I’m signed up for IMCA in October. I don’t have a lot of concerns about finishing, but I would like to improve over my average. I’ve done one full and several half in the last couple years. My time for the full was 16:39 (with an injury) and my half times are generally just about eight hours, so I know I’m not even remotely fast.
I would like to improve that but I don’t think my slow pace is nearly as much about fitness as it is about weight. I’m a good 20 pounds heavier than I want to be, and that’s significant for my size.
I know someone who has had good results with weight loss through intermittent fasting. It sounds like a very viable strategy. However, given the intensity of training for a FIM, I have to wonder if it’s something that’s really feasible with that kind of training.
I certainly wouldn’t attempt the full protocol I’ve heard involving a 72 hour fast several times over the course of a month. But what about a 20/4 or 18/6 on my “down day”? How would fasting affect recovery? Maybe just two or three days a month to try and kick in autophagy?
I fast every day to at least noon, when I work out completely fasted(except coffee). I have found I can do at least 2 1/2 hours if I needed to without interruption or bonking. Of course if I were to be doing a much longer day(which I don’t anymore) then I would fuel during the workout. It has been at least 8 years now that I do this regime, and hunger in the mornings went away in the first couple of weeks.
The thing I have to work on now to hold the weight down is what I eat. In the beginning you lose a good amount just from the fasting and only eating in a 6 hour window or so. But eventually you still have to clean up your diet to get the full benefits..THe need to eat is a lot in your head, and you can really train you body to do great things on an empty stomach and the reserves from last nites meal..
It just becomes another habit, and I only break it if I’m having a breakfast with others on a vacation or something rare like that..
Intermittent fasting doesn’t have magical properties. It works by causing you to eat less over the course of the day, week, etc. So why not just eat less in a controlled way - count calories using Myfitnesspal or something similar? You have a job where you work shifts without full control of your schedule, if I remember correctly, so avoiding morning/evening sessions is not really on the table?
After 10 years of doing tris up to middle distance and weighing more than I’d like to or need to, I hit a 12 kilo (26 pound) excess (92 kilos, so 201 pounds) this February, and said “enough is enough”. I downloaded an app that lets you scan bar codes and AI-analyze plate content and makes calorie counting quick and easy, and lost 2/3 of that over 2.5 months. I eat about 2100 calories a day plus whatever I burn in training (net of Speed Nectar consumed), so typically about 3000, resulting in a deficit of 500-700. I’m now the lightest I’ve been in the last two decades, and have been training for a June 5-hour race throughout (~10 hours a week). I only paused the weight loss protocol just before and during a triathlon camp in March (i.e. continued to count calories but ate as much as I was estimated to be burning, so ca. 6000 kcal/day).
I learned a ton about products that fill you up on few calories (potatoes) or quite the opposite (nuts). Calories in, calories out. No way around it.
Oh and it massively helps with consistency. If you know that skipping training cuts your dinner down to 200 kcal, you don’t really skip training…
Also recommend the book “Race weight” by Fitzgerald.
Any time I restrict calories for a few days in a row (not prolonged fasts even, other than maybe a late breakfast), I end up getting minor aches and injuries that invariably go away when I eat more for a few days.
Low calorie + lots of running longer term is a great way to get stress fractures.
Great point, but it’s individual IMO. Some people have naturally higher bone density and are less prone to this risk. Also, I figure excess fat “helps”, no? There’s a reason old age osteoporosis primarily hits slimmer folks.
I mean, no one normal thinks I’m fat, not by a long shot. But to a triathlete I’ve got a few handfuls I could stand to lose…
So I definitely have some fat stores I’d like my body to metabolize, but if sure does want to hold on to it and make my bones and tendons suffer first.
I don’t stress too much about it and I’m not trying desperately to lose it. I just come back to the conclusion for me that I’ve a period of years my body gets where it needs to be but faster changes I will pay for either with injury, which reduces training potential or with less training up front and focus primarily on the calorie restriction.
Since I’m kind of addicted to exercise as much if not more than the eating… I’d rather not stop just to lose 10lbs. But yes, I guess some people are different and maybe heavy set people carry so much mass their bones are already tough.
That’s partly true, but there are other benefits too. I had several major improvements in some of my blood markers, primarily ii got rid of my fatty liver and halved the bad markers associated with it. My triglycerides also dropped into normal range, and my mental battle with food came under control.
And to Lurker and the running injury increase you felt, what really causes running injuries is being 20 to 30 lbs overweight. Now I’m not saying to fast during Ironman training, just that for a light schedule of 6 to 10 hours a week it is entirely possible. Any more and like I said, probably best to fuel during your longer sessions. My 2 to 3 runs a week never go over 10mpw, and all on dirt and treadmill, so I have not experienced any sort of injury or twinges that you did.
Mondays are my typical rest day or easy day. So I would fast from dinner Sunday night to dinner Monday night. I still qualified for KONA during that build so I would say it didn’t affect my training. Now, I’m just a turd, but trying to get back into it.
Restricting intake + increasing exercise seems like a sure fire way to get injured. I’d also have concerns about whether I was creating a Low Energy Availability situation and making myself prone to RED-S problems. This sounds like something you should do in conjunction with a nutrition professional (not sure what the designations are in the US) rather than asking for anecdotal advice on the internet.
This is about what I do. Since a couple of years I skip breakfast. You get used to that quite soon. In this way I went from 88 kg in winter (85 in summer) to 86 (84 in summer). Than stagnation. Still doing Ironmans with overweight.
This year I finally wanted to do an IM with a race weight of 80 kg (at least 82). So I had to change some more.
Since October (weighing 86) I have one meal (of the two) without carbohydrates. And I stopped with snacks totally (not easy on the couch at night). As Monty, I admit to have some exceptions on vacation.
Now I have 82 kg, on the brink of 81. I already notice it from the running pace.
I’m a clinic nurse now so my schedule is very consist. That’s actually a double-edge sword for IM training. When I worked the hospital, I generally had four days off a week to train hard. Now, I can only do light “maintenance” work outs on the weekdays and heavy training on Saturday and Sunday.
As for diet, I don’t necessarily eat a lot of bad food. I just over eat. I do need to get better about portion control What really does me in is my addiction to soda. And when I say addiction, that’s not much of an exaggeration. Dr. Pepper is like crack to me. I know it’s horrible for me but I just can’t help myself.
I am definitely one of those “denser” people. Ideally, I would like to get down to 145. According to the general BMI chart, for my height and age, that still puts me in the obese category, but with my bone and muscle density, that actually puts me right around 23-24%. I would be happy with that.
Your last comment is ironic to me. I often joke that “I don’t exercise like I do because I like to exercise. I exercise like I do because I like to eat.” I say that in jest, but there’s quite a bit of truth to it as well. I got started down the triathlon path because I was just doing 5 and 10k stand alone races. I went to my doctor and my A1c was 5.9 (pre diabetic) and my doctor encouraged me to bring that down through diet and exercise. So I made a conscious decision that it was actually easier for me to increase my activity level than to decrease my calorie intake. Don’t get me wrong, I have improved my diet, but not to the exclusion of the items I really enjoy the most. I just chose to up my activity level to a point where my body was forced to use some of those worthless calories rather than store them.
And in case you’re curious, I’m still pre diabetic, but it is better.
Ya, this is kind of what I’m thinking. Just maybe do a 20/4 or 16/8 on my off day. I generally have at least one off day a week as I see one patient once a week after my day job.
I don’t have a lot to add on top of what others have already said. I’ll just throw in my 2c to say even if you’re only eating in a 4-6 hour window on a daily basis you can still overeat (I could comfortably throw down a large pizza in one sitting if I so desired). Storm eating/binge eating when you’re super hungry is also quite common so it will take a lot of restraint to not do that. So it may not be the magic bullet you’re after.
