Multisport: Adjust Your Diet Daily For Weight Maintenance

By Matt Russ & Ilana Katz

We are all creatures of routine and our diets are no exception. Time-strapped athletes tend to gravitate towards the same foods and supplements that allow them to fuel their bodies quickly and effectively. But a proper training plan requires changes in training intensities and durations throughout the day, week, and season. This means variance correspondingly in energy expenditure daily, weekly, and seasonally. Nutrition periodization is a hot topic right now. The essence of this plan is to match your diet to the specific requirements of the training phase you are in on the macro level. It is equally important to make small modifications to your diet on a daily basis to compensate for variances in activity factor and caloric expenditure / use. The difference in energy expenditure between a rest or recovery day and a heavy training day can be enormous, and it may be necessary to cut calories on days of reduced training. These small modifications to your daily diet add up and are helpful in maintaining your proper race weight and energy balance.

Less energy density

On rest days, your caloric expenditure is reduced, perhaps extensively, when compared to a training day. As little as 100 unused calories per day can add up big over time -- a weight increase of 10 pounds per year. Body fat is ballast for an athlete and excess body fat reduces performance and optimal power-to-weight ratio. To prevent storing unused energy as body fat, replace dense carbohydrate foods such as pasta, bagels, bread, and potatoes with lower calorie carbohydrate snacks such as yogurt, cottage cheese, fruits, and vegetables.

Watch the supplements

Energy bars, gels, supplement shakes, and other sports nutrition products are not necessary for recovery days; they are for training and recovery from training. On a light training day consider using reduced serving sizes during your workouts. Typically a workout of less than 60-90 minutes at lower intensities will require only water for hydration. You can also modify your recovery or meal replacement shake by substituting ice and water for milk or yogurt on recovery days.

Portion control

Portion sizes are one of the biggest factors to control. Reduce portions on rest days, but keep your macro nutrient balance of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats in tact. You will find it easier to maintain your weight throughout the season if your choice of meals and snacks are mainly natural and unprocessed. Fresh or frozen fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and lean sources of protein such fish, egg whites, and white meat poultry should make up most of your daily consumption. Egg yolks are mainly saturated fat and removing them on recovery days is another way to mitigate excess calories. Tofu and soy products are also a good source of lower calorie, lower fat proteins, especially for vegetarian athletes. Reducing calories includes eliminating those desserts that you may be able to get away with on heavy training days. Plan your daily menu. Planning helps resist temptation and ensures the availability of the best food choices for weight management. Planning can be as simple as making a grocery list or choosing a restaurant with healthy or lo cal menu items.

Replenish glycogen stores?

Glycogen is the stored from of carbohydrate in the muscles and liver. Your stores of glycogen can quickly become depleted or be reduced slowly over time. It is not unusual to put on several pounds after a few rest days in glycogen as it contains a lot of water and is therefore heavy. You may find your work out quality is significantly higher after a few rest days. This may not only be due to sufficient recovery but is likely a product of increased energy stores. Maintaining a race weight while having enough energy to train can be a slippery slope. Glycogen weight can be added very quickly and should not be confused with body fat which comes off and on more slowly. It is important to know your fully replenished weight. If you are eating enough calories on heavy training days glycogen depletion should not be an issue but if you find yourself down a few pounds going into a rest or recovery day cutting calories is not applicable if your goal is weight maintenance.

Weight maintenance is, therefore, a balancing act of energy utilization and replenishment, and it is important to know your individual parameters. We have the ability to test an athlete’s individual metabolic rates and determine the correct caloric zones for weight maintenance. If you track your caloric expenditure during your workouts, you can then adjust your caloric intake accordingly. Many heart rate monitors give caloric expenditure, and it is relatively accurate as it accounts for exercise intensity in the algorithm. Knowing the calories per potion of the foods you commonly eat allows you to “eye-ball” the amount of energy you need to eat to maintain your optimal weight. There is a fair amount of wiggle room, but it is important not to tip the caloric scale too far in either direction.

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Copyright © 2003-2006 The Sport Factory. All Rights Reserved. - Reprinted with permission.

Matt Russ has coached and trained elite athletes around the country and internationally. He currently holds Expert level licenses from USA Cycling and USA Triathlon, and has been licensed by USA Track and Field. He contributes regularly to publications such as Triathlete and Inside Triathlon, and a variety of websites including Active.com. Matt is Head Coach of The Sport Factory. Visit him at www.thesportfactory.com

Ilana Katz has a masters degree in dietetics with an emphasis in sports nutrition. She enjoys working with athletes from the elite to recreational. She specializes in body composition and weight management specific to individual goals and needs. Ilana, herself participates in many endurance and team events in order to relate personally to her clientele. Ilana is The Sport Factory's head nutritionist, has worked with many local celebrities, and is the founder of the nutrition program IndiFITualize. You may hear Ilana on the “Bert” radio show (Q100) as well as “Dave FM” in Atlanta

Posted by: Best Weight Loss Program

Here's the skinny on body fat

Kristen Ganzhorn was just looking for a weight-lifting routine when she signed up with a personal trainer about 10 years ago.

As a distance runner, Ganzhorn, 40, considered herself athletic, and at 5 feet 7 inches tall, she was not much more than 120 pounds.

But when her personal trainer measured her body fat percentage, she was shocked to find 24 percent of her weight was made up of fat. That wasn't bad, but it was more than she expected.

``I had no idea at the time that there was a, what I call, skinny fat,'' the Solon resident said. ``It was definitely an eye-opener.''

While excess fat, which is associated with increased cardiovascular and health risks, usually is associated with people who are overweight, it also can be an issue for people of normal weight.

You can be of normal weight but over-fat, said Lonnie Lowery, an assistant professor of nutrition at the University of Akron and a board member of the American Society of Exercise Physiologists.

That's why body fat percentage is a better measure of fitness and weight-loss than weight or body mass index, which is a formula of height and weight, said Mark Feakes, health and fitness manager of Akron General's Lifestyles West fitness center and Ganzhorn's former personal trainer.

If Ganzhorn had measured her progress by the number she saw on the weight scale, she said she might not have thought her new routine was helping.

However, regular body fat measurements showed she was losing fat even as she was gaining weight and muscle, she said.

Body fat percentage is the percentage of your weight made up of fat. If you're 200 pounds with a body fat of 25 percent, that means 50 pounds of your weight is fat. The rest is lean tissue -- muscle, bone, organs and fluids.

For women, a body fat percentage of around 21 to 24 percent is considered fit; 25 to 31 percent is average and 32 percent and higher is obese.

For men, a body fat percentage of 14 to 17 percent is fit, 18 to 24 percent is average and 25 percent and higher is obese.

The average college-age man is about 17 percent body fat, and the average college-age woman is about 23 or 24 percent body fat, Lowery said.

The most accurate methods of measuring body fat are with MRIs or X-rays, experts say, and the least accurate is with circumference measurements of the waist and other sites, like those used by online calculators.

Some fitness centers use a bio-electrical impedance device that measures body fat by sending an electrical current through a person's body.

Those can be unreliable, however, because they require that users follow strict protocols with body positioning, hydration and room temperature, Lowery and Feakes said.

The two say the most practical while accurate technique for measuring body fat is skin-fold measurements with calipers that pinch body fat.

Lowery and Feakes recommend getting body-fat measurements at facilities based with universities or medical institutions, or contacting the nutrition or exercise physiology departments at universities for referrals.

If you want to try an online calculator, Lowery recommends one associated with a university or reputable medical source.

Still, even though excess body fat isn't good for you, it's not necessarily much of a health hazard if you're at a normal or ideal body weight, Lowery said. A variety of other factors affect health, including genetics and activity levels.

Losing fat will make you look better, though, he said.

Put two people of the same height and weight next to one other, and the person with the lower percentage of body fat and the higher percentage of muscle mass will look leaner or slimmer.

That's the reaction Ganzhorn said she's gotten from friends. She now weighs more than before -- 138 pounds -- but has a body fat of 12 to 13 percent and has continued to wear the same pants size as before.

If you're at a normal weight but want to lose body fat, Lowery suggested resistance training that builds muscle, which speeds up metabolism and burns fat. He discourages people of normal weight from trying dramatic dietary changes or losing weight, because they risk losing too much weight.

When it comes to aerobic exercise, slower sustained activity burns a higher percentage of body fat, Feakes said, but it's not necessarily better for fat loss. Fat loss ultimately comes from the amount of calories you expend, regardless of what activity you do, he said.

Experts recommend burning 1,000 calories per week through exercise, Feakes said.

Choose exercises in which you use more of your muscles and carry more of your weight, Feakes said.

Both losing fat and gaining muscle help unveil a killer body and keep you healthier longer.

So think about exercising, even if you're thin.

Posted by: Best Weight Loss Program

Thin people have won battle to lose weight

BUNNY DIMMEL

CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST

Humble pie is the only pie I have ever eaten that stays with me for life.

I have eaten the same humble pie for about three months now, and I've had enough. I am confessing publicly to the following change in my way of thinking . . . Drum roll please:

You do not have to be at least 50 pounds overweight to say you struggle with your weight.

Previously, I thought that group of people with only a few pounds to lose should quit complaining. I thought they only needed a new hairdo, taller shoes or a new outfit to be comfortable with their appearance.

This past year has taught me that weight problems come in many sizes, shapes, ages and in either gender. Hail to the millions of people who work hard to lose 10 pounds or even maintain their current weight and are struggling every day to do just that.

Sometimes when I am jumping up and down in an aerobics class, I will ask a reasonably thin woman next to me if she ever loses any weight doing this. She tells me no, but she keeps at it. I used to think that woman had too much time on her hands. Who would subject themselves to that kind of torture if they didn't have a serious weight problem to work on? Now I understand that she knows the secret I never knew before: it is a constant struggle, and it doesn't go away.

Previously, I thought no one except another obese person could understand how hard it is to be around food all of the time and to find the strength to say "no, thank you."

Somewhere in this muddled thinking I believed that two groups of people existed: those with weight problems like mine, and those who could eat whatever they wanted and remained thin.

It never dawned on me that without fanfare, or any special recognition, there was a select group of people who embraced a healthy lifestyle for all of their lives, and they will not waiver from it. They are my new heroes.

You have to admire people who get their weight under control before their weight controls them, as mine did.

My goal is to stay on their side of the playing field now.

The next time you are in a buffet line, or at a restaurant, sit back and watch what people are eating. If you do see someone in a size you would like to be eating a portion that is larger than their head, I am positive they will not go home and eat popcorn or ice cream before they go to bed, and they won't wake up to doughnuts or bagels. They treated themselves, had the meal, and now they will pull the reins back and resume consuming the daily calories that keep the scale in the spot they want it to be in.

Humbly, I have learned, there are people everywhere saying "no, thank you" to snacks, desserts and second helpings just to maintain the shape they have. I have done nothing noteworthy in my weight loss journey except change my way of thinking. And that, as they say, has made all the difference.

Bunny Dimmel, of Liverpool, is an English teacher at Clary Middle School in Syracuse who has lost 220 pounds. She weighs in every other week. Reach her through asmith@syracuse.com.

Scales Are For Fish, Not Weight Loss

Contrary to common belief, your weight is not really the indicator of a weight problem – the actual percentage of body fat is the true indicator. You need to know what percent of you is actually FAT. How are you going to monitor your weight loss if you do not know what percent of your body is fat, before you begin your program?

Let me give you an example on measuring body fat, this is important in understanding weight loss, or should I say FAT LOSS. This is actually what we are trying to lose, right? FAT!

Lets say someone weighs 200 pounds and when we measure their body fat we find out there body fat is 40%

This means that 40% of the members body is made of fat (80 lbs). The other 120 lbs is muscle, bones, organs, water, etc. (everything but fat).

Now any true weight loss program should include some form of strength training customized to their personal abilities (Another reason you need someone who truly understands the whole body and how it works). Because if you can gain some of that muscle mass that we lose with age, our bodies will burn more calories and therefore burn more FAT!

Now it’s a few weeks into the program and this person steps on the scale and they now weigh 198 lbs. They are a little disappointed because they thought they were doing better. Their clothes fit better, they have more energy, and they are feeling better.

But they are still depressed because they only lost a lousy 2 pounds! Right? Are we sure???

We now check their body fat and it is now 36% not 40%. Let’s do a little math.

200 lbs at 40% body fat means that 40% of them is fat, which equals 80 lbs of FAT, and 120 lbs are muscles and everything else (called the lean body mass).

198 lbs at 36% body fat means that 36% of them is fat which equals 71 lbs of FAT, and 125 lbs of lean body mass.

This person actually lost 9 pounds of FAT (the stuff we are trying to lose) and gained 5 pounds of lean body mass (mostly muscle mass, which is a good thing because this will allow their body to burn more calories!)

You need to measure and focus on PERCENT OF BODY FAT, AND NOT WEIGHT!

But don’t worry, when your body fat goes down, as your body fat decreases so will the numbers on the scale!

About The Author

Dr. Jeffrey Banas is a Chiropractic Sports Physician, practicing in Mesa; AZ. Dr. Banas personally lost 60 pounds in 2003 and now uses his experience to help others struggling with their weight problems. Dr. Banas can be reached at his office at 480-633-6837, or by visiting his web site at www.personal-weight-loss-help.com.