How do you lose weight without losing to much power (muscle) like wiggo has done, but not have to fork out for a mega expensive dietician…….. just out of interest of course.

i would guess watch what you eat, count calories in and out, cut fats, etc.

Probably a different scenario to the one you're looking for, but I've just lost a stone and a half in 5 weeks by eating less and exercising more.

I did have a fair bit of fat to shift and I've cut out eating as much junk and eating when hungry instead of just having a meal at a set time. My strength has improved massively just by getting more use out of my legs.

I think weight loss for someone like Wiggins is a different ball game than it would be for someone like me.

Mind you dont Snap them legs Wiggo !! Jeez.

Not for nothing is he now known as Twiggo.

ride shitloads would be my guess.

shit he looks ill …. did he loose all 6kg in his legs !

Obviously these guys in the tour are fit and healthy (fittest and healthiest might be more apt) but is it doing them any long term damage?

Some of that will be dehydration, as it is physically impossible to hydrate properly in hot weather while exercising. He looks spent.

Obviously these guys in the tour are fit and healthy (fittest and healthiest might be more apt) but is it doing them any long term damage?
i have a vague memory of reading that the life expectancy of a pro cyclist is significantly lower than the general population (low 50s?). but can't remember/find a source for this (so may be pish).

Sheeesh… he actually looks anorexic in that photo.

I'm pretty sure Wiggo has lost some power (and muscle). After fat, you have nothing left to lose, other than muscle (and maybe some water). If I recall correctly, the great Robert Millar used a strict vegetarian diet to ensure he was positvely skeletal and didn't build too much muscle.

apparently the haircut had minimal resulting powerloss and the 'samson effect' turned out to be utter bollox – do you have a silly hair cut? that'd be the first thing to do.

then i guess you have to lower your body fat, as little power comes from a beer gut and double chin. Run a calorie deffercit of about 500 Kals a day, this'll result in minimal muscle loss (provided exercise is continued) and you'll loose a pound of flab a week.

Do some stregth work, on your legs, reps of 3-7 apparently, sqauts, lunges with weights ert. That's increase your metabolic rate so you'll burn more Kals just watching tv.

Join a pro tour team and race a few grand tours, Barry Bethel said the weight just fell off.

The major problem with losing weight and going below a certain limit is that you're getting slow, lazy and a bit dizzy because of low sugar levels when you're on a diet. It hinders your brain and hence thinking and attentiveness: not good for a working person. The second obstacle is precise calorie counting.

Jan Ullrich once fell off the bike and hurt his arm when he was working on his weight before TdF.

Employ the best coaches and nutritionists.

It's a dilema I face each day. stay overweight and laugh in the face of headwinds or slim down so my mates don't have to wait at the top of hills for me.

Jan Ullrich once fell off the bike and hurt his arm when he was working on his weight before TdF

That's hardly suprising, have you ever tried to get a Bratwurst out of it's wrapper whilst doing 50kph, it's always going to be dangerous.

When I'm on vacation I usually lose some weight, around 1kg in 1-2 weeks. But when I come back to work it creeps back again. I hate my brain's need for carbohydrates. I want to be 5 kilos leaner and 5 IQ points more stupid.

I want to be 5 kilos leaner and 5 IQ points more stupid.

Just remove your brain. Easy 😛

Just remove your brain. Easy

I'm not that stupid 😆 My IQ is high thus I can sacrifice some points. 😆

Illegaly:

To shift fat but not muscle take HGH

To build muscle take steroids (essentialy painkillers) and HGH and testosterone.

Legaly:
If you already have the muscle and no fat then just change your excercise routine to shift the muscle about. The only problem is lots of enduance excercise thends to actualy reduce muscle mass.

I'd guessing lots of long rides, calorie deficit of 200-300 per day (he only lost 8kg in total, and the slower you do it the better), and making sure he takes on about 8-10g of protein an hour during and after excercise.

He gave up beer and counted the calories and rode loads of miles. Simply really. I do think giving up beer is going to far and sets a bad example.

Obviously these guys in the tour are fit and healthy

Fit, for riding a huge distance in a relative short space of time, probably. Healthy? I doubt there's many doctors that would call these guys (or what they do) healthy.

Wiggins reckons he lost a bit of top end power after losing his weight, but it's not something he was bothered about as road cycling is different from track in that respect. So eventually you can't loose shed loads of weight without effecting your muscles, but in reality, if you're a regular Joe, just eating less and exercising more would do it

all very interesting, i was just curious, i dont actually need it myself ( i think ) being 5'8" and 72kilos. think thats about right-ish…….

Healthy? I doubt there's many doctors that would call these guys (or what they do) healthy.

Indeed not – I've had similar thoughts about the sport I do (or at least used to do) seriously. In fact any high level training to get good at a sport is unlikely to be that healthy.

Interesting to see an article in the paper with comments from somebody I knew who used to do the same sport as me to a very high level – apparently she got the beginnings of arthritis when <40, hence why she stopped competing for several years.

5'8" and 72kilos

Plenty of cyclists and other sportspeople I know would call you fatty 😉 eg 6'3" lightweight rowers who make the lightweight weight limit of 72.5kg

The thing to bear in mind is that the weight they all are at the tour is only temporary and won't be sustained. Most will deliberately weigh 2-3kg more for the majority of the time, only losing that last bit of weight in a controlled way near the race – too little fat makes you very succeptible to picking up illness/infections.

Fatty! how very dare you…….

I'll never forget my mate who struggled to make the weight in the minibus on the way to a race in Belgium eating a single jelly baby whenever he felt like he was going to pass out because he'd eaten so little. not good…

Take out and freeze a couple of litres of blood. Then diet and train like billy-o. A couple of days before you need to be fast just mainline that blood back in there. Job jobbed.

5'8" and 72kilos

59kg at the same height here. One of my goals for this year was to gain weight (muscle) in the hope of getting faster. I managed to put on 0.5kg, but that's totally within error on most scales.

Things like osteoporosis and osteoarthritis are fairly common in ex-pro cyclists, or in the case of Merckx and Hinault, a slight belly!

His legs are sick in that photo! That's all I've got to contribute!

Not wanting to incite a riot, but would we all be thinking this is 'natural' if he wasn't British? He seems like a nice guy, and I really do hope that it's all genuine, but you have to wonder!

59kg at the same height here. One of my goals for this year was to gain weight (muscle) in the hope of getting faster. I managed to put on 0.5kg, but that's totally within error on most scales.

Jeez, i wish i could get that light (i'm 60kg/5'6"). Do you spend a lot of time hungry, or is it mad amounts of miles? Or both?

would we all be thinking this is 'natural' if he wasn't British?

Of course not. That's where the difficult questions lie.

My opinion is that he is clean (I think that British Cycling (team) is clean and Wiggo's so closely tied in with that and Garmin's ideals that I can't see on a human level how he can't be) but it does then raise the issue that the other guys around him on GC inc Alberto and Lance could therefore perfectly reasonably be clean too since the margins weren't large enough to be unreasonable.

5'8" and 72kilos

I weigh less than that and I'm 6'2".
I ain't as fast a Wiggo though 🙁

Jeez, i wish i could get that light (i'm 60kg/5'6"). Do you spend a lot of time hungry, or is it mad amounts of miles? Or both?

Stuff my face all the time, just had a pre-lunch snack of honey on brown bread as a good example. When I don't ride I lose weight (over a few months, not had to do that for years) due to loss of muscle. Is just the way I am, I try not to worry about it too much.

Blimey I'm 5'8" and 76kilos 46" chest 18" neck and Twiglet legs. Just a few pounds makes the difference between slow/weak/fast. Train 5 days a week anymore sends me downhill. Age 50 work 6 days a week. Some people are light wow, probably explains why I can climb fast off road and slow on road.

the key is not nessessarily being 'light' at the level of sporting proess we are realistically talking about for us mortals – the objective is to get lean, look at thor, he weighs 80 odd kg, yet when he went on the attack to secure the green jersey he was flying up those hills.

Loose the belly, with lots of kardio, gain power through reistnce training in the off season, you'll climb a lot faster, maybe not as fast as thor, but still faster.

Sheesh.. this is getting a bit like some sort of ana-mia* thinspiration thread. Go guys! 😕
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* http://anamiachronicles.blogspot.com/