assuming you are asking me. I try very hard not to track to closely as ive had disordered eating my entire life and the slippery slope to not eating at all is an easy one to get on when I start tracking. I eat roughly 2000kCal/day outside of ride fueling, with an emphasis on protein and fiber, no absolute restrictions. Ive been down the restriction road before (I was keto/carni for 4 years and before that i dabbled in plant based, cico, macros ect. if there is a diet i have tried it) i train about 16ish hrs/week which is pretty consistent with what i have done for yrs. (triathlete now racing marathon mtb/gravel) biggest side effect is that I have to be very cognizant of my fueling. It was nothing before to go for a longish ride fasted. Now there is no way I can do that without feeling hypoglycemic.
Interesting thread, as a recreational cyclist who is now 5 weeks into Mounjaro.
I started at 106kg, FTP circa 180w-200watts
In 5 weeks I have lost 7kg, and around 40watts sustained power.
I can still hit peak power no issuse but energy is just not there to sustain anything, so much like the op, I am just pottering about having fun and that is getting noticeably easier as I get lighter and my body adapts to the lower calories.
My power seems to be improving, as are my energy levels compared to weeks 1-3, but not there yet.
In terms of fuelling, I will try to eat as much as possible the day before which is still a deficit as I cant seem to overeat on GLP-1, not even one day in the whole time have I exceeded my net calories.
I have a banana in the morning with a coffee before I ride, but am still doing very short easy circuits, slowly interjecting a few harder intervals as I improve over the weeks.
Today I had carbs in my bottle as a test, in a cautious close to home circuit, but that wasnt needed as they landed fine while exercising.
Like others have said, there is no way anyone could compete on GLP-1 succesfully. Any kind of over exertion, for me, results in complete exhaustion and nausea.
I’d encourage you to drink those carbs. You are already in a calorie deficit. Not fueling workouts just puts you in a deficit for the next workout. One banana is not enough.
The lack of fuel and muscle glycogen stores could be where those 40 watts went.
Congrats on the weight loss!
Fair comment and almost certainly correct that the lack of fuel is causing the drop on power.
An unfortunate trade off to shift the weight. Body will adapt both in fat burming potential and daily calorie requirments and of course getting used to mounjaro, which i am not yet. Still have the occasional side effects.
On carbs in bottle, on mounjaro its something that you have to be careful of as one sip to many is a fast lane to needing an emergency hedge stop.
Not at all fussed about the short term power loss, just turning the cranks, enjoying myself as i shed the dead weight. Once at goal weight ill focus a lot more on carbs/calorie intake before and during as i lift the intensity again and seek to regain power and strength.
Ride safe !
Why is that?
The body processes sugar differently when you are exercising.
Welcome to the club!
I can now give a “6 months later” (and 12 months overall on Mounjaro) perspective which may help.
In brief, my weight loss has slowed considerably and now just drifting down gradually and specifically only when I’m focusing on it instead of flying off without thought like those early days. This is likely because I’ve chosen to go back down to the 5mg dose - it works best for my gut and I’m no longer desperate to lose weight fast like I was. I’m very happy with how it’s going.
What that has meant for my training is that my bike fitness is the best it has ever been. I can consciously fuel my workouts fully and my power numbers have just got better and better. I’m currently sat at 297w at 89kg, anxiously awaiting my next AI FTP update. So up 17w since I started Mounjaro and down 21kg. I’m very happy with how it’s going.
Mounjaro is a GLP 1 which slows down digestion. Its then very easy to “over do it” on carbs when on Mounjaro and cause sudden nausea/diarrhea.
Not something you want on a bike when miles away from home.
Thanks for that update, as yet I have not gone past 5mg. Will see at 8 weeks how I am getting on if I do go up. No need at this point. My calories are already too low some days.
Is this something you experienced?
It doesn’t seem like drinking a liquid would be a problem for the decreased rate of gastric emptying on a glp1.
I tried ozempic for a while and never experienced any kind of nausea or diarrhea. In fact the problem was the opposite - getting too bottled up - painfully bottled up.
Mildly yes. Any over indulgence and my stomach is definately not happy, and I will be nautious and potentially “loose”. Not drastic and not sudden as others have had though.
Yes too to being constipated at times.
As a good friend also on mounjaro said, I never really thought it was possible to have diarhea and constipation at the same time until I started mounjaro.
Last night I drank a bottle of carbs pre-TT, and I certainly had a lot of “gurgling” that had me wondering where the nearest loo was. Thankfully not needed.
I’ve been doing very well competing on tirzepatide. You do need to work very hard to dial in your nutrition because any holes are absolutely glaring. But I have been competing marathon MTB and gravel this year including unbound where I did well. I have also been joining the A road groups this summer to learn the skills i need to push up onto page 1 of the results from page 2.
I use precision gels(3/hour) plus maurten drink mix for hard efforts.
I tried tirz last year (low dose) and had a weird experience. No GI side effects. I think the food noise went down a bit but the real hunger signals (stomach rumbling) went up? And it absolutely destroyed my ability to ride fasted. I’d bonk after an hour. I suspect it must’ve interfered with fatty acid metabolism, as it suppresses glucagon. Typically I’m on the far end of the spectrum when it comes to fat adaptation. I can ride long distances without food (obviously not ideal, but shit happens). Tirz basically zapped my superpowers. I stopped because I felt it interfered with my training too much. Might consider playing around with the dosage or looking into it again during the off-season.
My partner has done a 2 month cycle of Mounjaro. She has lost a lot of weight but has struggled with GI and exercise. I think she has lost muscle but she has barely been eating, I’m personally looking forward to her getting an appetite back and hopefully being able to do a bit of exercise again.
But for weight loss, it has taken her from overweight bmi (just over 27) to middle of the healthy range, so should be a better place to start exercising. And hopefully given her the motivation to be healthy and continue.
Anyone have any experience training while taking Retatrutide? Putting aside the whole aspect of it not yet being officially on market (big ask, I know) - how are people finding endurance training while on it? There is a lot of chatter about this product online.
I think the general consensus in the peptides community is to start with Sema or Tirz first. IF you hit a wall later on with weight loss then you can transition to Reta. Reta has a lot of hype recently in the bodybuilding community but it’s not fully studied / approved and much more expensive.
I’d imagine the chatter you are hearing is NOT from the endurance community. What do you want out of a peptide that’s not available in tirzepatide? Also, there is a lot of chatter about TRT as well, but in our sport it’s banned. If your source is social media and general fitness platforms I don’t think you’re going to find it applicable to endurance sports.
I used tirzepatide for two months and experienced a considerable reduction in body weight, particularly through fat mass loss. However, I closely monitored my body composition daily using a bioimpedance scale, maintained my training routine, and even increased my strength training load. I was able to preserve my lean mass and slightly improve my performance.
That said, I would not recommend using this medication close to competitions. I raced L’Étape in September and, by a miracle, I was almost disqualified at the finish when I had no strength (and no glycogen) left to sustain the long final climb.
Best regards.
I have tried all three: sema(really really had hypoglycempic issues but i think this was learning how to fuel differently, also GI upset). tirz (my preference. it shuts off food noise while also letting me fuel/race). and Reta(somewhere between the two. my dose of tirzepatide is low enough that i found that it actually required more reta to get the same level of shutting down food noise and then i felt tired/no appetite at all).
I think it would depend on the dose you are on and what you are looking for.
The challenge of being on a glp1 to lose weight while training is that you are using it to run an intentional chronic, long term calorie deficit.
Any kind of training is going to be more challenging.
Yeah I haven’t seen much online in endurance spaces about retatrutide, hence the Q here. I think it would be interesting to hear experiences due to the third inhibitor - glucagon (which the main Nate mentioned up in the thread), as it supposedly stimulates fat metabolism in a way that other peptides don’t. I wonder if cyclists experience on Reta would be different than the current two on the market.
I think if you’re close to approaching the pointy end of performance it’s probably not worth taking it to shave a couple KGs, but casual cycling needing to drop multiples of 10 kgs may find utility. Although I wonder if microdosing could be advantageous to pros, maybe in offseason?