As an athlete, the decision to lose weight can be a number of reasons. Reducing body fat may positively impact your performance by improving your power to weight ratio, agility, speed and/or endurance, and it may be necessary to reach a certain weight class. Your health is number one and any fat loss goals you have should not sacrifice health and performance. The first step is to determine what amount of weight loss is realistic for you.
Balancing heavy training and food intake can be challenge, and even more so when trying to create a deficit for fat loss without having negative consequences on performance or eating less than needed to support your normal metabolic functions. However, it is possible when you avoid the next quick fix and adopt strategies you can maintain long term. As an athlete, energy expenditure is typically already high, so modest changes to your diet will help with changing your weight. While there is no one specific diet plan to follow for weight loss, working with a Sports Dietitian like myself can take into consideration the many factors that makes you unique and put together an individualized plan and approach. I do have some tips that just about anyone can incorporate no matter what way of eating you choose to follow.
Before we get into those tips, athletes have a few important factors to consider when losing weight:
The Speed of Weight Loss
Losing weight too quickly can mean that weight lost is not fat and instead is water, glycogen and/or possibly muscle mass – 3 things as an athlete you don’t want to be losing!
Cutting carbohydrates heavily or not strategizing when they are consumed can result in glycogen (stored carbohydrates in the muscle and liver) depletion. For every gram of glycogen we store, 3g of water is stored along with it. That is why the first week of a low carb diet you can lose several pounds, but really it is a loss of glycogen and water.
Give yourself plenty of time to reach your goals. If you’re trying to make a weight class, minimize large fluctuations between the seasons and don’t wait until too close to competition in order to avoid making drastic changes in a short period of time. Losing weight modestly at about 1-2 lb/ week, without cutting calories to much or unnecessarily eliminating food groups can help preserve muscle.
The Timing of Weight Loss
During the regular season or during competition is not a good time for athletes to be attempting weight loss as this can hinder performance. The off-season or pre-season is the time when you can make changes to your weight.
Maintaining Performance and Training Adaptations
During periods of weight loss, you still want to ensure you have enough energy to train, recover and adapt to training. Fuel up properly with carbohydrates so that you don’t compromise the quality of your training sessions (which in turn can impact your weight loss goals if your not working as hard). Recover after training with carbohydrates and protein to make sure you still get the nutrients needed to adapt to training. In my post about about Recovery Nutrition has guidelines you can still follow when trying to manage your weight.
How Realistic is the Goal?
In addition to point #1 where you want to avoid setting high weight loss goals with short deadlines, other factors like your current body composition, body weight history, guidelines for your sport and whether it will help your performance are a few things to consider before setting a target weight. A professional can help assess and determine these things for you.
So, what should you do to create a calorie deficit that will not lead to some of the negative effects above? Avoid severe calorie restriction and quick fixes because in the end they won’t be sustainable.
Here are 10 tips – no calorie counting or cutting out food groups required:
- Eat enough protein to preserve muscle mass and promote satiety. In addition to including strength training to help preserve muscle mass, protein intake can help as well. Total protein needs will be increased during weight loss, but the frequency at which it is consumed is just as important. The key here is getting a serving of protein every 3-4 hours, so aim for 3 meals a days and 2-3 snacks in between.
Choose protein-rich foods to include at meals and snacks like: plain Greek yogurt, cottage cheese, chicken, fish, lean meats, raw, mixed nuts.
For meals, aim for about 20-30g/meal (depending on your body size) and 10-20g/snacks (also dependent on body size).
2. Balance Snacks with Protein and Carbohydrate. As mentioned above, have a protein at all snacks, but make sure to have a bit of carbohydrate to help provide energy and keep blood sugar stable. Pair the protein with a fruit or vegetable (they contain carbohydrates) most often to provide lots of nutrients and fibre without too many added calories. The purpose of the snacks is to help you meet nutrient needs, keep energy levels up between meals, and to avoid long periods of time without eating.
Examples of balanced snacks: Cottage cheese mixed with diced pineapple or red peppers; small handful raw nuts and an orange; mixed raw vegetables and hardboiled eggs, edamame and carrot sticks.
3. Choose whole, unprocessed foods more often. Think about some of the foods you consume and if they are processed or packaged, replace them with something either minimally-processed or in its natural form.
For example, if you typically eat cereal as your starch at breakfast, switch to oatmeal or steel cut oats. If you typically have bread or pasta as carbohydrate of choice at meals, try switching that to potatoes, brown rice, and quinoa or other whole grains sometimes. Instead of always having peanut butter, have raw nuts in their whole form. Portion sizes are still important for whole foods, but since these foods are less processed, our body metabolizes them differently, they will be more satisfying and provide more nutrients.
4. Minimize foods or drinks high in energy but low on nutrients. These include sweets, sugar or cream in coffee, cakes, pop, juice, fried foods, creamy salad dressings and too many condiments and sauces.
5. Avoid eating out of boredom and eating while distracted as this can lead to overeating or eating to quickly (which can also lead to overeating). Some strategies to help you slow down & portion size are: Put down your phone and turn off the TV when eating; put down your fork after taking a bite and only pick it up once you have finished chewing and swallowed the food; portion out food instead of eating directly from the packages and choose smaller plates.
Example of what not to do!
6. Prioritize healthy fats. When you want to lose fat, that doesn’t mean you should eat fat-free. You still need fat to stay healthy and absorb nutrients. Instead, cut back on the saturated and trans fats from foods like processed meats (sausage, deli meats, hot dogs, bacon) and get a moderate amount of healthy, unsaturated fats from avocado, salmon and other omega 3 rich fish, olive oil, raw nuts and seeds chia and ground flax seeds.
7. Aim for variety. You can still eat flavourful foods and lose weight without constantly eating plain broccoli, chicken and brown rice. If simplicity works for you, that’s fine too, but at least try to rotate between several different meals and snacks or else you may lack some nutrients. On the other hand, boredom sometimes prevents people from sticking to healthy eating. Make it a habit to switch up the produce you buy week to week or try at least one new healthy recipe.
8. Avoid skipping meals and snacks during the day as this can lead to increased hunger and overeating in the evening as well as lack of energy for evening workouts. You don’t need to cut off your eating by a certain time at night, but if most of your calories are consumed in the evening, you may be more likely to store fat. Plan ahead and take the time to pack food with you if you are out all day.
9. Make double the dinner for leftovers at lunch or pack your meals the night before so you can avoid fast food and take out.
10. Chop all veggies ahead of time so that they are ready to eat, easily visible in the fridge and already prepared. This way, its just as convenient to reach for some veggies to snack on than it is to grab something less nutritious. As another bonus, dinner is partly prepped for things like salads, roasted vegetables or stirfrys when everything is washed and chopped.
While this may seem like a lot to change, start by choosing 1 or 2 things that you can start to do. If you need more guidance, contact me and I can provide individual nutrition coaching and meal planning support to help you reach your goals.
Looking for more articles like this? Check out:
Calorie Counting Sucks: 10 Things to Try Instead to Help You Lose Weight and Keep It Off
How to Build High Performance Meals Tailored to Your Training Levels
5 Tips To Stay Motivated During Your Weight Loss Journey
Written by: Andrea Docherty, RD
Registered Dietitian and Sports Nutritionist
Windsor, Ontario