Big change coming :D

[geoffdavison]

So totally no geek related.. decided to start training for triathlons.. hoping to lose some weight and trim down..

My current build is more linebacker... I always get comments of "did you play pro ball.. etc".. kind of over being the big guy that everyone asks to help move furniture...

So dropping 700 bucks on a bike and going to hit it hard...

Don't know why i'm posting here.. maybe it will help keep me going

[Ðeceased]

oo what distances you looking at for each leg?

hope you don't mind me asking but have you looked into the diet you are going to be on for your training? am training for a 10k run atm and got stuck at around 50 mins :S am only really getting somewhere now that I changed my diet (seems training is 40% work 60% diet). Not diet as in eating less, but eating properly

Has helped that my dad recently became a personal trainer (exploiting family :P ) might be able to answer some questions you might have

[geoffdavison]

Mostly just starting the training to start and move into diet modification next... although i am going to be cutting out all the "crap".. no more cokes

i've been doing research and the most common theme seems to be increased periodicity and interval training.. one week longer runs and the next doing intervals...

[Stabface]

GL man, been dieting and working out myself since December. Lost about 25 lbs so far, 25 more to go.. my goal is by the end of the year and as long as I stick with it I'll make it for sure, early even

And yeah, get your diet sorted out. No, don't starve yourself but eat healthy, smaller meals and more of them. It is the key to losing weight. You can work out all you want but if you are eating junk, too much calories or a bad balance of fats/carbs/protein then you'll have a hard time.
I eat about 6-7 times a day, just less portions of what I normally eat, anything from a 1-200 calorie snack to 5-600 calorie meal. I cut back heavily processed foods and simple sugars and, that's basically it. No magic diets or any of that crap, just keep an eye on you calorie intake and eat quality foods. For example yesterday I had a bacon cheeseburger for lunch, today, I had pork roast with gravy and mashed potatoes and vegetables for dinner -- eat what you want just eat less of it is the key! I aim for a 2200-2400 calorie intake daily as thats what I need to lose about 1 lb a week.

[Ðeceased]

been looking at some insane training programs recently the UK marines need on average around 6000 calories a day to maintain their bodyweight any less and they would shrivel away :S


coming back to our own diets tho as Stabface said small meals is the key. You'll need to maintain your protein levels throughout your training but not in the way most do with shakes, a steak or whatnot.
Your body can only absorb around 25-28grams of protein with each meal you take in, so eating a stake for instance, means all but those initial 25g is going to go right into your fat deposit around yer belley (not assuming that you have one, just in general).
This would be the number one reason why 80odd% of the UK or US population have a protein deficiency whilst still, eating a lot of meat!

on average you will need around 1gram of protein per day, per Kg of body weight if you are not training. that number goes up to 2gperdayperKg if you are doing intensive training. Triathlon training would put you at around 1.6g (2g is seriously only for top athletes)

I'll use my body weight as an example.

73Kg*1.7= 117g of protein a day divided by 25g per meal means I am looking at around 5-6 meals a day depending if I eat protein with every meal.

Calorie wise, stabface is spot on. try to stick to the lower limit at first, and slowly increase it as you start loosing weight. I know this sounds counter-productive but there is a reason behind this. Assuming you haven't done too much training in the past, your muscles will attempt to build up more muscle fibres then a normal person (it seems roughly in the first week or two of training, going from absolute 0, that the body drastically increases its energy consumption), to which you must make enough protein and energy available once you start training. Keeping to lower calorie diets for an extended period of time usually results in your body acctually converting muscle fibres back into energy if you aren't providing your body with enough.
The average male would burn 1800 calories if he were to lay in bed all day and not move. Your body functions require an amazing amount of energy, so those spare 400-600 calories are what you should be looking at using up each day on training (roughly an hour of cycling at my weight)

Oh and head down to the gym if you haven't already! you need to build up your muscles for strength too, otherwise you run the risk of damaging your knees when you start training for the running part of your tri (I know too many ppl who have ground their knees down because of their lack of strength training :S ). Besides when you start building up muscles you'll be burning more calories even when your not training ^^ = more fat loss although not necessarily weightless :P

[Tasty]

I ate three pieces of steak yesterday /flex (Lemon peppercorn ftw) Thats right lemon on steak.

The average male would burn 1800 calories if he were to lay in bed all day and not move.

So if I sleep in till 3pm I'll be burning around 900 calories without doing anything!? :P

Also good luck with your training

No more cokes

I feel your pain

[Ðeceased]

I ate three pieces of steak yesterday /flex (Lemon peppercorn ftw) Thats right lemon on steak.

The average male would burn 1800 calories if he were to lay in bed all day and not move.

So if I sleep in till 3pm I'll be burning around 900 calories without doing anything!? :P

acctually you will have burned 1125 (from midnight to 3pm :P -15hours), but careful, resting doesn't mean sleeping as such, just not active. When you are resting your Heart Rate, gastrointestinal functions, brain activity, muscle activity (even tho your are resting) will increase quite substantially vs you sleeping.

there's a simple calculation you can use to work out how much energy your body uses up in complete resting (not sleeping)

Age----------------- Male-------------------Female
10 - 18 ------ 17.5 x W + 651 ------ 12.2 x W + 746
19 - 30 ------ 15.3 x W + 679 ------ 14.7 x W + 496
31 - 60 ------ 11.6 x W + 879 ------ 8.7 x W + 829

where W is your weight in Kg


Note: this is just an average, it depends a lot on your metabolism and hundreds of other factors. intelligence for one :P only jkin But things such as temperature, etc stress... list goes on and on

[Binaryzero]

I can tell you cutting out the "Crap" foods (or carbs) helps alot, I dropped 20 lbs (not that I was THAT bad, but...) just by cutting out sodas (diet included) and other sugars. Thought I really would not call it such, what I do is close to the Southbeach diet. It list out the good and bad carbs and how much of each you can have and hope to lose weight.

Good Luck, with your training. I have a great bike but until the kids are out of school, I will not have the time to ride it

[Dawnstone]

My weakness is Mt Dew at the moment. What did you all switch to when soda wasn't an option?

[Niveous]

Lost 150 lbs over the last 6 months just by eating better; no exercise involved. I started drinking Fresca instead of pop, I actually like it better.