How To Lose Weight While Triathlon Training

I came across a story on reddit today of this woman who lost a lot of weight after committing to finishing a triathlon within 1 year. Here’s her before and after photos:

“It’s funny, I remember she’s always admired the ironman competition – but I thought it was because of the intense athletic milestone it is to achieve – that or because she liked seeing strong dudes sweating it out in tiny pants.

It wasn’t ever conceivable that she would ever actually compete – she could barely balance on a bike and couldn’t swim a lap of a pool and couldn’t even run 100m without keeling over as if nearly dying.

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The kids had a school sports day and they wanted her to run in the “parent’s race”. She did it for them but felt embarrassed that she couldn’t run the whole way and couldn’t keep up – her goal was to be able to run in the next parent’s race, so her kids would be proud of her, not embarrassed by her.

She began running and riding and met other riders along the way that encouraged her to do a triathlon and the rest is history…”

But this is likely not the case. This is evidenced by so many examples of people who do sports like triathlon and distance running, and cannot seem to get down to their ideal body.

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But triathlon can definitely help with any weight loss or fitness goals, if it is combined with the right mindset (psychological awareness) and proper nutrition, as well as rest & recovery.

For this woman, and likely for others who have had success losing weight with triathlon, the very act of commitment to doing the race, and sticking with that commitment were the keys to making fitness gains.

And the discipline it takes to stay with the training will help improve your self image, leading to greater confidence and belief in yourself!

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So training and staying with it can mean shedding off those undermining voices that say “You can’t do this” and turning them around into a belief in yourself, a belief that you can master swimming, biking, and running, and that you ARE a triathlete.

It’s the combination of the wholistic fitness approach of psychology, nutrition, rest, and finally workouts that will lead to success stories like this woman on reddit.Picture this: you’re training for your next long distance road race or triathlon. You’ve got a great training routine planned out and you’re following it to the letter. You think to yourself with all that training, you’ve got to be losing a few extra pounds. Yet you step on the scale and to your dismay, you’ve gained weight. What happened?!

One of the biggest complaints I hear from my clients is that they struggle with either a) unexpected weight gain during training, or b) trying to balance proactive weight loss with the demands of training.

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Or in my case, hangry (hungry angry) if I wait too long between meals. While you may not notice it immediately after a long session, you probably are familiar with that ravenous feeling later in the day or the next day. A la this…

The large majority of research on fueling for distance supports eating adequate calories (with most of those from carbohydrates) before and after your workouts. If you are fueling correctly but also eating your other normally portioned meals, you may end up overeating.

Do you ever have a long workout and then feel drained and veg on the couch the rest of the day? Even though you just burned a crap ton of calories during your training session, if you are far less active during the rest of the day you may end up a bit out of balance when you compare it to your average intake across the week.

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So if you’re struggling with the hunger games (ba-dum-bum) and balancing how to lose weight effectivelywhile training, I’m going to share some tips that will hopefully help ya out today.

I’m all about body positivity and being comfortable in your own skin. If you don’t want to lose weight or you don’t need to lose weight, then there is no reason I would suggest it – and more power to ya. What I’m referring to are athletes that are actively trying to lose weight or avoid gaining weight during training but are struggling and frustrated with that.

If your top goal right now is to PR at a race in 2 months, it may not be the best time to focus on major weight loss. I recommend focusing on weight loss in either the off-season or in the base phase of training, rather than in build/competition times. It’s easier because you aren’t relying on being well-fueled for super long workouts during those times. My typical progression for most athletes is to focus on fueling for sport during the competition phase, focus on recovery (both in terms of fitness and food) after your A race, and then in part of the off-season or in your base phase, focus on weight loss if needed.

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Think about your goals (race performance vs weight loss) and decide which is the primary goal for your right now and throughout the next year. Then you can adjust your diet and expectations according to that.

Many athletes I know tend to be very numbers driven. You’ve got your power meter, you’ve got your Garmin, you’re tracking your heart rate…you know what I mean. If that’s you and you prefer to be numbers driven with food as well, you can try a numbers approach to weight loss. In this case, you’d figure out your calorie needs and track them in one of the many online systems like MyFitnessPal or LoseIt.

I recommend working with an RD to help you estimate your caloric needs, and ignore whatever the numbers in the online trackers say. But if you want a starting point outside of that, you can use this calorie calculator. Plug in your info and select a multiplier that matches your training regimen. For weight loss, look at the number that says “lose 1 lb a week.”

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As an aside, you’ve probably seen some articles out there that question whether a calorie is truly a calorie. While it’s true that a) metabolism varies from person to person and changes as you lose weight b) certain foods may be processed in our bodies differently, leading to slightly different amounts of caloric intake, and c) the nutritional quality of those calories vary – the laws of physics still apply. If you take in fewer calories than you burn (in a healthy, non-starvation kind of way), you should lose weight. (For an anecdotal story on this, I always think back to the infamous “twinkie diet”)

I think there’s value for just about anyone to focus on a more intuitive approach to weight loss. In this case, rather than getting fixated on numbers each day – you simply focus more on hunger and fullness, and fuel your body with healthy foods that nourish you.

Nutrient timing refers to eating at times that are going to maximize your training. For those of you trying to lose weight, think about eating around your training – higher carbohydrate meals before and after your tough training runs & rides. This will help to fuel your body and support recovery. Then focus on high volume, nutrient dense, lower calorie options outside of those times.

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One of the biggest challenges when trying to lose weight is, of course, feeling hungry. I don’t like my athletes to feel hungry – I want them to feel nourished and well-fueled. One of the best ways I found to help with this is to focus on high-volume, filling meals.

These are meals that are quite large, but because they are full of lower calorie food choices (namely veggies) – the overall calorie count is low. These foods fill up the belly and help keep you satisfied.

Think meals like quinoa veggie chili, spaghetti squash lasagna, zucchini noodles with meat sauce, polenta and garden veggie bake, or skillet dishes with sweet potatoes/peppers/onions/ground turkey. In all of these, non-starchy veggies are the star and help to bulk up the meal and keep you full.

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When losing weight while training, focus on eating enough protein at each meal. Getting adequate protein can prevent the loss of lean muscle that sometimes comes along with weight loss, and is also key for muscle repair and recovery.

Try to space out your intake evenly throughout the day. Breakfast tends to be a challenge for this, but many dairy products (like milk, greek yogurt and cottage cheese) as well as eggs are good sources of protein.

One of my favorite breakfast dishes is two slices of whole wheat toast topped with two eggs, a bunch of sliced tomatoes and chopped scallions, along with a sprinkle of salt and pepper. It comes out to less than 300 calories but is filling because of the protein/fat in the eggs and the nutrient-rich tomatoes helping to add more volume. Plus I get thosehealthy carbs from the whole wheat toast.

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I hope this was helpful!