Conor Dunne: Cycling can be a great way to achieve and maintain a healthy weight. In this video,
amongst other things, we thought we'd share with you the best way to mix
good nutritional practices around your cycling. Manon Lloyd: If you're looking to use cycling to
shed a few pounds, or just to perform at optimal race weight, we hope you can find some of these
tips useful, not only to lose weight but also to learn how to use cycling as part of a healthy and
balanced lifestyle. Let's get into it. [music]
Conor: You've decided to lose some weight. Well, when should you look to do this? Well, you'll
have far more flexibility if you look to organize it in around lower intense periods of training,
such as base training. If you ride casually, like myself these days, then anytime will suit,
really. Better get cracking. Manon: During high-intensity
and heavy volume training and race periods, for example, your fueling
and recovery demands are too high to maintain a calorie deficit whilst maintaining fitness.
Conor: If your goal is achieving optimal race weight, don't wait until a few weeks before your
peak race goal or just assume that the weight will fall off through training. The majority
of us will need action through a detailed plan. Manon: Regardless of whether you're an endurance
athlete or a recreational cyclist, losing weight involves paying a lot of attention,
if not more attention to nutrition than exercise. Competitive cyclists looking
for gains in performance should be focusing their sole exercise habits on performance development,
first and foremost. Training to burn extra calories can quickly lead to overtraining and
under-fueling and it definitely does not help your fat loss or weight loss goals,
and it does not help improve performance. Conor: Fat loss takes time. Water loss happens
overnight. If you want to lose weight and improve your cycling performance,
then you'll want to focus on fat loss, which means staying patient. At the same time, it doesn't mean
you should be over-ambitious in your calorie deficit goals. You should aim for roughly 300 to
500 calorie deficit per day. If you want to have a healthy fat loss routine, which is achievable
during lower intense periods of training, such as base training, which we will talk about later.
Manon: Starving yourself each day in a high-calorie deficit isn't going to help
anything. It's actually going to hinder your performance and your weight loss goals. It is
going to have negative effects such as a weakened immune system, depression, slow metabolism,
nutrient deficiencies, and high fatigue. You want to make sure that any efforts to achieve your
optimal weight are carried out in a controlled and gradual manner and you stay healthy throughout.
Conor: While under-fueling is the fastest route to overtraining, over-fueling won't
work on weight loss either. The perfect balance takes action and attention to detail.
[music] Manon: That's
worth highlighting that no number on the scales is a complete picture of your own health. The way
you treat your body and mind are sometimes better indicators of your general health and wellbeing.
Conor: Muscle is much denser than fat. One liter of muscle weighs approximately 1.06 kilograms,
while one liter of fat weighs 0.9 kilograms. An easier way to think of it is that if you have an
equal volume of muscle and fat, well, the fat is going to weigh 80% of what the muscle does.
Manon: As two people may weigh the same, their body compositions could be
completely different. It's not just as easy as looking at the scales and losing weight,
or looking at the scales and seeing no difference in weight despite your continued efforts. To
improve your cycling performance, you need to maintain or increase your muscle mass whilst
keeping your fat percentage in a healthy range. Conor: If you're frustrated that you aren't losing
weight, well, it may be worth getting the help of a sports nutritionist to help you measure
your body fat. You may just be losing fat and gaining muscle, which isn't a bad thing at all.
Don't treat absence of weight loss as a negative. Manon: The amount of essential fat differs between
men and women, and it's typically around 2% to 5% in men and 10% to 13% in women. A healthy range of
body fat in men is typically defined as 8% to 19% while the healthy range for women is 21% to 33%,
which is dependent on age as shown in this table from the American Council of Fitness.
Conor: Low body fat is hard to maintain over a sustained period of time and there are no
recognized health benefits to having a body fat under 8%. Actually, there's quite a lot
of negative effects, with low body fat in women linked to fertility and reproductive issues. Also,
there's links to decreased performance and immune function, heart problems, and also,
low energy levels. Body fat is integral to keeping your entire body in check.
I think the key point to note is that whilst we see super skinny riders on
our screens at key events throughout the year like the Tour de France, for instance,
these riders, they're not maintaining their lowest weight for the whole year. They're
timing this low race weight for only maybe two or three points throughout the season,
and often for only two weeks at a time, at the end of a Grand Tour, for instance. Also, they're using
professionals to really manage this weight loss and maintain the race weight in the right way.
I think what I'm trying to say is not to emulate them in your riding throughout the whole year or
look at it as a holy grail of how you should look on the bike because, well, these are professionals
pushing their bodies to the absolute limits. Manon: You'll get the most out of your cycling
and general health if you look to maintain a healthy body fat percentage, not a Tour
de France winning body fat percentage that has been timed to perfection into
the week leading up to the Grand Tour. Conor: Set yourself goals and mark your
progress. Now, that doesn't necessarily have to be a weight-orientated goal. It could be
as simple as setting a time on a climb near you and trying to beat it week after week,
or it could be trying to beat a set course near your house. I think the point is don't get too
hung up on the weight. Think about trying to create a healthier lifestyle and a better cycling
performance. Keeping tabs on your progress can help you stay on track for a sustained period of
time. Remember the lost art of keeping a diary in one of my previous videos? Well, it can be really
useful for keeping tabs on your progress. Manon: Either way, you want to make healthy
changes that are going to make you feel happier both physically and mentally. It's
worth considering what do you actually want to achieve by losing weight before you begin.
[music] Conor: There are
many fad diets out there and technical sounding nutrition plans that, let's be honest, will leave
you more confused than anything. What is this now? Only eat cornflakes? You shouldn't have milk
with your cornflakes. Just cornflakes on their own, dry cornflakes. The cornflake diet. I mean,
what is the world coming to? In my opinion, the best approach is to eat a balanced healthy diet,
with management of total food consumed in line with that 300 to 500 calorie deficit per day as
we described earlier. Here are a few bits of key advice which will really help you achieve this.
Load up on vegetables by filling half your plate with veggies at most meals. Fruit is
also a great component of any healthy eating regime. It's worth getting familiar with the
current food pyramid because you want to be looking to get fruit, vegetables, and salad
as your primary food source at most meals. Manon: GCN's Plant-Based Cyclist recipe book
is a great resource. I'm not saying you need to be vegan, but this book has loads of recipes and
ideas and ways you can incorporate more fruit and vegetables into your diet in an interesting
and creative way. I use it in tandem with other recipe books because I do still eat meat but
it is nice to have one or two vegetarian or vegan meals throughout the week. What
about you, Conor? Do you still eat meat? Conor: Yes, I do still eat meat, Manon,
but I wouldn't say it's the main aspect of my diet, actually. I would eat meat maybe every three
days. The majority of the time, I'm more focused on fruit and vegetables and salad. Next up,
eliminate all sugary sodas including diet sodas. Liquid calories can quickly add up without filling
you up. Next up, you want to eliminate all sugary snacks, junk food, crisps, chips,
lovely sweets. This step alone, though, is enough for many of us to begin losing weight gradually.
Away. Athletes who are eating a whole food nutrient-dense diet need to start their weight
loss journey with portion control, unfortunately. Even the best foods can be overeaten.
Manon: Try to maintain a protein intake as normal despite having a lower calorie
intake. This means upping the proportion of protein in your daily diet to 25% to 30% of
your daily calorie intake. Focus on lean protein sources such as meat, fish, eggs,
tofu, beans, and pulses. Maintaining protein intake will maintain a lean
body mass and focus weight loss on fat loss. Conor: Try to limit random grazing and instead
focus on mealtime. Identify the points when you really pack in those unnecessary calories and take
measures to curtail this. If, like me, you like to eat a whole portion of porridge when you're
relaxing in your hammock, try to replace this with maybe a portion of natural yogurt instead.
Take a look at how training can complement good nutrition. If all this seems like gobbledegook,
don't worry, just get out there and ride. Fuel for your training sessions before, during,
and after. Don't look at these times as places where you can skimp on your nutrition. That means
get an adequate meal in before your training, get carbohydrates into you whilst you're training,
and when you finish training, get a protein-rich recovery meal in. Skimp on these areas and you'll
probably not get the benefits of the session that you were hoping for, and you'll probably also
suffer from a dramatically increased appetite at other times of the day, making it harder to stay
on track. Fuel effectively, train effectively. Another tip. Lower your carbohydrate intake
a little on rest days and recovery days. These are days when you can get away with
training on a little less carbs than you're used to. Doing so will have little impact
on your fitness progress. The day before a recovery day, eat a light, low carbohydrate
meal for dinner and see how you get on. Manon: Make sure you're getting enough
sleep. Aim for around eight hours per night, and remember that sleep deprivation can inhibit fat
loss too. Recovery is all part of training too. Think about when you eat your meals. Try and plan
them around your training instead of sticking to the usual meal schedule. For example, when you get
back from a ride, you'd usually have a protein shake and then have a few hours' wait until
lunch or dinner. Why not plan your meal straight after your training and use it as a post-ride
recovery? I'm going to tuck into this now. Conor: Add in a glycogen-depleted training
session to your weekly routine. Try riding for 30 to 60 minutes before breakfast, but then
make sure you do get your usual breakfast after you finish the session. There is evidence that
training like this in a fasting state can help boost fat loss and aid your fat-burning efforts,
but it isn't for everyone. It wasn't for me. I hated it and I never really used it too
much in my training routines. It might work for you, but if it doesn't, don't sweat it.
Manon: Mix your sessions up and try and work your body in a different way. This
could mean doing different sort of efforts, or it could simply mean riding a different
way to work up a different hill. Conor: High-intensity efforts aren't
a magic bullet, but for many of us who are time-constrained, we just simply don't have
the time to ride five or six hours every single day. If you do find yourself limited on time,
try adding in some more intense efforts into your training rides. A good one I always used
to do was 30 seconds sprinting in the seat, 30 seconds easy, repeated four times, and add
in more reps as you gain fitness. There's plenty more shorter intense workouts on the GCN channel
if you want to dive into those in more detail. Manon: Incorporate some tempo efforts into your
training using the aerobic system at the top end of its capacity. You'll get more bang for
your bucks, fatiguing the aerobic system faster. You could do this on a social ride
by getting your buddies to do a couple of blocks of through and off rotating on the
front. This is a great way to up the pace and get some achievable goals out of the ride.
Conor: I hope this video has helped you to understand how to lose weight
in a healthy and sustainable way. Just remember, if things aren't working,
just back off and re-assess. Remember to consider
your physical as well as your mental health. Manon: Weight is a small part of a vast array
of elements that are all linked to your cycling performance. I really do need to emphasize,
really do, do not get too bogged down about losing weight as a cyclist. It's all about being able
to enjoy cycling as part of a healthy lifestyle. We'd love to know what you thought of this video,
and if you have any questions, please leave them in the comments below. Thanks for watching.
Conor: Thank you for watching, everyone. [00:15:25] [END OF AUDIO]