Weight / Fat loss

I found that was beer.

I hardly drink beer anymore and along with a pretty strict gym routine I've managed to get my middle less whale like.

Anyway, I've been stuck at 87-88kg for the past 5 months - but my sizing has changed a lot - broader shoulders, thinner waist etc. Issue is I'm off to New York for a week and then Xmas rears it's ugly cheesey, meaty and booze soaked head...

Beer is a killer. And I LOVE beer. Damnit.

Ice cream's nice. Don't beat yourself up about it. The "bad day" thing makes me sad.
(Although I admit that my ocassional dips into this thread leave me feeling fairly bewildered - I don't think weight loss, conceptually, suits me... )

And I LOVE beer. Damnit.

I've switched my home beer to some low alcohol stuff (currently Saino's Czech 0.5% Low Alcohol lager). It tastes barely good enough to temporarily satisfy the thirst for beer, but nowhere good enough for me to have more than a couple (usually one is enough).

28 units of booze a week is (at least) 1680kcal, which is worth 1/2 lb of fat.

I REALLY like the erdinger alkoholfrei stuff, the falvour is nice, combined with the fact its been given out free at all my best races this year means that as soon as I drink some it takes me back to finish line satisfaction feelings, its annoyingly expensive though (for low alchohol beer)

@hoefla agree that ice cream is nice, the bad day was more related to eating a pile of sweets that I didn't even enjoy eating at the time, I figure if I'm going to eat stuff it should be tasty and hopefully healthy...

Erdinger alkoholfrei is on offer at Waitrose at the moment, FYI.

Have managed to establish a food routine which I think is sustainable and seems to be having the right effects. I'm strict for breakfast and lunch, then give myself a bit more lee-way for dinner; a bigger portion and a stubby, so I don't feel completely disconnected from enjoying food. I feel like this has been my trouble in the past, dramatic, unsustainable changes.
It's my girlfriends birthday tomorrow though, which means a weekend of restaurants and bars...

I REALLY like the erdinger alkoholfrei stuff

I just had 4 bottles delivered from ocado today for about £1.70 a bottle (500ml), I too had it post berlin half this year and for alcohol free it really is nice.

on my current nutrition plan i'm on a strict carb limit so i've not drank for a month but i figure I can afford to splurge on a bottle of this once a week after a hard session much like the post race thing you described.

will be by far the highest sugar content of anything i've eaten in a month though, averaging about 10g a day and most of that is incidental from stuff like salad. all my carbs have been high fibre stuff instead.

have lost over a stone since i started doing it though, just a shame I gained 2 stone over summer so am only halfway back to my starting point still.

good stuff, glad your plan is working out for you, I've tried restricting carbs and training in the past and while it does have a positive effect I always end up getting a huge unquenchable hunger drive that undoes all the progress.

my eating and weight loss is a fair bit more steady; I've lost about 1.5kg in the last 4 weeks, but I'm making good progress on a diet of roughly 60% carbs, 20% fat and 20% protein, with as much as possible coming from whole grains and vegetables.

The result is that I'm managing to eat three big meals a day which is keeping me happy plus a few snacks here and there which are generally carby, and quick energy like bananas or energy gels shortly before a hard workout.

I can't see the diet taking off commercially though as aside from the slow progress it also requires a lot of exercise!

my current split is 20% carb 30% protein 50% fat. but i tend to go a little over the protein and a little under on the fat.

on 2000kcal a day it's 100g carb, 150g protein, 110g fat and i tend to eat about half my calories over breakfast and lunch with the rest reserved for a decent dinner.

last 2 days I've woke up with not much appetite so made myself a super protein shake instead. and that keeps me going til after my trip to gym (I go at 11am every day to avoid it being too busy)
have been trying to top up my basic foods with stuff that helps me get everything I need to balance my diet (even if some of it is a little synthetic) so my morning shake is

300ml coconut milk (the diluted milk-substitute kind not the tinned cooking stuff)
30g whey protein
1 tablespoon milled flaxseed (for omega-3)
10g cocoa nibs (for potassium/antioxidants)
20g hazelnut butter
1/2 avocado
handful of spinach (for vitamins)
7g myprotein nutri greens (am a fussy veg eater so this is just to keep me close to my 5-a-day)
10g vitafiber (to bulk out my fibre intake)

comes out quite thick with the avocado but it's still drinkable though could be loosened up with a little water.

not sure it's an everyday thing for me though but helps me get on top of a lot of my nutritional requirements so I can be a bit more free in what I eat for dinner.

in general though out of the 4 weeks i've been doing this I've probably had 4 days where I've snacked between meals and that was generally because i'd not eaten enough in the preceding meal.

They have a kind of unfermented beer up here.

Tastes like fizzy sweetened marmite. ie. Awesome.

Not that low cal. But full of B vits.

I drink about 12 bottles a week.

Closing in on two weeks without a beer. Got a stone to lose...

Fancy going running with me? I've not run for months so will be tres slow, need some motivation to get back to doing it regularly.

81.3kg this morning. Jabba alert!

85.8kg yesterday, down from a high of 91.3kg at the start of September.

Get a dog!

102.3kg was 109.1kg on 8th Oct so down 6.8kg in 7 weeks on 2000kcal a day but low carbs & no sugar.

quite happy my diet/nutrition seems to be nicely sorted now so hoping can get under 100kg by the time I start marathon training in 3 weeks. still a long way off where I want to be though.

28 units of Rum is 1568kcal.

28 units of Rum is 1568kcal.

It'll be slightly more than that, my figures were more aimed at lager which is a bit bulkier.

The alcohol in 28 units of rum (or any alcoholic drink) will account for 1568kcal (alcohol is 56kcal per unit) but the rest of the liquid that isn't alcohol is unlikely to be completely calorie free.

Looking online I can find stats for some 80 proof rum (40% ABV) which is 231kcal per 100ml. So that's 4 units (40ml alcohol). So 28 units will be 7 times as many calories, 231*7 = 1617kcal.

That's a really decent return.

I think I might employ a similar tactic up until and then after Xmas period.

How are you finding your recovery after the gym?

I managed to go to the gym 4 times in 6 days in NYC and aiming to go tomorrow but I'm dreading stepping on the scales. I know I'll be plus 90kg for the first time since March :'(

Work, Illness, holiday and house stuff have put a bit of a dent in my efforts of late

#fuckingexcuses >>>>>>>

You do have to drink less units of it to accomplish the same thing (unless your me in which case, drinking rum can be a very bad idea). I found 56kcal for 40% rum online and did the calculations with that. Probably depends on the site you go to though.

Have been working away from home for 3 months = and chips most nights and a good few pints taking full advantage of my meal allowance. Also, no cycling.

The consequence of this + 7.5KG. Resting HR has gone up from 54 to 69. Fuuuckkk.

So i've got rollers some ant+ gear for speed and cadence, and a few weights.

I've never had to lose weight, lucky me i guess, but now i do.

Help?! I'm conscious if i diet i need to do it in such a way i retain energy for exercise but that's as far as i can get. Worth spending a few weeks building baseline fitness before cracking on with the diet?

1. Don't beat yourself up.
   
2. Start the diet- but be sensible.
   
3. Train even more sensibly.
   
   
   

Things that have worked for me.

-Calorie control is everything, but you need to account for fuck up %- give yourself a target figure (say -400 for the day), and give yourself 20% leeway on this figure. eg- BMR is 2100, aim for 1700 but allow up to 2000 or down to 1300- on days where you don't exercise)
Obviously the aim is to have more days around the 1600-1800 than any other.

-With Exercise- take the calorie burnt estimate with a pinch of salt. You'll probably burn 700 from a good hard hour of cycling, but I've always assumed 500 per hour.

-It is fucking hard work, and boring to keep this up. Give yourself a treat day, maybe 2ce a month, or whatever. Reward yourself.

-DO NOT WEIGH YOURSELF EVERY DAY. It is pointless. Weighing time is maximum 2x/ week. Make it the exact same day every week at the exact same time with the exact same preceding events. So ideally- out of bed, before you go do any exercise or pretty much anything else.

-Be nutritionally conscious- up your fruit and veg intake, take some b12, in fact a multi-vit is probably alright (even though you will probably piss it out) and take some omega fat supplements.

-Try and avoid alcohol. For all kinds of reasons, but predominantly because ice cream or cake totally kicks its ass as a treat. Obviously don't cut it fully out- but significant control is required.

-Additionally- you will discover that exercise is slightly harder initially, but it will get easier. Just stick with it and don't eat because you're about to exercise.

-TL;DR- be sensible, don't expect fast change, don't expect any of the above to be easy.
Sorry, it sucks but its worth it, probably*.

*with the obvious caveat that a little fat seems to be protective/ too much obsession is a bad thing/ etc/ etc/ etc.