weight loss and cycling - I Love Bicycling

How to Lose Weight Cycling: The Essentials

February 23, 2020 by Sarah Lauzé

Your bike, when put to good use, may just be the best tool you have to lose weight. Whether you’re just starting out and looking to cycling as a means to a healthier lifestyle, or are a veteran cyclist, there are a lot of reasons you may be looking to lose weight cycling.

Shaving off the pounds can make you faster, boost your confidence, and impact almost every part of life. Just make sure you are putting your well-being first. If you are working towards a weight goal, ensure that is it one that will actually improve your overall health and fitness.

Why Cycling?

So, why chose to lose weight cycling over other means? Running is known for being on of the more effective way to burn calories, but is also a high impact sport. Especially if you live in a city and are running on roads, each step sends impact through your feet, ankles, calves, knees, and onward. This can make it a difficult activity to start if you have previous injuries, and you can be at risk of overuse injuries (which increases the heavier you are).

Cycling, on the other hand, is a low impact activity that like running, you can do almost anywhere. It’s also a ton of fun! Biking is all about the legs, but it’s also a cardiovascular exercise that burns a ton of calories. Weight loss comes down to burning more calories than you are taking in, causing your body to use energy stores. Plus, as you strengthen your muscles cycling, you’ll also be building up oxygen delivering capillaries. With oxygen running through your body at a faster rate, your metabolism will speed up and start to eat away at fat cells, resulting in weight loss.

Steps to get started

Make a plan not a goal

Goals can be a great motivating tool, but without the plan to get there, they will remain out of reach. You need to get specific and lay it out in a way that makes sense to you. This could be a simple as riding your bike to work three days out of the week or putting in a couple hundred miles.

Be realistic with yourself and your schedule. If your plan is too demanding in the start, you probably won’t stick with it, but if it’s too easy you won’t see results. Can’t find time to commute or ride in the evenings? Try a lunch hour spin class. For more information check out this article: The Benefits Of Having A Cycling Training Plan.

Find your moderate base pace

Starting out you will want spend most of your time on the bike at 68-79 percent of your max heart rate. If you don’t want to fuss about measuring it with a heart rate monitor, then aim for a pace that leaves you out of breath, but still able to carry on a conversation (no gasping). Great, now hang out there.

You shouldn’t be so drained at the end of the ride that you won’t want to head out again, enjoy it! Once you’ve established your base, then you’ll want to introduce some variety to your rides in the form of intervals or high intensity sessions.

Diet

Your diet is the sum of the food you consume, and as you probably already know it is a huge factor in weight loss. Ignore what the latest fad is, it all comes down to nutrition and fueling your body with the right amounts of the right things. Just because you are going for ride after work does not mean you should carb load.

Carbohydrates need to support your cycling routines, not hinder them. The reality is that too large a portion can lead to peaks and dips in energy that can actually leave you feeling lethargic. A good rule of thumb is to aim to eat a fist-sized portion of low-glycaemic carbohydrates to ensure that you get a steadier release of energy as you ride.

Weight loss is a simple concept: More calories out than in. So, keep your diet simple. Eat a balanced, healthy diet, control your portion size, and cut out unnecessary snacking and you will be well on your way.

Don’t fear the hills

Going up a hill takes a lot more energy than riding on a flat surface. This will cause you to use up extra calories in a shorter period of time. So, hills are actually your friend!

Embrace the cycling community

Accountability is important for everyone, but it’s not something you should dread. Finding a cycling partner or joining a weekly group ride not only ensures you show up, but it’s also a great way to meet people. So, head down to your local bike shop and find out how you can get involved.

Enjoy it!

Cycling is fun above all else, so make sure you keep it that way! Think of it as a part of your day you’re looking forward to, rather than something you have to do to lose weight. The more you enjoy it, the more likely you’ll be to stick with it for the long haul.

Battling the Holiday Weight Gain with Cycling

December 29, 2016 by Josh Friedman

The end of the year is a time of revelry, and with that revelry comes indulgence and over-consumption. The weather is turning for the worst too making riding a bit more difficult because of condition and not wanting to suffer through bad weather. Devising some tactics to deal with holiday weight gain can keep you happier and healthier along with maintaining your fitness through this season that is fun and fraught at the same time.

Indulgence and Holiday Weight Gain

There are sweets at work. There is alcohol at the party. There is a feast at your family’s house. It is hard to handle all the indulgence. Find some strategies that work for you to enjoy yourself but also to keep holiday weight gain to a minimum.

It is okay to have treats and delicious food. Make sure whatever you are consuming is really worth it and increases your enjoyment of the moment.
Before going into a situation, set limits for yourself. An open ended commitment to eating and drinking will not end well.
Be honest with yourself when you are full or you have had enough to drink.
If there are a lot of options, take small portions so you can get a taste of everything you might enjoy. Then you can make a decision about what you really like and go back for more (if you are not violating the previous point).
There is no obligation to force feed yourself. Remember that peer and societal pressure is a thing, even when you are an adult and make a conscious decision to ignore the pressure.
Choose to fill up on the healthier options on offer – vegetables, fruit and other non-processed and less calorie-dense foods. It will make you feel fuller without dropping a calorie bomb in your gut.
Hydration levels affect your perception of satiety. Make sure you are well hydrated while partying the month away. An additional bonus to good hydration is that it will help you cope better with alcohol in your system.

The Bottom Line

The bottom line to battle holiday weight gain is to keep pedaling or staying active in some way. If you are already riding regularly, find a way that you can continue even as the daylight fades, temperatures drop and precipitation increases. A good set of lights might help to keep you on the road in the dark; nothing beats them to see or be seen. All the high visibility colors and reflectors do nothing compared to active illumination.

When the weather is sure to make you uncomfortable, set up a space indoors that you can ride in on a trainer or rollers that will keep you motivated. You will need a fan and some sort of entertainment. Staring at the wall or your bike computer the whole time sets you up for failure. Music, movies and friends make the time go by much faster.

Prepare a manageable schedule for yourself that you can stick to for your rides. A commitment will keep you on the bike and keep the holiday weight gain at bay. The more you ride, the more you can indulge, within reason of course. If you are lucky enough to have a schedule that allows you to ride more than usual at this time of year, the easier it is to burn off those treats. But beware – those treats do not provide optimal fuel for training.

Other Activity

The winter is also a great time to throw in some other activities to your exercise program to stave off holiday weight gain. Find something that is interesting to you that you may not get to do when it is nice out and you are more committed to riding. Again, make a regular schedule so you can stay fit and keep burning those extra calories you may be eating. The activity could also be a nice mental break from all of the riding; when you come back to riding, it will be fresh and exciting again.

You Already Know

You are already aware of what the end of the year can do to your body. It is hard to handle the indulgence and holiday weight gain if you do not have a plan. Make a plan and try to stick to it. You will be even more committed to the plan if you write it down and tell others about it – this works for anything. This will lead to a happier and healthier season, and that is what it is all about, right?

Pedal Away The Pounds E-Book – Just Released

July 17, 2016 by Adam Farabaugh

The modern day lifestyle is largely built around working too much, not having enough time to do the things you love, and stress from those two that leads to eating foods that aren’t always the healthiest. All of this on top of not exercising as much is just about the perfect recipe for being heavier than you otherwise would like to be.

There are a lot of diet and exercise plans out there to get you to lose weight but they don’t always focus on the right things and, let’s be honest, aren’t always the most fun or appetizing. The key to losing weight and keeping it off is to do it in a way that is fun, manageable, as well as tasty. This approach then isn’t something you just do for a period of time and go back to what you were doing originally. It is an approach that creates a healthy, balanced lifestyle that leaves you feeling great, doing the things you love, with the body you want.

Riding a bike is one of the best ways to increase your activity level and lose weight for a number of reasons:

It is soft on your joints (a potential issue if you’re carrying a few extra pounds).
Gets your heart rate up.
Can promote muscle growth.
Overall is just fun to do because you’re traveling at speed covering more ground exploring more places.
Additionally, it is also something you can easily do with others which has even more benefits.

Combining the benefits of riding a bike with eating the right foods at the right time will give you the body you want as being active and eating certain types of foods was what nature intended and have you ever seen a fat wild animal?

In our Pedal Away The Pounds – A Guide to Cycling & Weight Loss E-Book we will give you the tools you need to first ride a bike whether you’re a first timer or have ridden before on a regular basis.We will then get into the basics of food and why you should know what things are and how your body reacts to them. Following this is a detailed look at exactly what we should be eating and how to prepare it as well as shop for it. Then we get into what to eat surrounding your ride because you can’t exactly have a full-course meal while out on a ride. This then leads us into alternative ways of eating and why they are good or bad. Summing up the book is then a chapter on the little things that contribute to your weight; things like sleep and addiction. Accompanying this book is also an 8-week training plan to get you rolling on the bike and burning more calories.

We hope you embrace our approach to weight loss and that it’s not just something you do for a set period of time but rather as a way to adjust your lifestyle permanently toward that of a healthy, enjoyable, productive lifestyle.