg: that is Nibalis height and racing weight. Not only is he a skinny guy, he has a real slender frame as well. Might work for one with Nibalis genetics but certainly not for every one.
As much as weight is important for pro cyclists (especially GT contenders) it is not as important for even the avid amateur. When your ftp is already absurdly high you can start manipulating the w/kg equation on the weight side. For us mere mortals there is usually more to gain on the wattage part.
 
#33 ·
Something else to put in perspective and why it's dangerous to compare to pros, kind of what LMN pointed out, it's not that the guys are so skinny it's that they have massive engines, first and foremost.....recovery and good nutrition will get more gains there than losing a few lbs based on what I have seen.

Look at Froome, he used to be 15%+ body fat and high 160's lbs (76 kg), he'd still have enough power to blow any domestic dude away.

I found this a while back too, this guy probably walks around at 190 lbs (86 kg) and would be 'fit' by any standard even at that weight (aka normal)....but even at that weight he'd crush any local domestic race, off the front, ride away solo, no matter how hilly it was:

California Power: Analysis of Rory Sutherland's stage 4 power data | VeloNews.com

(478 Watts for 18 min with a couple 1-2 minutes efforts above 500 watts)

My strategy has changed a bit over the years, but I race better when I am comfortable and riding strong and recovered vs losing 5-6 lbs (2-3 kg).....which if I was a pro and had a nutritionist would probably be closer to 20 lbs or more (10 kgs) so I'd look like Wiggins @ 6-4 (194 cm) and 155 lbs (70 kg), which is doable...in theory.

I think 10-15% BF for a strong cyclist is fair and healthy to shoot for. I'd bet all the strongest local guys are somewhere in that range.
 
#35 ·
Something else to put in perspective and why it's dangerous to compare to pros, kind of what LMN pointed out, it's not that the guys are so skinny it's that they have massive engines, first and foremost.....recovery and good nutrition will get more gains there than losing a few lbs based on what I have seen.

Look at Froome, he used to be 15%+ body fat and high 160's lbs (76 kg), he'd still have enough power to blow any domestic dude away.

I found this a while back too, this guy probably walks around at 190 lbs (86 kg) and would be 'fit' by any standard even at that weight (aka normal)....but even at that weight he'd crush any local domestic race, off the front, ride away solo, no matter how hilly it was:

California Power: Analysis of Rory Sutherland's stage 4 power data | VeloNews.com

My strategy has changed a bit over the years, but I race better when I am comfortable and riding strong and recovered vs losing 5-6 lbs (2-3 kg).....which if I was a pro and had a nutritionist would probably be closer to 20 lbs or more (10 kgs) so I'd look like Wiggins @ 6-4 (194 cm) and 155 lbs (70 kg), which is doable...in theory.

I think 10-15% BF for a strong cyclist is fair and healthy to shoot for. I'd bet all the strongest local guys are somewhere in that range.
Eh, if Sutherland was 86kg, his w/kg for that climb would be 5.37.

There are plenty of domestic dudes who can do that at the end of a race. Now, four days into a stage race? Fewer. But, having raced on the road extensively, that (5.37 w/kg) is not an exceptional number. What IS exceptional is the massive power (462w for 18min) produced at his racing weight (75kg) on the fourth day of a stage race.

Fresh, at my race weight (63kg) with a warmup, at low elevation, I could match the Rory + 10kg (86kg) version (5.37w/kg) up that climb. I've done that before in training and in a race. And I'm hardly under consideration for a contract with UHC or Rally next year. But, take away even one of those variables and he'd stomp me into the ground.

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#34 ·
Brad Wiggins sacrificed quite a bit of raw power to bring his w/kg up to snuff for GTs. The Wiggins of just a year or two later, trying to win P-R was a very different beast. As was the Worlds TT winning and Hour Record version of him.

One thing to contemplate is that a lot of amateurs (with jobs, SOs, kids, etc.) don’t have the time to do the 25hrs+ a week to really max out their natural aerobic capabilities. With the 10-15hrs a week most people have to train, that numerator can only get so high. So, they focus on the denominator to get the overall w/kg number higher. It’s understandable.




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#52 ·
Good discussion here. I'm trying to get my weight down a bit, but having no luck. I'm 192 cm, currently sitting at 91kg. The best I ever see mid season (cross is my focus) is 87 kg. I've been putting more focus on the MTB than usual this year, and realize weight will matter more than for CX, but am struggling to make more progress. Cut out most beer/alcohol. Cut out eating cookies/fatty/sugary things except for before/during/after riding. I'm a cat 2 cxer, cat 1 xcer, but hoping to make a jump up in my fields this year. I'm in the 10-15 hr a week category, and not particulary strong upper body, something I feel negatively effects me, and have been working on at least integrating more cross training.

For what its worth I currently feel a decent amount healthier than when I havent been watching my weight.

Can anyone recommend some rule of thumbs for carbs/fat/protein ratios? I started tracking for a bit, and realized my fat content was a bit high on average, closer to 35%, with my carbs being around 55, and protein 10. With some work I'm getting closer to 60/20/20, but not 100% there yet, or do I know if this is the right choice. I'm assuming this changes a bit as I start to integrate more intensity?

Lastly, its not my intent to track this stuff, but I like to do it every once in a while as sort of a check in.
 
#54 ·
Good discussion here. I'm trying to get my weight down a bit, but having no luck. I'm 192 cm, currently sitting at 91kg. The best I ever see mid season (cross is my focus) is 87 kg. I've been putting more focus on the MTB than usual this year, and realize weight will matter more than for CX, but am struggling to make more progress. Cut out most beer/alcohol. Cut out eating cookies/fatty/sugary things except for before/during/after riding. I'm a cat 2 cxer, cat 1 xcer, but hoping to make a jump up in my fields this year. I'm in the 10-15 hr a week category, and not particulary strong upper body, something I feel negatively effects me, and have been working on at least integrating more cross training.

For what its worth I currently feel a decent amount healthier than when I havent been watching my weight.

Can anyone recommend some rule of thumbs for carbs/fat/protein ratios? I started tracking for a bit, and realized my fat content was a bit high on average, closer to 35%, with my carbs being around 55, and protein 10. With some work I'm getting closer to 60/20/20, but not 100% there yet, or do I know if this is the right choice. I'm assuming this changes a bit as I start to integrate more intensity?

Lastly, its not my intent to track this stuff, but I like to do it every once in a while as sort of a check in.
On the macro balance: percentages can be terribly misleading, especially for endurance athletes who can swing caloric needs by a factor of multiple thousand kcal per day. If you want a rough guide and don't want to read through the details, I would recommend the following:
1g protein/day per pound of lean body mass

What you do with fats and carbs is largely down to your comfort levels and how your body responds metabolically (see MattMay's post below, this touches on some of those points). Your body does not 'need' carbohydrates to function - the only organ which really suffers in the absence of glycogen is your brain, but after a period of time it will switch on ketone production in the liver which can substitute for glycogen. So theoretically you can go totally carb free if you want: ketogenic diets, Lyle McDonal rapid weight loss, Tim Noakes' banting etc.

Some endurance athletes stay away from carbs (quax has some good posts about training low which touch on this; see also Tim Noakes who was an ultrarunner-turned-nutritionist from South Africa) and some keep carbs as a central mainstay of the diet plan (see Allen Lim and the 'portables' diet etc., he works with WorldTour teams on the TDF).

All of this to say that there is no hard and fast rule of thumb behind macro ratios, except that you have to hit minimum protein requirements lest your body catabolize lean body mass while you're creating deficits. Weight loss results from deficits, weight gain results from surplus. One thing you must be careful of as an endurance athlete is creating deficits during training - Lyle McDonald has a great body of work on this; if your deficits are substantial and you are training, your hormonal balance will flip over (that's not the technical term obviously) and you'll actually gain or maintain weight rather than losing it. As with everything, moderation and patience are virtues here.
 
#53 ·
Stumbled on this thread but thought I'd comment. In addition to biking I play tennis. One day a hitting partner I hadn't seen in about 6 weeks showed up on the court, looking 15 lbs slimmer and getting to balls he usually didn't. I asked him if he was on some sort of diet. He said "not really, I went to see a nutritionist. I'm eating like twice as much as I was before." Obviously I queried him a bit more.

The nutritionist's name is Philip Goglia. He's in Santa Monica, CA, and is a regular on The Doctors tv show. Former bodybuilder. Big cyclist (road only). He's on staff for several local college and pro sports teams (UCLA, Rams, etc). He has clients like Chris Hemsworth and Ryan Gosling amd Chris Pratt. I've actually been in his I office when Gosling was there. He helps actors rip up for roles. He's written a book called Turn Up the Heat. His firm is Performance Fitness Concepts, site is http://pfcnutrition.com. He does long distance/phone coaching as well.

Short story long, obviously I went to see him. Not cheap. He starts with a blood test, basically a lipid panel. Turns out there are three metabolic types, which you can discern from a lipid panel. He says the fast/slow metabolic metaphor is wrong, it's more like hot/cold. About 70% if the population burns fat and protein most efficiently. About 25% burn carbos efficiently. (You know the type, strong beans who can scarf beer and pizza without gaining an ounce.) The remaining 5% burn all three equally efficiently.

From your blood he "types" you and constructs an eating plan. I came in as being in that 5%. I weighed 182 the day I went in. 90 days later I was 162.5...eating 7 meals a day and drinking 3-4 liters of water a day. NO difference in riding or working out. If I had to point to a popular diet as a comparison to how I eat, it would probably be Paleo. Lots of single ingredient items, no bread, pasta, etc.

I was not consuming enough calories, and the wrong kind at that. I was catabolic. I was actually in starvation mode and holding on to fat. And not drinking enough water...which is a lot more than you think to tell your body you're not dehydrated. When you're under hydrated your body cools metabolic rate. He would tell me he'd rather me eat a pizza than not drink enough water, because it would take three days to recover from not drinking enough. Full confession: it was annoying how much I'd have to pee.

At this point it's a way of life, and I've been able to maintain it. The water thing is a pain, but if I back off it I definitely see and feel a difference. It's a discipline. Not easy. Not always fun.

It's worthwhile at least picking up the book to get another perspective on all this. He gives you the breakdown on the metabolic types, how to determine yours, and most of the book is menu plans built on those.

Just thought I'd share!
 
#60 ·
I weighed myself for the first time in a while...I'm the heaviest I have been in years at about 68kg. But I also feel stronger than ever, and feel like I only have an extra couple kg of fat. I'm not worrying about it. I'll try, but I'm not going to try hard to lose it over the next month or two.

I'm thinking about trying my old "Jared" diet...footlong Vegi Delite sub to spread out half the day. Not sure that will work anymore since list time I did it I was substantially larger, and training less than now.
 
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