Hi ladies - Requesting some advice for the wife.

[*Bunny*]

The body goes into a state of starvation holding onto fat and burning off protein. The opposite of what she is trying to do. So she needs to have carbs when she wakes up for fuel, and pre and post work-out. Think Protein + Carbs, or Protein + Fat. She is burning a tremendous amount of calories running those long distances.. She needs fuel=carbs to maintain her. Yes carbs right after she finishes but another meal an hour later also. Is she taking any food in while she runs? Like goo gels or anything?

^^ I think ya'll got it covered

 

[musclemom]

Good call on the fitday - as far as her endurance / strangth training, her workouts last about 20 minutes, that's it. Really just to maintain muscle.

She has been on Keto only for about 6 weeks, she takes carbs pre and post runs for fuel.

Can someone elaborate on wieght loss being stalled from not taking in enough calories per day?

Thanks for repsonding so quickly!

Bluesman

Regarding not taking in enough calories:

Your body needs so much energy to function. Depending on your size, weight, height, energy level, food consumptoin level, a basic minimum amount of calories you consume go to making sure you stay healthy and everything works like it is supposed to. Long story short, BREATHING burns calories, growing HAIR burns calories, your heart beating burns calories, digesting what you just ATE burns calories, growing new skin cells, etc., etc., etc. Even if you did NOTHING but laid in bed all day and ate three meals a day, you'd still burn calories. The calories you require to maintain your body's day to day functioning are considered your Basic Metabolic Rate (aka, BMR).

If you eat below your BMR you stress your body. A stressed body wont lose fat. It will hold as tightly as possible to water and fat; and it will sacrifice lean muscle. Your body will devour its own muscle in a famine cycle (which it interprets eating BELOW your BMR for more than 5 or so days as, a famine situation) to lower your BMR. Fat is considered LONG TERM storage. This is really important, it's why yo-yo dieting fails, it's why anorexics live as long as they do and why bodybuilders have big muscle and low body fat but are forever eating: Lean muscle tissue burns a LOT of calories while at rest, substantially more than fat tissue. When your body thinks you're experiencing a famine it has the basic philosophy of offloading all unnecessary baggage. Lean body muscle tissue is, in the long term scheme of things, a massive waste of energy (calories), guess what your body offloads FIRST?

Buuuutttt, lean muscle is what raises your metabolism, and losing it is actually one of the worst things you can do to yourself. Starvation diets work - at first. You see the numbers on the scales going down and you're happy. What you're losing is muscle. When you go back to eating a healthy amount of food you start gaining weight at a remarkable rate. The reason for this is that you've lost so much muscle that your metabolism is slower than ever and your body is storing everything it can as fat in preparation for the next 'famine'.

Now onto the other general issue ... it's been scientifically proven that the body tears into it's own muscle stores in people who are distance runners. SERIOUS long distance running is diametrically opposed to lean muscle building. I have heard of marathoners who cycle, take a break from running to work on lean mass building, but following a marathoners training schedule and trying to do any sort of lean body mass build up is just fuggin' frustrating ... you need to gain weight, a LOT of weight, to gain muscle. Remember what I said about the body being frugal? It needs to BELIEVE we are in a time of plenty to be willing to CREATE that energy wasteful tissue, lean body mass.

Now, by one calculator I used, your wife's BMR is 1397 -- but remember, this is just the calories you burn if you lay in bed all day, who does that?? The average individual can add to their BMR by 200 calories and will STILL lose weight -- A 135 lb. female running for one hour at 6 mph (I guessed) burns 615 calories. Your wife needs to consume AT LEAST 2212 calories a day, minium, to operate and lose weight, more on the days she lifts weights.

Here's where I got her BMR: http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/

Here's where I worked out the calories burned: http://www.healthstatus.com/calculate/cbc

So, long story short, she can take a break from running and build her lean body mass, or run, tweak her calories and macros and probably cut her fat, but the two together are oil and water.