Eat more to lose weight and lift weights to lose more

I know the first part of the title sounds exciting. But what I meant was to eat more often in smaller portions rather than having 3 large meals a day. Many people try the opposite – sticking to strict diets and doing lots of cardio trying to shed that extra pound of fat. The problem with starving diets is that you are losing your body’s perfect composition and lose your muscles in the process. This also affects your metabolism and your body tend to conserve as much fat as possible.  A carb-low diet is also proven to be damaging to the proper functioning of brain. 

The focus, instead, should be on increasing your metabolism – the rate at which your body burns those calories. And the best way to improve your metabolism is to split your meals into 6 small meals in day instead of 3 large meals.  One should also be careful about what you eat.  Any food is a mixture of three types of caloric sources – fat, carbohydrates and proteins.  One gram of fat provides 9 calories, and 1 gram of protein or carb gives you 4 calories each.  So it is important to look at the composition of these 3 sources in the food that you take in.  An average active person need 1 gram of protein per 1 pound of body mass per day, based on a 2000 calorie diet.  So if your lean body mass is 150 pounds, you need 150 grams of proteins per day which gives you 600 calories out of your 2000 calorie daily need.  Similarly you need 1-2 grams of carbs per day 1 pound of body mass.  The key is to have the right mix of protein, carbs and fat in your 6 meal per day plan.  Having small and healthy meals every 3 hours keeps the glycogen levels in your cells at a constant rate.  The body will burn any additional intakes instead of converting and storing glycogens as fat, as your body knows that it is getting another feed within next 3 hours.  This is the same reason why it is said that  you should never skip your breakfast.  When you skip the breakfast everyday, your body will tend to store everything that you eat the previous night, as its own intelligence thinks that the next feed is only at lunch the next day.  Hence the body will try to conserve as much energy as possible, thereby reducing your metabolic rate.

The second best method for increasing your metabolic rate is by increasing your lean muscle mass using moderate levels of weight lifting or resistence training.  Building muscles is proven to be much more effective in burning fat compared to hours of cardio training (Note: muscle building should not be confused with body building).  Muscles need energy to maintain; so the more lean muscle mass you have in your body composition, the more energy it requires to maitain itself.  This increases your metabolism and burns your fat storage.  Your muscles are burning calories even when you are sitting idle.  When compared to this, a cardio training burns energy only during your period of training.  You would need hours of cardio to burn fat compared to the time you spend on resistence training.  Moreover, your body becomes more efficient over a period of cardio training.  If you burn 200 calories during a 30 minute jogging today, your body would probably burn only 175 calories the next month if you continue your cardio on a daily basis.  Your body becomesefficient in utilizing energy stores, thereby reducing your metabolic rates.  I’m not saying you should quit cardio.  Cardio is the only way to train the most important muscle group of your body – your heart.  But instead of just cardio, your training program should include more resistence training along with low intensity cardio.

Another suggestion for burning those excess calories is to drink enough quantities of cold water during the day (note:  this method has mixed reactions; so don’t take my words for it).  Water helps to hydrate your body and also helps to avoid cravings for those junk snacks.  When your stomach is full, your body stops sending signals to your brain that triggers those cravings.  Also, when you drink the water cold, the body has to increase the temparature of that water to your body’s internal temperature level, thereby spending those unused glycogens lurking around in your cells waiting to be pushed to those deadly fat stores!!!

SFM Again

Completed the SF marathon again on August 3rd.  Was not planning on running this year as I had not trained like last year.  But as the date came closer, I couldn’t resist.  I did a trial run of 8 miles to gather some confidence and finally registered a few days before the event date.  The goal was to complete in 5 hours and so I joined the wave group that had the EFT of 5:00 – 5:15.

My wave started at 6:30 am in the morning.  It was the same route – starting near the ferry building at embarcardero, running along the bay, through the beach near Chrissy field, climbing the hill towards golden gate bridge and return to the golden gate park and to the hilly streets of SF, along the baseball park to the finishing line. 

The first 10 miles were ok and I ran at a moderate pace with the pace group.  At mile 13, when the half- marathoners were finishing their race, I was cursing myself on signing up for the full.  I could hear one of the volunteers cheering and saying “…you are half way there.  Only 13 more miles to go…”.  I think this is one of their standard lines for cheering the runners at half-way point.  But unlike last year, I didn’t find those words encouraging.  My legs had started giving up on me.  Waves of cramps were sweeping all over the body.  From mile 18, it was a struggle.  I had to stop and stretch at every mile to release the lactic acid build up and relax the cramps.  This was an expereience that helped me realize the importance of proper training.  I finally crawled through the finish line in 5:25:29.  I was glad that I was able to finish it within the cut-off limit of 6 hours.  But I will never run again without proper training.

San Francisco Marathon

I ran my first marathon on 29th, July 2007 and completed the 26.2 miles in 4 hours and 42 minutes.  Finally, a fruitful end to 4 months of training I had been following from www.halhigdon.com.

SF Marathon is known for its scenic route and touted as the only race that runs on the road bed of Golden Gate bridge.  It is also the coolest summer marathon in the country.  I was in the wave that started at 6:00 am in the morning.  More than 15,000 runners register every year and due to the huge turnout, runners are grouped into waves based on their estimated finishing time (EFT). 

The race started near the ferry building situated along the San Francisco Bay.  Our pace for the first 5 miles was carefully controlled by our pace setter.  I still remember her words – “The first 10-15 miles – you run with your brain; not with your legs”.  All the excitement, the initial energy (both physical and mental) and the energy that you draw from the crowd would really tempt you to run faster.  An important tip was to use only 50% of your energy for the first 20 miles and the rest on the final 6.2 miles. 

The first 5 miles were along the bay, through the fisheman’s street.  The sky lighed up as we ran past the beach at Chrissy Field.  At mile 5, the climb towards the Golden Gate bridge started.  We could see only one of the suspension towers of the bridge, covered in thick fog, from the distance.

The bridge was the best part of the race.  I broke out from my pace group after we completed the bridge as I couldn’t control the temptation to run the down hill from the bridge towards the golden gate park.  We entered the park at mile 13 where the first half mathoners were finishing their race.  One of the volunteers was cheering - “you are doing good….you are half way there”!!!

Miles 13 – 18 was inside the park, looping through various paths inside the park along rose garden, Young museum, stow lake etc.   You could see all kinds of runners – a runner on bare feet with blood dripping from his feet, a newly wed couple running in their wedding dress, an 80 year old veteran whizing past you, a runner with only one leg  – everything around you was motivational.  This is also the segment of the race that the endurance you build during your training really helps you.

We exited the park to Haight street at mile 19 and the next few miles were through the crowded and hilly streets of San Francisco.  At mile 22, I kind of hit the wall.  The legs were sprained and I had to stop and stretch before continuing.  Our pace setter’s words came to mind again – “This is the part of the race that the thoughts about your family help you”.  Didn’t know what to think.  I was literally counting my steps during the last couple of miles, and chanting the names of my daughters at every step.  Left leg was “Diya” and the right was “Megha”.  I know it sounds funny, but it helped to distract the pain a little bit.  Had I known that the beer and wine they were serving at one of drink stops were to reduce the pain in your legs, I would have stopped there and gulped a whole keg.  I was wondering why they were serving a dehydrating drink during a marathon and came to know the reason only after the race.

The last two miles were again along the bay, past the SBC park.  There was a Giants game going on and we could hear the cheering from the park as we ran past the home of Giants.  The last .5 miles were never ending.  As I ran past the finish line, I remembered to look above, lift my arms and smile at the camera.  The timer on my GPS read 4:42:18.