Training & Nutrition - Need some info on recovery

Ok so I am trying to loose a lot of weight. In Jan of 04 I was 255 lbs (5'10" male, 32 yrs old) and was diagnosed with high blood pressure. Doctor told me that I had to loose some weight or I was going to die (not like right away he was trying to illustrate that I would die sooner than if I got my arse in shape). So I changed my diet a bit and started to exercise regularly. By Sept of 04 I was at 225 lbs which was great but then I stalled. I had been running and it was hurting my knees so I decided to get back on the bike after many years off. So I got a bike, then another...and another, I gave up driving to work other than in bad weather and started pouring the miles on. So far in 05 I have over 3100 miles but after putting a few lbs back on over the winter I only got it down to 215 lbs...then recently I started GAINING weight again. I got back up to 220 lbs.

Last week my son got sick so I had to stay at home, this came the day after a day off the bike (I play Volleyball on Tues and Thurs so I wanted fresh legs for my match). I rode to work on Thurs but no additional ride and then on Fri I got sick so no ride there either...then I sat around on Sat and played VB on Sun plus I rode to the gym (8 miles round trip). Mon I commuted to work and yesterday I decided I needed a good ride after work so I jump on the scale FULLY expecting to have gained weight and MUCH to my supprise I was 214 lbs. I get out on the bike and MAN I had some good legs, easily and quickly (before I hit my HR goal) I was spinning out of my highest gear on flats (50-12 is my highest combo). The ride I took has a couple of good climbs and they were easier than ever.

So this got me thinking about recovery. This week I also got the new issue of Bicycling and there is an article about a guy that was 308 lbs and got back into cycling and in 2 years got it down to 195 lbs. In that time he got a coach and one of the things his coach did was to give him more time off the bike for recovery. I am wondering if I am not taking enough time for recovery and looking at my schedule wondering where I can take more time. I recently started taking one day a week off my commute but as I mentioned above I am playing VB and our league just started so 2 nights a week I am jumping around for an hour or so (which at 210+ lbs is a good workout for the legs).

Should I not ride on VB nights (Tues and Thurs)?

Do I need more protien (I have been trying to add more but I think I am still low for good recovery)?

Other thoughts?

Your weight can vary a whole lot just based on fluid retention as 1 gallon of water weighs 8 pounds.

This might be a variable in your weight loss.

One good poop weighs about 2 pounds.

Sounds like you are getting some good muscles in your legs, which would add weight.

You have a routine on which you have lost a good amount of weight. Folks plateau all the time in weight loss. I would suggest you keep up the routine, being sure to provide sufficient recovery time.

Each of us has our own needs for recovery, and I don't really know about yours. Just make sure your bod feels rested and your legs have energy, which are good signs of recovery. Likely the energy you felt on your ride after work was related to having recovered more fully. You weight loss to 214 may be attributable to less fluid in your body, as fluid loss can be accumulative, and you exercised at VB over the weekend and commuted that day.

As you get closer to your weight goal, you will likely not lose weight so easily. Just keep up the good work, congratulations on the weight loss so far.

Them's my thoughts! :D

Just to pipe in here I am going to take water weight out of the equation here. Part of this weight loos deal is that I am drinking a TON of water, I am sure this reduction weight was not due to water loss (after my ride yesterday I was down to 211.6 lbs which WAS from water loss).

Thanks for the comments. I guess what I am saying is that I think I am not recovering as quickly as I think I should be...what can I do to speed recovery?

It's not quite so simplistic. There's a ratio of fat-to-carb calories that's burnt. People often confuse the percentage of fat-burning with total-calories of fat burned. In general, the higher the intensity up to your LT, the higher the total calories burned from both fat and carbs. Fat-calories also goes up with intensity, just not as much as glycogen. It really depends upon your level of fitness and condition. Let's compare a beginning-rider vs. an elite athlete:

BEGINNER RIDER
50% max-HR = 500 Cal/hr = 75/25% fat/carbs = 375 fat-calories/hour
65% max-HR = 650 Cal/hr = 60/40% fat/carbs = 390 fat-calories/hour
80% max-HR = 800 Cal/hr = 25/75% fat/carbs = 160 fat-calories/hour

ELITE FIT ATHLETE
50% max-HR = 750 Cal/hr = 80/20% fat/carbs = 600 fat-calories/hour
65% max-HR = 1000 Cal/hr = 75/25% fat/carbs = 750 fat-calories/hour
80% max-HR = 1250 Cal/hr = 65/35% fat/carbs = 813 fat-calories/hour
90% max-HR = 1400 Cal/hr = 25/75% fat/carbs = 350 fat-calories/hour

Basically, the more fit you are, the more fat/hour you can burn at a higher pace. Your energy and cardiovascular systen becomes more efficient at converting fat to ATP for burning, without resorting to anaerobic fermentation and phospho-creatine at high-effort levels. So the more fit you become, the more total fat-calories you burn at a higher-intensity, even though the percentage is lower compared to a lower effort.

The latest studies appear to show that total-weight loss is more related to total-calories burnt in the workout regardless of whether it's fat or carbs. If you burn off 3000 calories in a workout and eat only 2500 calories a day, you'll lose about 1-lb fat/week regardless of the intensity. You can ride easy for 6-hours a day or ride really hard for 2-hours. The weight-loss will end up being the same. What happens is that after the ride, your body will convert fats into glycogen to replenish your energy stores. So it doesn't matter if you burned up that fat during the ride, or if it's converted later to be used on the next ride, it's still gonna be used up at one point or another to make up the calorie deficit.


Looks good so far. You have about a 10-15 minute window to eat carbs right after ride. About 1.5gm/kg body-weight is about optimum. If you wait longer than this, the body will disassemble perfectly good muscle to convert into glycogen to replenish your energy stores. This is the prefered source rather than fats. So you cannot starve yourself to make your body burn fat, it'll take apart muscle instead. Fat-catabolism is initiated at the same time and is triggered by low blood-sugar. Glucagon is then secreted to signal the body to convert fats into glycogen (through glycerol->glucose) But this process is much slower than converting muscle & protein, so you have to eat carbs right after a ride.


They are linked somewhat. Here's a summary of the processes:

http://www.gururacing.com/cycling/MetabolismSummary.gif

The bottom-line is that the citric acid cycle (Krebs cycle) is what generates the ATP for muscle contractions. It is fed acetyl-CoA from either carb or lipid metabolism. The carb pathway is much quicker and can allow the kreb cycle to generate more ATP/second than the lipid pathway.* So that's why as intensity picks up, a larger percentage of energy comes from burning carbs. But the amount generated by lipid metabolism also increases as well, just not as quickly.

Here's how they are linked (a closer look at the fatty-acid spiral):
http://www.gururacing.com/cycling/FattyAcidSpiral.gif

Notice that the fatty-acid spiral also generates acetyl-CoA for the kreb's cycle, but it initially requires the input of ATP. Where does this ATP come from? It comes from carb metabolism! So you cannot burn fats without having carbs to burn as well! This is a double-whammy when you bonk, because once you go through your carbs, you have nothing left to ignite the lipid pathway either. Your body shuts down carb & lipid metabolism and resorts to burning proteins and muscles for energy. :(

So that's why it's so important to replenish your carbs during long rides, once you bonk, that's it, you pretty much gotta stop unless you want to tear your muscles apart. About 250-300 cal/hour is the maximum your body can absorb, so you gotta start eating early if you're doing a long ride at high intensity (to burn as many calories/hour per workout).

Another catch is that in the intestines, in order absorb a single glucose molecule, you have to have an exchange of a sodium ion. You sweat away about 1000mg of sodium per hour, so you have to make sure you get electrolytes as well on the ride. You can end up with a triple-whammy when you bonk if you run out of carbs and electrolytes. You've got a stockpile of fats you can't burn because there's no carbs to initiate the process. Then you can't absorb carb scraps you've been picking off the ground because you've got no sodium... heh, heh... ;) no wonder cyclists who bonk look like zombies! :eek:

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* Slight error in this summary chart. Fructose is not entered into glycolysis direclty. It has to go through the liver and get converted from a 5-carbon fructose into a 6-carbon glucose first. Then that glucose is fed into glycolysis.

I lifted DannoXYZ's post from another thread, "burning fat/burning glycogen. lots of good info. there.

Hey grasschopper! Could you post a couple weeks of your bike workout schedule along with any other physical activities you're doing? And some samples of your daily meals? Along with the water-retention already mentioned, you may also be gaining muscle-mass. Which throws off the total weight measurements you've been taking. So having your body-fat % tested monthly would show some useful trends. Also, I will only weigh myself once a week, on the same day at the same time. That's Tuesday mornings after having gotten through a rest-day on Monday to let my water-levels and food-intake stabilize.

I was also in a very similar situation as you on Jan-05 where my doctor threatened to take out life-insurance on me. I had gained 100 lbs over my trimmest weight in school when I was bike-racing. I've lost 65 lbs of that so far this year and hope to be back at 145-150 lbs and 5-7% body-fat by Feb-06 for the season opener at USD. :)

From what you've posted so far, I would suggest an easy ride on your VB nights. And get in at least one long ride per week of 3-4 hours at a fast steady clip you and maintain the whole time. Eat and drink lots so you can maintain that pace. Personally, I find that the one long ride of the week does more for me in trimming fat than many short high-intensity workouts.

Well I have to say I am not overly anal about my diet but it is much better than it used to be.

I commute 4 days a week and it is now (I take the long way home unless the weather is bad) 9.89 miles...yesterday I lengthened it to 14.8 miles since I knew I wouldn't get another ride in (wife out of town so I am a single parent for a couple of days). Breakfast is a bowl of Honey Nut Cherieos (2.5 cups) with a half cup of 2% milk on it. Around 10:00-10:30 I have a lowfat yogurt, lunch varies, some times it is a Slimfast Optima and other times I will walk (between .75-1 mile round trip to all of the stores near my work) to Subway, or to get Chinese at a local supermarket. Some time between 2:30-3:30 I will have some sort of snack wich could be a Special K breakfast bar (90 cal) or it could be a single serving bag of chips or pretzles (just one). Dinner of course varries, lots of chicken in our diet and some beef and pork, some vegies. I drink 1 diet soda a day max many days none. I will drink between 80-100 oz of water while at work (I work 8 hr days Mon-Fri and have a mainly desk job).

Exercise:
In addition to the commute miles, if I don't go out for food I will walk 2-3 miles over my lunch break if the weather is good. On Tues and Thurs I play VB in the evening. This is good level of play not picnic ball and I play for between 1-2 hrs. On Sun mornings I ride to the gym (7.4 mile round trip, not flat) to play VB from 10-12. I haven't been riding my roadie much since VB started back up, but on Sat my wife, son and I will go on a bike ride which is generally 11-15 miles with an 11-13 MPH avg...I tow my son on his trailer bike on these rides. I try to ride one other night during the week and this could be either another family ride or a roadie ride, the family ride would be the same as above and the road ride would be between 20-40 miles at an avg speed of 16.5-17.5 MPH.

I can't ride Monday evenings so that gives me Wed, Fri and Sat for road rides. Unfortunatly my wife wont ride without me so if we do family rides they have to be on Wed, Fri and Sat. Honestly recently this has been fine because I was getting a bit bored going for 60 mile solo rides. These family rides might be short (under 20 miles...well we did do 24 miles on a rail trail once) but I am pulling my son so any time the road goes up (which is a lot around here) I get a good workout. As the weather gets cold I have a trainer that I will be using and honestly these will no doubt be more focused workouts due to the controled riding atmosphere.

I guess I kind of ran on a bit here...is that what you were looking for?

I lifted DannoXYZ's post from another thread, "burning fat/burning glycogen. lots of good info. there.

And some that isn't. Not about to pick it apart now, at least, not in this thread. Where was the original?