Cycling UK Forum

I am very tall and burn an awful lot of calories. I struggle to hold onto weight if I'm cycling a lot, and with the effort of moving house (internationally) and a now much more active lifestyle, I've lost about 5-6kg over the last 2-3 months. Down from 110kg, to about 104kg.

I know how to eat well, and how to pack calories in, but the sheer calorie burn cycling 200km a week..... Swimming every day (only 10-15 minutes, but the water is starting to cool now, resulting in more calories burned) and cycling the kids to and from school. I also spent about 3hrs down dismantling a neighbours tree and processing the firewood.

As an example, this is what I've eaten today.

Greek/Turkish yoghurt - 10% fat. 500g with stewed apple/jam/sugar for first breakfast

500ml tropical juice during my 50km morning ride.

Porridge - 125g oats, 450ml full fat milk, 20g sugar

Cornflakes (not an ideal lunch, but it was a busy day). 125g. 600ml full fat milk. 20g sugar.

500g fruit yoghurt

50g sweets (a rare treat, prior to starting my neighbours tree)

Dinner: 250g pork roast, 300g mixed veg, 800g potatoes, 40g butter. 500ml beer.

I'll have 400g or so of homemade stewed apple before bed.

And I'm struggling to maintain weight on a diet like this!

What kind of tricks do you guys have to avoid unwanted weight loss?

Maybe you could pack a lot of carbohydrates into your daily eating routine. Something like pasta can really pile the pounds on.
But really your current situation is a good one so there is no need to worry. Having less weight is obviously more beneficial for your health than being overweight.

Cyclo2022 wrote: ↑6 Sep 2022, 8:51pm Maybe you could pack a lot of carbohydrates into your daily eating routine. Something like pasta can really pile the pounds on.
But really your current situation is a good one so there is no need to worry. Having less weight is obviously more beneficial for your health than being overweight.

I do eat a reasonable amount of pasta and rice too. I just don't remember having to eat quite so much as a kid when I was last cycling properly. I was a lot skinnier then though.

I'm still carrying some muscle from weight training, and I'd rather not lose that, but I'm not fat.

But then I'm sure I remember reading that Tour de France riders are on 7000kcal a day and I've got 40kg on the average rider there.

I do sometimes wish I had a slower metabolism - I remember people telling me when I was younger that it all changes in your 30s and into your 40s (I'm now 38) but that hasn't happened for me!

I would recommend more protein for lunch. and More vegetables, as well as the fruit/juice. The porridge and yogurt are good, but as you said, cereal isn't an ideal lunch.

We often cook an extra portion or two for the evening meal & save it for lunches. My lunch yesterday, for example was left over vegetable pie & sweet corn on the cob.

Monday, I had leftover rice, roasted vegetables, and lentil soup.

Both of those were evening meals at the weekend.

Today, I will likely make a broccoli & cheese omelette, lacking leftovers. But tonight, I am making chilli & rice for the evening meal, and I will make a few extra portions & have that for lunch Thursday & Friday.

Also, some sauces, like salad dressings, mayonnaise, bbq sauce, tartar sauce, etc. are high in calories. Slathering them on can be an easy way to get extra calories in your diet.

Since adulthood, I've had a bmi in the high teens, pretty much irrespective of what I eat. Now in my sixth decade, I've got used to it.

Vorpal wrote: ↑7 Sep 2022, 7:56am I would recommend more protein for lunch. and More vegetables, as well as the fruit/juice. The porridge and yogurt are good, but as you said, cereal isn't an ideal lunch.

We often cook an extra portion or two for the evening meal & save it for lunches. My lunch yesterday, for example was left over vegetable pie & sweet corn on the cob.

Monday, I had leftover rice, roasted vegetables, and lentil soup.

Both of those were evening meals at the weekend.

Today, I will likely make a broccoli & cheese omelette, lacking leftovers. But tonight, I am making chilli & rice for the evening meal, and I will make a few extra portions & have that for lunch Thursday & Friday.

Also, some sauces, like salad dressings, mayonnaise, bbq sauce, tartar sauce, etc. are high in calories. Slathering them on can be an easy way to get extra calories in your diet.

Yeah, it wasn't an ideal lunch. Needed something very quickly before picking up my daughter from school.

I think part of the issue is that my diet has changed a bit since moving to Sweden. We've been here 6 weeks now, and the food is subtly different. I'm eating much more cleanly, certainly, but almost all my high calorie, low effort options are no longer available. No bad thing I suppose.

Regarding protein, I've always kept a close eye on it generally (weight training history means I've always got it at the back of my mind).

I'm pretty sure I'm doing 150-200g a day on average, which is a lot more than most cyclists.

I think I need to sort out more on-ride carb options, as well as prepping larger quantities of food generally. I bake my own bread and am quite a good cook. I'm working on getting into the routine of batch cooking large quantities, but more often than not, if I cook a lot, I just eat it all there are then!

simonineaston wrote: ↑7 Sep 2022, 8:11am Since adulthood, I've had a bmi in the high teens, pretty much irrespective of what I eat. Now in my sixth decade, I've got used to it.

I was extremely thin as an 18 year old (6ft 8", 77kg). 4.5 years later, with weight training and a lot of eating, I got to 131kg. But in reality, 100-110kg is where my body wants to be.

Resistance training is the key to gaining a bit of (useful) weight. The stimulus of the training generates a calorie demand and you might find you gain weight quite quickly (as someone with a presumably fast metabolism). The flip side of that is that you'll lose it again quickly too.

Have you tried unsalted mixed nuts and dried fruit as “portable food”? I’m not a close watcher of nutrition/intake, and I’m not exactly a model
of fitness, but for me they seem to work really well as a way of topping-up energy level during longer rides; ditto flapjack with nuts and raisins in it.

Probably not relevant, but if you find that over several months you keep losing weight, despite eating what should be sufficient to keep you steady, do go and talk to your GP. It happened to me just over a decade ago, losing 1kg/month steadily, and after several months beginning to get other odd symptoms too. It was all very subtle, and took well over a year to diagnose, by which time I looked decidedly underweight, but when the issue was identified (hyperactive thyroid, provoked by a bad bout of ‘flu) it was sorted with a six month course cheap tablets.

Jon in Sweden wrote: ↑6 Sep 2022, 6:47pm What kind of tricks do you guys have to avoid unwanted weight loss?

Unwanted seems an odd measure, that is unless you're monitoring your body composition and know you're definitely losing muscle not fat or water. What sort of feedback are you getting from your body, are you permanently hungry or suffering from reduced energy ?

Nearholmer wrote: ↑7 Sep 2022, 11:33am ...
Probably not relevant, but if you find that over several months you keep losing weight, despite eating what should be sufficient to keep you steady, do go and talk to your GP. It happened to me just over a decade ago, losing 1kg/month steadily, and after several months beginning to get other odd symptoms too. It was all very subtle, and took well over a year to diagnose, by which time I looked decidedly underweight, but when the issue was identified (hyperactive thyroid, provoked by a bad bout of ‘flu) it was sorted with a six month course cheap tablets.

This is good advice.

Jonathan

Weight change is an indication of this being wrong with your body, a lot of conditions I believe.

But I'm no expert just think that if you've got a sudden but sustained change in weight which doesn't seem to have a dietary cause then I reckon there's no harm but a lot of potential for good to come from a gp visit. My first call rather than cycling forum in your situation.

Tangled Metal wrote: ↑7 Sep 2022, 1:37pm Weight change is an indication of this being wrong with your body, a lot of conditions I believe.

But I'm no expert just think that if you've got a sudden but sustained change in weight which doesn't seem to have a dietary cause then I reckon there's no harm but a lot of potential for good to come from a gp visit. My first call rather than cycling forum in your situation.

I don't think that there is anything wrong with me (though I do appreciate the concern!). I'm just way more physically active than I was in the UK. So many of the journeys we did by car are on the bike now, I swim every day and coupled with that, my diet has been cleaned up massively. I do miss a good fry up!

Bsteel wrote: ↑7 Sep 2022, 12:53pm

Jon in Sweden wrote: ↑6 Sep 2022, 6:47pm What kind of tricks do you guys have to avoid unwanted weight loss?

Unwanted seems an odd measure, that is unless you're monitoring your body composition and know you're definitely losing muscle not fat or water. What sort of feedback are you getting from your body, are you permanently hungry or suffering from reduced energy ?

I am pretty much permanently hungry. My training load in a week roughly comprises of:

200km on the bike, give or take 50km, mostly on road, some gravel, some mtb. Generally about 8hrs total.

30 odd km bobbing around the village on the bike with the kids, often towing one of them on the WeeHoo tow-along bike. About 2hrs.

3 free weights sessions: 90 minutes total.

7-10 short swims. Total 60-90 minutes.

Some physical work like log splitting etc.

I can gain and lose weight very quickly (such is the blessing and curse of a fast metabolism). When I've been hard on the weight training in the past, I can gain 2kg a month of clean weight. But in times when I've got massive physical demands and not enough calories (like packing up our house and moving to Sweden) the weight drops off so fast.

I have the utmost respect for professional athletes. My training load is next to nothing compared to what they do. I have no idea how they do it!

Nearholmer wrote: ↑7 Sep 2022, 11:33am Have you tried unsalted mixed nuts and dried fruit as “portable food”? I’m not a close watcher of nutrition/intake, and I’m not exactly a model
of fitness, but for me they seem to work really well as a way of topping-up energy level during longer rides; ditto flapjack with nuts and raisins in it.

Probably not relevant, but if you find that over several months you keep losing weight, despite eating what should be sufficient to keep you steady, do go and talk to your GP. It happened to me just over a decade ago, losing 1kg/month steadily, and after several months beginning to get other odd symptoms too. It was all very subtle, and took well over a year to diagnose, by which time I looked decidedly underweight, but when the issue was identified (hyperactive thyroid, provoked by a bad bout of ‘flu) it was sorted with a six month course cheap tablets.

Yes. Mixed nuts and berries are my go to work (sitting in a forestry machine) food. They are superb. Also, just pure walnuts are a favourite of mine.

I'll keep an eye on other symptoms appearing - I just need to eat more at the moment I think.

Jon in Sweden wrote: ↑6 Sep 2022, 6:47pm
Greek/Turkish yoghurt - 10% fat.500g 535 with stewed apple/jam/sugar 100?

500ml tropical juice 255.

Porridge - 125g oats 454, 450ml full fat milk 288, 20g sugar 80

Cornflakes . 125g.473 600ml full fat milk 384. 20g sugar. 80

500g fruit yoghurt 415

50g sweets 178

Dinner: 250g pork roast 618, 300g mixed veg 150, 800g potatoes 600, 40g butter 298. 500ml beer 217.

400g or so of homemade stewed apple 216

So that's a total of 5341 kcals.

In 2009 I cycled a total of 6011 miles at 11.5mph, and walked another 996 at 4.3mph, and went from 82kg to 70kg on 1147303kcals, which is an average of 3143/day for a comparable(?) level of exercise.
The calorific value of bodyfat is 7800kcal/kg, so to maintain my weight I would have needed another 12x7800= 93600kcal, or 3399kcal/day.

Taking my mean weight as 76kg, and correcting for the difference between my weight and yours, 3399x104/76 = 4651kcal/day.

On my 20day summer tour that year I was averaging 44miles and 4300kcal/day.

If that menu above is typical (is it?) I think it ought to be enough unless you're cycling much faster perhaps.

(PS: If you have no appetite after exercise, and have trouble forcing food down when you don't feel hungry, that's a symptom of overtraining.)