Stalled weight loss

Hi all. I have been using TR for about 4 months now and have had a 30W FTP increase. My height is 5ft 8, and I weight 73kg. My target weight is 68-70kg. I’m currently half-way through TR build phase, on a medium volume plan. I track my nutrition accurately with Myfitnesspal and have a consistent daily calorie deficit of 500 calories. My macros are 30 Carbs/30 Protein/35 Fat as I find that I’m quite sensitive to carbs while trying to lose weight. I increase my carb intake on TR workout days, and keep the bulk of my carb intake to before and during my workouts (I intake carbs during workouts of durations over 1 hour Sweetspot/ VO2 Max).

I have noticed that my weight loss has stalled over the last couple of months, and won’t budge from 73kg. I don’t want to cut my daily calories any further for fear of losing muscle.

Any suggestions on how to kickstart my weight loss again would be much appreciated. Cheers

1 Like

Stress due to workouts. Keep on doing what you are doing. Also I am assuming you are tracking/weighing everything.

2 Likes

Perhaps do a week with no calorie deficit, a surplus even. It may let your body know that you will continue feeding it so it doesn’t need to be in survival mode and lower metabolism. Get that fire burning again.

4 Likes

I’ve also been tracking calories. Increasing protein and carbs and decreasing fat has moved the needle for me again in the right direction.

The interesting thing is that while eating the same amount of calories, I was starving after I exchanged some fat calories for carb calories.

I got this idea by reading the P.E. Diet book. It’s an interesting book. The author, Ted Naiman, has a lot of videos on youtube. He usually advocates low carb but he said something interesting in a video I saw - that low fat / higher carb also works for weight loss. I thought I’d try lower fat / higher carb since low carb eating is at odds with training and cycling.

2 Likes

Anyone who recommends diet advice without taking into account one’s lifestyle, I chalk them up to not knowing wth they are talking about.

The reason you were starving after replacing carbs for fats is that fats digest slower, and stay in stomach longer. Three things slow down digestion. Fats, protein, and fiber. Try eating more fiber rich sources of carbs. And/or eat your fats and proteins before your carbs. Just don’t increase fiber too quickly without also drinking more water.

1 Like

Just to be clear, only thing that matters is calories. High carb or no carb is still just calories in or out. You may notice that you gain weight when you intake carbs because glycogen, which is the fuel you use for your workouts, contains water. You need this fuel. This is typically why folks say they lose weight when they go no-carb, because they shed all their glycogen and thus lose water weight right away. But in reality, that isn’t weight loss, that’s fuel loss, so don’t avoid carbs, just count your calories.

3 Likes

Carbs are not the enemy as you already know.

The key is more low calorie-dense carbs over sugars and chips. Real food basically. Those high calorie foods are high because either fats are added to them or extra sugar. Pure sugar is good for fuel but not nutrition and it won’t keep you satiated like real food carbs, particularly those with decent fiber content.

1 Like

Get an extra hour of sleep every night.

Twice a week, right after a meal do 45 minutes z2 riding. This in addition to regular workout schedule. Don’t eat after the ride or during the ride…until your next regularly scheduled meal.

1 Like

I think this is super difficult to do and some argue it might cause your BMR to decrease if it’s too consistent.

I shoot for small caloric deficit after Z2 rides twice a week, and break even every other day.

A 90 minute Z2 ride for me burns about 1150 kJs. I fuel 280 kCals on the bike (two Gatorades). That puts me in an 870 kCal deficit for the ride. The ride is easy enough that I just eat normally to maintain that deficit for the day.

On a 4 hour unstructured outdoor Z2 ride, I’ll eat 300-400 kCals for breakfast, then burn 2500 kJs on the bike and fuel half of that with carb drink and bars. After the ride, I can consume about 1700 kCals for the rest of the day and maintain a 1000+ kCal deficit.

Combined, that’s about 1800 kCals per week, or about half a pound, which I think is ideal for sustainability.

2 Likes

Thanks for the replies. Some great feedback :+1:

Who ever said anything about eating sugars and chips? I’m not sure why you are offering a sugar and junk food lecture.

Sorry, didn’t mean to make it personal. My point was that the general populations experience with high carb diets and why they are afraid of them is due to low quality high calorie dense carbs. Good carbs are your friend.

Interesting. What’s the reasoning for that? Not heard of that before.

Just something to try if you haven’t / are inclined to do so: Do a week or two of intermittent fasting (e.g. 16/8) and observe if it does anything to your metabolism.

I wouldn’t have believed it but it sped up my weight loss by factor 3-4 (same amount of training). Besides skipping breakfast I reduced carbs significantly to reduce cravings.

I’m a total IF noob though so better read up before taking any advice from me…

Three things…

First, it changes the blood glucose response post-meal fairly dramatically.

Second, it just flat out adds 1.5hrs of extra activity per week…a few extra hundred kcals.

Finally, it will act to suppress appetite. I know the TR crew just recently asserted on the podcast, ‘If you ride your bike it’s going to make you hungry.’ but this isn’t true. If you ride your bike hard…or lift weights…or run at 10k pace…it’s gonna set off a cascade of physiologic events that will make you hungry. If you do one of the rides I’m talking about and you are hungry when you’re done IT MEANS YOU RODE TOO HARD. :smiley: I avoid eating for 18 hours, be a little hungry, do one of these rides & suppress that hunger for several hours. Trust me, it’s true!

Several years ago I participated in a strava competition that was basically a 110 mile TT. I noticed one of the other participants posted blood glucose data in the ride feed so I contacted them & asked about it. Turned out to be data from a continuous monitor…and reviewing that data is where I got this idea. If we rolled into a gas station & ate some raspberry zinger while drinking a coke the shape of the blood glucose curve would be dramatically different depending on whether we sat around at a picnic table for another 40 minutes or got back on our bikes and rolled out again immediately. IMO glucose in the blood that gets consumed during light activity can’t make it’s way into a fat cell.

Interesting, thanks. I suppose its similar to how you can eat more sugar on the bike, because it gets used pretty much straight away.

And yeah, cycling usually surpresses appetite for me too, but typically more hard or long rides. Not sure if a short z2 ride would do anything for me in that regard.

Have you made any other changes to your exercise regime in the meantime? Body composition changes can result in plateaus as well.

I plateaued for about 5 weeks after restarting swimming. I may have been the same weight at the beginning and end of that period but I’m a good bit stronger and have clearly lost fat.

Weight lose had resumed since, I’ve lost another half a kilo in the last couple of weeks.