Should I lose muscle mass for distance running? What’s the best way to do it?

Just keep doing distance running and you will get lighter and leaner. Your muscles naturally adapt to distance running by getting lighter. Slow twitch muscles are thinner and lighter than fast twitch. The more you do distance running, the more slow twitch fibers will be developed and the fast twitch will be neglected. That being said, you are who you are as far as your body type. You cannot change your bone structure or the composition of your leg muscles. If you have short and fat calf muscles, there is no way to make them longer and skinnier like an E. African's. But you will see changes if you stick with distance running.

Being strong is good, but strong for running, and not too heavy or tight.

It's more important to be trim in your upper body than your legs.

I ran in high school and college, then took off for 5 years in my 20s while training and competing in olympic weightlifting competitions. I didn't gain much weight, but got extremely strong and very hard muscles. Then I went back to running and it was quite difficult. I was fast at the 400 right away, but slow at anything from a mile on longer.

I started running more distance, kept increasing it and changed my diet to 90% complex healthy carbs. In two years I started breaking my best times, and a year after that was smashing them, which I attribute to changing my diet, running much higher mileage, and doing distance type of training. Also I wore a wind breaker all the time in my training, nylon singlet underneanth, except when I was pushing to run fast. Sometimes I would take it off, roll it up and carry it along in my hand, but it was with me all the time, and this was in Los Angeles were it was warm for most of the year.

Precious Roy,

thanks for the advice :) I just ask because i don't see any change since i stop playing football. It's been more than a year by now and i don't see any difference. I had a considerable number of long runs, especially during the three months in preparation for marathon, and some times i train twice a day but, at least apparently, no change at all :)

Thanks for the reply Winbreaker Runner :)

That's quite a bit what i feel when doing intervals with my friends. In short intervals i do great, but in longer ones i have a hard time to maintain a reasonable speed beyond my 10k rythm. Let's say 6x1K. I start the intervals strong and good, but then i start fading and can't keep the pace.

So, about the food, are you saying i should reduce on protein? I have a healthy diet with healthy carbs, protein, fruits, veggies and fibers.

About the windrunner, i wear it sometimes. It's cold and windy here by now, But i didn't get the purpose of wearing him. What's your objective? :)

Renato Sousa wrote: But before running I played football (i mean the European version of the word, not soccer/rubgy)

What's the Euro version of football if it's neither soccer nor rugby?

Wutness wrote:

Renato Sousa wrote: But before running I played football (i mean the European version of the word, not soccer/rubgy)

What's the Euro version of football if it's neither soccer nor rugby?

Great question.

Sorry the misunderstanding, it's soccer :)