Body composition

kmavm

I've made a lot of gains over the last six months or so by losing about twenty pounds. I'm now down in the 132-134 lb range, depending on hydration, at about 5'8" (60-61kg at 173cm for my metric friends). I've cut my times on local hill benchmarks by a roughly proportionate amount, plus a little extra, due to some improvements to my training program. So, I'm pretty happy with what this weight has achieved for me.

While I haven't had reliable body composition testing done (skinfolds, etc.), I'm pretty darned lean at this weight. E.g., I have visible veins on my lower abdominal muscles.

However, I find I'm getting a bit mentally exhausted with the discipline required to hold this weight. Even eating clean (whole foods, stuff I've prepared myself at home, etc.) I need to restrict calories and go to bed a tad hungry to stay down here. Part of me thinks I need to take a break from the strict regimen and not worry about gaining back a few pounds. I'm in the northern hemisphere, so there aren't too many races to do for the next few months.

Then again, there's a local hill climb race that I have a chance of doing pretty well in on January 1st. (If I can maintain my current weight and power output, I should beat the winning time for my category from last year). I've never come close to winning a race before, and it would be life-changingly awesome to start off 2006 with a decent result.

What do you all think? Should I let a couple pounds creep on, then try to lose them before January 1st? Just let them creep on and not worry about them until spring? Keep the weight off? I'm sure a few of you born climbers will chime in telling me to lose some more weight.

I guess I also have a theoretical question, which is: where does all this body weight optimization end? Suppose, for the sake of argument, that I don't care about my health at all, and only care about cycling performance: should I really lose as much weight as possible? That's hard for me to imagine. The pros look skinny, but not marathon-runner skinny (unless they're pure climbers). Lance's tour weight (something like 158lbs, if I recall correctly) is really not that small for his 5'10" frame. So, unless Lance is getting it all wrong, some lean tissue is helpful for cycling performance. How much lean tissue? What role does event selection play? Genetics? Etc.

frenchyge

I was thinking about this the other day. It seems like we get fixated on eating lots of healthy carbs, but if everything we eat is rich in carbs then we cannot eat enough bulk to satisfy our hunger without overdoing our calorie intake. Are you eating a good mix of fiber (bulk) along with the carbs, proteins, etc? Can you mix in some foods that don't have as many calories per pound, so that you can eat more without greatly increasing your calorie intake? I'm as bad as they come in regards to diet, so I don't know the answer to those questions.

kmavm

I'm eating a very fiber-rich diet already. My morning meal is usually a half-cup of oatmeal (measured dry), and a whole fruite (apple, pear, asian pear, plum) all of which should be pretty fiber-rich. My lunch is a dry salad with either cottage cheese or 3 oz. of grilled chicken, i.e., a big ball of fiber. Dinner is a small protein portion (3-4oz.) plus 100kcals of starch (e.g., 1 small potato) and as many veggies (where carrots and peas and other starchy things don't count as veggies) as I feel like, so it often ends up a big ball of fiber, too. If I snack in the AM or PM, it's a whole fruit.

So, I'm pretty much ignoring the conventional wisdom that cyclists need to live on pasta and bread and bagels and powerbars. The exception here is if I'm on the bike for 90 minutes or more, I'll eat "power food" (gels, bars, etc.) at a rate of up to 60g of carbs per hour. I'm currently training in the vicinity of 10-15 hours per week, depending, so these do add up to a significant chunk of my food intake for the week. But, I figure they should be more than compensated for by the on-bike expenditure.

Pureshot78

Have you considered using a software program to track your calories and nutrition? One i used would track calories from Carbs / Protein / Fats and you could set variable goals for %s. Also was able to use the USDA guidlines as well as many of the 'fad' diets or a custom template.

kmavm

I'm not sure how this would help. I don't particularly care about macronutrient breakdown, since whatever I'md doing seems to be working well enough. To recap: I'm more than happy with my current weight. I also know what I have to do to maintain it, since I've been doing it for three months now. I'm just exhausted from trying to maintain it, and am wondering whether it's wise to try to hold this new, much ligher weight year-round from both short-, medium-, and long-term perspectives.

Felt_Rider

Just my opinion, but I believe it is much safer to cycle your bodyweight and conditioning.

You can set an upper limit for off season bodyweight / composition that is below the average male or female composition and yet give yourself a mental and physical break from the stress of maintaining a low bodyfat composition.

For my body type I could not physically hold down around >5% for more than a few weeks without risking viral infections and injuries from the stress of training and restricted calories. However, this can vary from person to person based on individual genetics.

If you are struggling now I would suggest not trying to hold the condition long term.

By the way good job on getting down to a low bodyfat level.

robkit

they say that if your body fat is much lower than 6-8% it can be unhealthy, notably it can lead to more frequent illness, so the optimal case (in terms of power:weight) of no fat is clearly undesirable.

i beleive that even pro's concede that maintaining "tour" weight is mentally taxing, and isnt something they do all year.

perhaps the best strategy is to stay within about 3 kilos of optimal weight - thats not an unmanageable amount to lose when the time comes.


thing is, if you struggle to maintain weight X, is it going to be any easier to maintain X + 3 kilos?! once youve gained the weight, you would still need to manage the same calorie balance every day to maintain the new weight i think?

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frenchyge

Dang! I don't know how that diet even gives you enough calories to sustain 10-15 hrs/wk on the bike. Maybe eating several helpings of celery or cardboard a day would help increase your dietary "bulk."

Normally I would say to ride at a stable weight, but I remember reading how hard you've worked to get to this level, and it's tough to let it go when you're finally getting the results you want. Still, it sounds like your body fat is extremely low, so your body might be fighting you a bit by trying to put some fat back on for a rainy day. Maybe trying to add a few more lean muscle pounds (which increases your basal metabolism) would let you increase your body fat slightly without hurting your bike performace, and by increasing your metabolism might let you eat a little more while keeping your weight stable? Just a thought. Hopefully someone who knows better will comment on whether that makes sense.

kmavm

I'm sure there's stuff I'm missing in there, and remember, I do eat when I'm actually riding the bike. I'm guessing my BMR is somewhere around 1600 kcals/day, and I'm definitely getting that from this diet (haven't lost weight in a while).

kmavm

Oops, hit reply a little early. Yeah, I'm curious about the role of lean mass as well. As I've mentioned above, even the pros, while they're undoubtedly super-lean, don't look super-skinny. I.e., they appear to have some substantial muscle mass to them, and the weights for Ullrich and Armstrong are not teeny-tiny.

I know the "gods" on this site are quick to remind us that cycling is an endurance sport, that it doesn't take much force to drive a pedal down, etc. And yet, some of the monsters of the sport seem to be carrying around a non-trivial amount of muscle mass. E.g., letour.fr lists Armstrong's weight as 78kg (!!!), and Ullrich's as 73kg. Obviously these guys are about as lean as they come, so there must be a lot of muscle on their frame. Do they just have such huge aerobic engines that they can actually power all those muscles aerobically? I know my own genetic endowment is very modest; does the amount of lean muscle mass you can carry scale with "engine size" (VO2max, power at your favorite definition of "threshold" or what have you, etc.)?

robkit

well armstrong has a big head. and ulrich has always had a huge weight on his shoulders called trying to beat lance. both of thse things sound fairly heavy!

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Dini77

LOL - that's funny mate

on a serious side, I find it very difficult to hold diet type intakes year round, rather i just do this on the lead up to key races for me. I think one of the earlier posts talked about upper and lower limits - that's pretty much my approach. I think Chris Carmichael has a good book out about eating right for cyclists, haven't read it though.

Equus123

my question for you is how long do you plan on staying at this weight? it seems like your body doesn't naturally want to be there.

i suggest periodizing your training throughout the year to peak during your season. but do this with your food too. i would suggest keeping your lowest daily caloric intake to go absolutely no lower than what you're already at. throughout the year as you increase training intensity, positively adjust your calorie intake to compensate. i think your body will balance out to be where it wants to be as long as your training and nutrition/diet comply with one another.

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kmavm

That's what I'm learning. After the last month or so of really struggling to stay down around 135, I decided it was taking too much mental and physical energy. My training and recovery were suffering. I felt completely overtrained on 8-10 hours without that much intensity, where my usual volume is in the 10-14 hour range. My sex drive had disappeared, and I was constantly preoccupied with calories and food.

Once these realities became clear enough, I decided I needed to eat like a somewhat normal person for a while, and if I gain some weight, so be it. Amazingly, my body went up to 140 in about three days. I don't think I can have run that big a caloric surplus in just three days, but who knows. Those five pounds all came from fruits, whole grains and lean meat, believe it or not!

Long story short, I feel much, much better after spending a week or so at 140. Mental and physical energy are both way up. I have a hill climb on January 1st, which is why I'd been trying to stay strict with the diet. But, ultimately, nobody's paying me to ride the bike, so my health and happiness have to come first.