Four tips for skinnyfat hobby joggers

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colorunner123 wrote:

If your body fat percentage is 20 or higher, you probably are skinny fat, like me. When I say 20%, I mean 20% as measured by a DEXA scan. (Most people dramatically underestimate their body fat percentage.)

I am a 48-year old man. I've been running off and on for about 40 years. My PRs in college were 16:04 for the 5K and 33:57 for the 10K. I can't run anywhere near those times today. My current body fat percentage is 23 percent (confirmed by DEXA scan). This is an improvement from a few months ago when I was at 27 percent. I am currently 5'11, 165 pounds.

Here's some advice for my fellow skinnyfat hobby joggers:

1) You are eating too much. You may think you don't need to worry it because you are a runner, but your post-run gatorade (80 cal), bagel with cream cheese (440 cal), and frappucino (170 cal) canceled out that 7-mile run you just did. Here are some hard truths: (1) it is almost impossible to run your way out of a bad diet and (2) it is much easier to cut calories than to run more. Relatedly, you need to learn the difference between physiological hunger and psychological hunger (stemming from boredom, habit, or whatever). True physiological hunger is pretty rare.

2) You are eating too many carbs and too many refined foods. At the end of the day, of course it's all about calories in and calories out. But some foods (e.g., salmon, chicken, broccoli) reduce hunger more than others (e.g. pasta, pancakes) for a given number of calories. So look into a Paleo low-carb diet.

3) You are eating too often. If you want to lose weight, limit your eating window to a short window each day (intermittent fasting). A low-carb diet and intermittent fasting work extremely well together.

4) You are weak. To reduce your body fat percentage, build muscle. Lift heavy. Do compound movements such as squats, deadlifts and bench press. Pay a Personal Trainer to make sure your form is good. You will get stronger. You will look way better and feel better and you will much be less susceptible to injury. Whether your times will drop is an open question, but (seriously) there is more to life than getting faster.

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Along with diet and running, core training is important if not critical to loosing that skinny fat (at least abs, pull ups, etc.).

Not as old (I’m 32) or slow as you, OP, but I started doing each of these things seriously about 4-5 months ago and have seen considerable benefits although I don’t intermittently fast on a schedule. This info is all common sense by now but it takes discipline that most people don’t have to stick with in order to see the benefits. I think it gets even more difficult for runners putting in a lot of mileage whose sole focus is running.

I was already low mileage while doing other sports/activities so the post-run lifting is now additional stimulus. My weight has stayed about the same at 5 foot 10 / 150-155 pounds. Muscle mass had gone up. I’m more powerful on short track intervald and hills. Strangely enough I feel fitter in terms of endurance despite running less volume with more days off.

My only concerns are eventually training for marathon at a level commensurate to my ability. Keeping focused / balanced life / outside interests / maintaining weight / diet.

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constrained wrote:

Along with diet and running, core training is important if not critical to loosing that skinny fat (at least abs, pull ups, etc.).

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You only need one tip: no booze.

Some high intensity workouts help as well.

go keto

You could have cut your post down to two words: eat less.

Or, do the following:
1. Two to three times a week do heavy ass lifting, low reps, high weights. Just the basic compund movements is all you need i.e. deadlifts, squats, bench, over head press, dips, pull ups and barbell rows. Accessory work is b.s.
2. Eat a clean healthy diet. Cut out processed foods I.e. avoid soda, "sports drinks", fried foods, white flour, and refined oil. Just eat whole foods i.e. whole grains, legumes, fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.
3. Hills, run more hills.
4. Look up Percy Cerutty and seek pain as he did.

Let's be honest about these skinnyfat posts. They are really not about health. They are really midlife crisis posts. Most runners who hit their masters days find out pretty quickly that their aging metabolism cannot process carbs like we did when we were in our 20s and 30s. So, we modify our diets and replace a sandwich for lunch with one of those healthy "bowl" things with quinoa, kale and whatever. We also find that we are more injury prone due to the beginning of a decline in muscle mass. So, it is time to get into the gym and use it before we lose it. So, for normal folks, a few common sense modifications are needed in midlife.

But for others, midlife is a time to freak out and find some new path of enlightenment. For lifelong runners, that takes the shape of strength training and meat eating to end the "skinnyfat" runner body. Strength training is just fine and reducing carbs is an obvious necessity. But the midlife crisis version of making common sense lifestyle modifications is out of control. Paleo is BS. It is just an excuse for heavy meat eaters to diet without giving up eating meat. Animal fats do way more damage than excessive carbs. And spending all morning in the gym is just boring. There is no great health benefit in getting big muscles. In fact, in middle age, care needs to be taken in weight training to avoid damaging knees, back and shoulders with overly aggressive weight lifting routines. Sports meds are seeing far worse injuries from aggressive weight training in middle aged people than from distance running. Knee and shoulder replacements and slipped discs are becoming very common with middle age people who are aggressive weight lifters.

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Precious Roy wrote:

Let's be honest about these skinnyfat posts. They are really not about health. They are really midlife crisis posts. Most runners who hit their masters days find out pretty quickly that their aging metabolism cannot process carbs like we did when we were in our 20s and 30s. So, we modify our diets and replace a sandwich for lunch with one of those healthy "bowl" things with quinoa, kale and whatever. We also find that we are more injury prone due to the beginning of a decline in muscle mass. So, it is time to get into the gym and use it before we lose it. So, for normal folks, a few common sense modifications are needed in midlife.

But for others, midlife is a time to freak out and find some new path of enlightenment. For lifelong runners, that takes the shape of strength training and meat eating to end the "skinnyfat" runner body. Strength training is just fine and reducing carbs is an obvious necessity. But the midlife crisis version of making common sense lifestyle modifications is out of control. Paleo is BS. It is just an excuse for heavy meat eaters to diet without giving up eating meat. Animal fats do way more damage than excessive carbs. And spending all morning in the gym is just boring. There is no great health benefit in getting big muscles. In fact, in middle age, care needs to be taken in weight training to avoid damaging knees, back and shoulders with overly aggressive weight lifting routines. Sports meds are seeing far worse injuries from aggressive weight training in middle aged people than from distance running. Knee and shoulder replacements and slipped discs are becoming very common with middle age people who are aggressive weight lifters.

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Gravy wrote:

You only need one tip: no booze.

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@Gravy wrote:

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Gravy wrote:

You only need one tip: no booze.

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There are plenty of skinnyfat and just plain fat people that never touch a drop of booze homeschooler.

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Precious Roy wrote:

Let's be honest about these skinnyfat posts. They are really not about health. They are really midlife crisis posts. Most runners who hit their masters days find out pretty quickly that their aging metabolism cannot process carbs like we did when we were in our 20s and 30s. So, we modify our diets and replace a sandwich for lunch with one of those healthy "bowl" things with quinoa, kale and whatever. We also find that we are more injury prone due to the beginning of a decline in muscle mass. So, it is time to get into the gym and use it before we lose it. So, for normal folks, a few common sense modifications are needed in midlife.

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Gravy wrote:

You only need one tip: no booze.

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I thought this was going to be a troll thread based on the subject, but that's some good advice in the first post.

I've been using a number of the those principles to guide my weight loss after a disatrous 20K a couple months ago.

One thing I'd like to add, no snacking after dinner, when you start to get the urge to go into the kitchen and get something else to eat, go to sleep.

"You could have cut your post down to two words: eat less."

It's not so simple. Many people have tried this approach and most have failed. A low-carb diet coupled with Intermittent Fasting is by far the most effective method I've tried to eat less.

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Sand Dunes wrote:

Or, do the following:
1. Two to three times a week do heavy ass lifting, low reps, high weights. Just the basic compund movements is all you need i.e. deadlifts, squats, bench, over head press, dips, pull ups and barbell rows. Accessory work is b.s.
2. Eat a clean healthy diet. Cut out processed foods I.e. avoid soda, "sports drinks", fried foods, white flour, and refined oil. Just eat whole foods i.e. whole grains, legumes, fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.
3. Hills, run more hills.
4. Look up Percy Cerutty and seek pain as he did.

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Not so fast my friend wrote:

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Precious Roy wrote:

Let's be honest about these skinnyfat posts. They are really not about health. They are really midlife crisis posts. Most runners who hit their masters days find out pretty quickly that their aging metabolism cannot process carbs like we did when we were in our 20s and 30s. So, we modify our diets and replace a sandwich for lunch with one of those healthy "bowl" things with quinoa, kale and whatever. We also find that we are more injury prone due to the beginning of a decline in muscle mass. So, it is time to get into the gym and use it before we lose it. So, for normal folks, a few common sense modifications are needed in midlife.

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40+ yrs old, 50mpw on average, eat 70% carbs & appx. 3000 cal/day to maintain weight.

If you're "skinnyfat," eat less or run more. It's that simple. You can eat high carb, low carb, all butter, whatever turns your crank. Just find the balance of calories in, calories out.

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