Running Lean with Patrick McGilvray
If you’ve ever felt like nutrition is way more complicated than it should be…you’re not wrong. Most runners are stuck trying to figure out calories, macros, meal timing, and what they “should” or …
Continue Reading about 326. Build Your Plate: The Simplest Fat-Loss Framework That Works →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner sports nutritionist, master life coach, and weight loss coach. For runners, I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you, properly fuel your body and your mind so you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought. Possible. This is running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 326 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners. And today, build your plate, the simplest fat loss framework that works. If you’ve ever felt like nutrition is just way more complicated than it should be. You’re not wrong. Most runners are stuck trying to figure out calories and macros and meal timing and what they should or shouldn’t be eating, and the result is inconsistency and frustration and not getting the results that you want.
So today I’m gonna strip all of that away. In this episode, I’m gonna give you a practical no BS way to structure your meals so that you can lose fat, get stronger, and actually feel better. While you are running, no tracking required, no complicated rules, just a simple system that you can use at your very next meal because fat loss doesn’t happen from knowing more.
It happens from doing the same simple things consistently, and that’s exactly what this whole episode is about here. Okay. So let’s get right into this. I wanna talk about something that I see over and over again with runners. They’re doing the work, they’re getting their miles in, they’re showing up for their runs.
They’re trying to eat healthy, but they’re not getting the results that they want. They’re not getting lean, they’re not feeling stronger. Running feels harder than it should, and almost always it comes back to one thing. Nutrition is too complicated and too inconsistent, and it’s not because you’re lazy or you don’t care.
It’s because. You’ve been taught to think about food in a way that’s way too complex, right? Calories and macros and apps and tracking and meal timing and good foods and bad foods, and there’s so much noise out there. And when something feels that complicated, you are not stick with it. You might do it for a couple of days, maybe a couple of weeks, but eventually you’re just gonna fall off, not because you’re a failure, it’s because the system failed you.
So I want, I wanna do something today and give you something that’s a little bit different here. A simple system. A system that is simple and repeatable and sustainable, and something that actually works. Okay? This is not about being perfect. It’s about building consistency over time, and the tool that we’re gonna use, I’m just calling this for this episode, build Your Plate.
Okay. So before I go into the details, I’m gonna zoom out for a second because this part is actually important. You, you don’t really need a better diet, okay? This is gonna sound kind of controversial, but you need simpler decision making processes, okay? That’s it. You need a simpler decision making process.
Most people are trying to solve fat loss with more information. But what they actually need is fewer decisions, and that’s what this framework is all about here. It removes all those decisions. It removes the guesswork, and it gives you a default way to build your meals. So you’re not constantly asking, what should I eat?
Is this good or bad? Is this on the list or off the list? Am I doing this right or wrong? Instead, you just kind of can look at your plate and you can build it the same way every time. Uh, so listen, every meal that you eat follows the same basic structure. Um, this is the framework, okay? This is the first kind of part of the framework.
I just wanna give you this. There’s four components to your plate, to the Build Your Plate framework, four components, protein, fiber, rich plants. Smart carbs and healthy fats. Okay, I’m gonna say that one more time. Protein, fiber, rich plants, smart carbs, and healthy fats. And we’re gonna walk through each one of these.
Let’s start with protein. This is the anchor habit. This is gonna be the most important piece of this whole framework here. Okay? So when I say protein is the anchor, what I mean is this. It’s the thing that stabilizes everything else in your nutrition. And most runners are protein light. They’re carb heavy, but light on the protein, and that creates a bunch of problems.
Uh, when you’re, uh, carb heavy and protein light, you’re hungry again. Like, you know, an hour after you eat, you’re snacking constantly. Recovery takes longer. You’re slower. Uh, your recovery is slower than it should be. You’re not building muscle, you’re not maintaining lean muscle. And here’s the part that a lot of people miss when you’re trying to lose fat.
Your body doesn’t just burn fat. It also breaks down muscle if you’re not giving it a reason not to, protein is that reason. It sends this signal, Hey, keep this muscle, we need it. And for runners, this matters a lot because the stronger you are, the more efficient you are, the more resilient you are, the less likely you are to get injured.
So this isn’t just about fat loss, it’s a performance. Okay, so what does enough protein actually look like? And here’s where people get stuck and they overthink this too much. They think, oh, I had some eggs, or I had a little chicken. And that’s not the same as enough. A simple, practical way to think about it is this, you want a solid, visible portion of protein at every meal, not hidden, not sprinkled in a real portion.
So a rough guide would be 20 to 30 grams per meal. This is a good baseline for most runners. If you’re bigger or more active, you’ll likely need more, but don’t get hung up on the numbers. Okay. Instead just ask, is protein the main feature of this meal? Right? And if the answer is no, then you gotta fix that first.
Now, if you wanna know what 20 to 30 grams looks like, get an app, you know, go to, you know, carb Manager or MyFitnessPal or lose it, something like that. Just plug in, Hey, six ounce chicken breast, and you’ll see it has whatever, 50 grams of protein. Just so you understand what that kind of looks like, and you don’t need to do this all the time, but you may want to do it a couple of times just so you go, oh, so when I’m eating.
You know, uh, four ounces of salmon. This is how much protein I’m getting here. Okay. So fix that first. Get the protein right first. Some real world examples. You know, if you’re eating a, um, a bagel with cream cheese, that’s mostly carbs and fat. All right? If you’re eating a bagel with some eggs and Greek yogurt on the side, okay, now we’re talking.
That’s better if you’re eating a salad with just a bunch of veggies. Probably not gonna be enough protein there, but a salad with chicken or a piece of salmon on there. Now you, you’ve got something that works. Okay? So a simple rule to remember when it comes to protein is don’t start your meal with carbs, start with protein, build everything else around that.
Okay? So that’s number one is protein, is the anchor habit. So make sure you’re doing that. Uh, the second principle. Around building your plate is fiber rich plants, and this is all about volume and control, and this is the part that makes fat loss feel easier. Um, not easy, but it feels easier. Okay? Because you’re not constantly fighting hunger.
And most people think fat loss means just eat a bunch of less food, right? Just like drop your calories way down. And that’s not really true. Uh, it means eating fewer calories. Yes, but you can still eat a lot of food. Okay. And that’s where plants come in, vegetables and some fruits. They give you volume and fiber and nutrients without a ton of calories.
So you can build a plate that actually looks big. It’s full, and you can still be in a little bit of a calorie deficit. Why does this matter for runners? Well, if you’re always hungry, you’re not going to stick with anything. Okay? You might start strong and then you’re gonna slowly drift back into old habits.
And I see this all the time with runners who. Try to cut back on their calories, they change their diet and then they just get super hungry and they’re just not eating enough volume here. Okay? So the way we fix that is we add more, um, uh, fiber rich plants and this. Fiber helps to slow digestion. It helps to keep you full longer, just like protein does.
It helps to stabilize your energy, which means fewer cravings, less snacking, and more control. So how do we visualize this on your plate? Well, half your plate should be vegetables, you know, most of the time anyway. Not every meal has to look like this. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but this should be your default.
And don’t overthink variety or perfection. Start with what you’ll actually eat. If you like broccoli, eat broccoli. If you like mixes of salad, you know, with different things in it, do that. If you like frozen veggies, I do. I love getting a bag of frozen broccoli. Throw it in the microwave. Put a little butter on there.
Good. Good to go. Stir fry. Stir fry blends. Stir fry blends. That’s hard to say. Um, any of that stuff is super easy to do. Uh, remember, we’re trying to make this easy. It can’t be too complicated. If it’s too complicated, you’re not gonna do it. But a lot of, um, mistakes that I see people make is that they think that it has to be all protein, and then they add vegetables as an afterthought.
Like, I’m gonna have this burger and then I’ll, I’ll put a piece of lettuce on there that, that’s not doing much for you. Right? Vegetables shouldn’t be just like a decoration. They gotta be a core part of the meal. So you want plants, you want fiber rich plants to take up some space on your plate. And if your plate looks empty without them, you’re, you’re doing it right.
Okay? ’cause you want to have at least half your plate, uh, to be full of fiber rich plants. Okay? So that’s principle number two. Principle number three, smart carbs. You have to fuel with intention. Okay? This is where we’re gonna bring in a little bit more nuance here, okay? ’cause runners do need carbs, but most runners are just eating total carbs all the time, and they’re doing it out of habit.
They’re not being intentional or mindful about it, and that’s where things can really start to get outta control. The real issue with carbs. Carbs are easy to overeat. They’re quick, they’re convenient, they taste amazing. Whether you’re, uh, tired, whether you’re hungry, uh, that’s what you go for. You go for simple carbs.
So the goal here is not to eliminate carbs, but to put some guardrails around them, right? We wanna be smart. We wanna fuel with intention. Carbs should support your training, not just your habits. And this is a big shift I want you to make instead of asking, you know, what do I feel like eating? Ask yourself, what does my training today actually require from a nutrition standpoint?
What does my training today actually require? So a practical framework would look like this. If you have a. Hard run or like a long run day. More carbs. Higher carbs that day. Totally normal. Moderate training, moderate carbs, rest day, like day low carbs, right? This doesn’t have to be perfect, but it should be very intentional.
This is an easy way to think about it. Hard run, long day, high carbs, moderate training, moderate carbs, like day lower carbs. That’s pretty simple, right? What does this look like in real life? Well, maybe you did a long run this morning. Um, so you include a solid carb portion in each of your meals. Okay?
Maybe today was a rest day. You’re sitting at your desk working all day. You probably don’t need a ton of carbs. Maybe just do a little bit here or there. Uh, the common mistake though, that I see a lot of runners make is like, oh, I run, I’m a runner, so I need to eat carbs all the time. And you don’t necessarily need to do that.
I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think eating carbs all the time causes a lot of problems. You know, your blood sugar’s outta control. It’s, it’s really hard for you to lose weight if you’re eating carbs constantly, especially refined carbs. You need carbs when your BO body is actually using them, and that’s round running.
So earn your carbs with your activity. You wanna fuel your runs, not just fueling your habits. Okay, that’s principle number three. Smart carbs, fuel with intention. Principle number four is healthy fats. Small but powerful. So this is the last piece of the Build your plate formula here, and this is where things can get outta control for some people.
Listen, fats are important. It’s also very easy to overeat fats. Fats are important though. They matter. They matter for hormone function, for brain health, for overall nutrition, you, you have to eat fats, right? If you don’t eat fat, um. You’ll die. If you don’t eat protein, you’ll die. Like you have to eat those things.
And we don’t wanna cut them out all altogether. We don’t wanna build entire meals around them though. And I see this with some people who are like, oh, I’m gonna just cut out all the carbs and I’m just gonna replace all that with fat. And so they’re eating a ton of fat, um, moderate protein and then almost no carbs.
And that, that’s really, you can lose weight doing that, but it is. It is very challenging to get healthy and fit and lean and, and maintain your running by doing that. So the thing with fats though, is they are very calorie dense and a little is fine, but a lot can add up really fast and most people don’t realize how much they’re using.
You think, you know, I’m just gonna drizzle a little olive oil in here and it’s like, you know, five tablespoons, or I’m just gonna have a handful of nuts and it’s really like 10 servings. That’s my problem anyway. If you give me a bag of like salted uh, almonds or something like that, and I grab one handful.
Uh, it’s probably like eight servings, you know? So anyway, what do we do? We wanna keep fats in the meal, but you just have to use more controlled amounts, okay? This isn’t about, um, you know, measuring everything and being perfect. Just be intentional. Okay, add some fat to your next meal. This is a practical way of doing this.
Just add a little bit of fat to your next meal. Be mindful of things like cooking oils and dressings and you know, you don’t want to have like tons of high fat foods in one meal. But let’s say you, you are eating some salmon and then you want to add some avocado to that with some olive oil dressing.
Well, that’s a lot of fat. Salmon already has a lot of fat in it. Avocado’s got a lot of fat. Olive oil’s got a lot of fat. Instead, maybe salmon and vegetables with a carb source. Now it’s more balanced and it’s not about eliminating fat. And fat is not to be feared, right? But we just have to have a little bit of balance here.
Fats should be, uh, compliment, not the main feature. This is a good rule to kind of think about. Fats compliment your meal. They’re not the main event. Um, so when you put all this together, here’s what you got. You got a plate that helps to keep you full. It’s a plate that helps to fuel your training. It helps you to support fat loss, and it remo, it removes a ton of decision making, and that’s really the point here.
Again, we’re not chasing perfection. We’re building a framework, a system. That you can follow easily. You don’t have to think about this all day. You don’t have to track everything. We just want this to be something that you can follow simply and easily without having to, you know, track everything and write it down and use an app that’s not very practical.
Okay, what could this look like in real life for you? Here’s some examples. I’m gonna give you like a breakfast example, a lunch example, a dinner example. I’ve given you some examples already, but let’s just kind of go through this. Breakfast might be eggs for protein, spinach and some peppers. Uh, that’s your plants.
Maybe a little bit of oatmeal and some nuts. Then you got some carbs and some good fats in there. And then of course you got some fats from what you cook the spinach and peppers in, and maybe some fats in the eggs as well. Lunch example, some grilled chicken. There’s your protein. Chicken is awesome. It’s very high in protein.
I’m very, very low in fat. A big salad with mixed veggies. Now you got some plants in there. Maybe some quinoa, uh, that’s some carbs, and then a little bit of olive oil dressing, and there’s some fats in there. Okay, this is a good mixture. Dinner, salmon, roasted broccoli, and carrots with sweet potatoes. Now you’ve got salmon, protein, and fat, roasted broccoli and carrots.
Since they’re roasted, there’s no. Extra fat in there. Um, that’s your plants. And then sweet potato for carbs. That’s, that’s a great pre-run meal. Like the, the night before, a long run, some salmon, some roasted broccoli, and carrots and sweet potatoes. Mm. That’ll get you there. This is simple, right? It’s not fancy, it’s not weighing everything.
It’s just a simple structure that you can follow. So a couple things I want to clear up because I see these mistakes that runners make all the time. The first, you know, I’ve already covered this, is just not eating enough protein. Most runners are just skipping protein or eating it very, uh, very small portions.
They’re not getting enough and we gotta fix that. So just make sure you’re getting enough protein. The next issue I see is too many carbs. Again, just because you run doesn’t mean you need to eat all carbs all the time, so match carbs to your training. Another big mistake I see a lot of runners make is just snacking all the time.
They’re not eating real meals. You should be eating two or three re real meals per day. Not snacking 12 times throughout the day. I see so many people that are like, I can’t lose weight. But then we find out they’re snacking, you know, four times in between each meal and that’s, that’s not gonna get you there.
Okay. That there’s no structure there. And usually when you’re snacking, you’re not eating a bunch of protein, you’re just eating a bunch of refined carbs. You know, let’s be honest. Um, another big mistake I see a lot of runners make is just undereating. They undereat, so they skip a bunch of meals, they don’t, they’re not eating enough.
You’re starving and then you end up overeating later. All structure goes out the window instead, get your meals. Straightened out. Okay? Two or three times a day. Make those meals significant enough to be satiating, but not making you so full that you feel miserable. Alright? We gotta control the portions in a way that feels natural for us, right?
Remember, we’ve been human beings for like two and a half million years, roughly. And our system is not made to snack all day long. Our system is not made to, to overeat. We’re, we’re made to eat as much as we need to, but not more than that. Okay. And it’s very easy to overeat, especially with, you know, refined carbs and sugar and all the junk that we are exposed to in this modern age here.
Um, another big mistake I see people make is they’re just trying to be perfect, right? Perfection is never the goal. We’re just trying to be consistent with all this stuff. Every meal may not look perfect, but just follow the framework and do your best at most meals to follow this framework. And I promise you, you’ll start to see some good results here.
So the, the reason this actually works is this isn’t magic, right? It’s just a structure, right? We’re talking about protein and fiber, which help to keep you full. We’re talking about a structured way of eating carbs, so fueling yes but without excess. And then we’re talking about eating controlled amounts of fat, which helps to prevent total overload of calories.
And what happens here is you naturally eat less without really trying. You feel more satisfied, you have more stable energy for running. Uh, your cravings go down, and most importantly, this is a plan that you can actually stick with. Okay. How do you start? Well, here’s what I want you to do. You don’t have to overhaul your en entire diet.
That’s where people just, they go a little crazy. They want to just change everything. Just start with one meal per day. Pick one. Maybe it’s dinner or breakfast, whatever. Just apply this framework. That’s it. Do that one meal and see if you can build some momentum from there. Okay? Now you can absolutely take what I taught you here today and start using it on your own.
And I think you should. I think you should try this and let me know how it goes for you. But if you’ve been trying to figure this out on your own for a while and you feel, still feel stuck, it’s probably not a knowledge problem anymore. It’s more of a consistency or an problem. And the reality is that you’re probably doing a lot of these things right, but something isn’t quite right.
Okay? It doesn’t mean that you’re. Incapable or you’re broken or something, you just, you don’t have a full structured approach that actually works for you. So you’re kind of guessing, you know, you’re trying different things. You, you’re starting, you’re stopping, and that can be very exhausting. And that’s why I created the Leaner, stronger Runner Project.
It’s not another generic plan, it’s a complete coaching system. Designed specifically for runners who want to lose fat, get stronger and become more efficient runners without sacrificing your running performance. So we’re gonna focus on simple structured nutrition, just like what you learned here today.
Strength training that actually supports your running mindset and habits that create consistency because that’s what gets you results. Not more information, not more motivation, but execution. So if you’re ready to stop guessing, if you’re ready to finally feel in control of your training and your nutrition, if you’re ready to become that leaner, stronger runner, just go to running lean coaching.com/ready and let’s get to work.
So here’s the bottom line. You don’t need a complicated diet. You don’t need to track everything. You don’t need to be perfect. You just need a simple system that you can follow consistently. So build your plate, do it over and over again, and the results will basically take care of themselves. Cool. That’s all I got for you today.
Love you all. Keep on running lean, and I will talk to you soon.
So here’s the deal: runners are some of the fittest people on the planet, and yet so many struggle with weight. You put in the miles, the effort, the discipline… and the scale shrugs. Or, you …
Continue Reading about 296. Getting Lean Without Going Crazy →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner sports nutritionist, master life coach, and weight loss coach. For runners, I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you, properly fuel your body and your mind so you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 296 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners. And today getting lean without going crazy or how to lose weight as a runner without losing your mind. So here’s the deal. Runners are some of the fittest people on the planet, or can be yet.
So many of us struggle with weight, and I get it. You put in the miles, you put in the effort, you put in the discipline, and the scale does not move. Or maybe you train for a race and somehow you gain weight. That was my experience. I talk to people every day that have the same experience, and this can make you feel a little nuts.
So we’re gonna fix that today by walking through a SANE framework, how to think about food, how to plan without feeling restricted, how to make decisions that help you to get leaner. While enjoying your life, I know it sounds crazy. I’m gonna tell you exactly what to focus on. What levers are gonna move the needle without dumping all the tactical minutia on you here.
That tactical stuff is what I do with clients one-on-one. Today, you’re gonna get a big overview on this topic, and I’m excited to share this with you. Um, quick note though, before we dive in, if you want help applying all of this in a way that fits your training, that fits your lifestyle, that fits your preferences, head over to my website running lean coaching.com.
Click on work with me and we will build a plan that works for you. Okay. Cool. Um, so here’s the deal. Runners are fit. Uh, so many people struggle with their weight. Uh, they feel like they’re doing all the right things and then stuff just really does not work for them. They can’t seem to drop the weight and it makes them feel a little crazy and a lot of the.
Uh, diet advice out there. A lot of the nutrition advice out there doesn’t really work for runners. That’s why I do what I do, because there’s dieticians, there’s nutritionists, there’s weight loss coaches out there, and they just don’t understand how to fuel for running. What it takes to, uh, lose weight as a runner or how to maintain muscle mass as a runner and why these things are so important.
Um, I’ve heard weight loss coaches out there that say you should not do any sort of exercise while you’re trying to lose weight. And I just think that’s sort of crazy. ’cause are you gonna do that? No. Am I gonna do that? No. We’re gonna keep exercising, we’re gonna keep running, we’re gonna keep doing our strength training, we’re gonna keep doing all the things that we enjoy doing.
We just have to understand that those things are not the only way to lose weight. Okay, so the first thing I wanna talk about here is that, you know, exercise and running is amazing. But it’s not a weight loss plan by itself. It’s great for your heart. It’s great to build that cardiovascular fitness. It’s good for your mental health, for your emotional health, for your stress, but you can’t outrun a bad diet.
You know, I’ve said that before. I’ll keep saying it because I think it is absolutely true. You have to switch what you’re eating if you wanna lose weight. It’s just not about running more. Then there’s something that we call the hunger and reward drive. So a lot of runners, a lot of athletes out there do long runs, they do hard workouts and you know, some of this can, you know, make you feel a little bit hungry and make you feel like, oh, I earn this piece of cake.
I earned this pizza. I earned this ice cream. And without a plan in place, what happens is we tend to reward ourselves with ultra processed foods, with sugar, um, whatever we feel like eating because we’re, we’re kind of conditioned or we’ve conditioned ourselves that I can eat whatever I want because I’m a runner.
Um, so a lot of that mentality has to shift. We’re gonna talk about how to shift that in this episode here. Another, um, thing I want to address here and, and another reason why runners struggle with weight. So first is, you know, they’re just trying to run more. They have this reward, uh, drive that they’re, uh, you know, sort of conditioned to believe, and then there’s randomness disguised as just listening to your body.
So I love listening to your body. I think that is important. But there’s a difference between listening to your body and then rationalizing eating a bunch of junk food. Okay? If every day is a new experience with food, if every day is some, uh, random, you know, meal plan, random, uh, strength plan, random running plan, your results are going to be random.
You’re not going to get the results that you’re looking for. So. You know, winging it, randomness, whatever you want to call it. Is not a plan. It’s the opposite of a plan. And when you’re just winging it, when you don’t have a plan, you tend to not make good decisions. You tend to not make a lot of progress towards your goals.
You might have this goal to lose 30 pounds and what are you doing every day? Just whatever you feel like. How’s that working for you? Is it moving you towards your goals? Probably not because it’s just randomness. Okay. And then the last thing that, uh, I wanna just talk about and, and kind of. Set up this conversation and talk about why a lot of runners struggle with losing weight is they get to this all or nothing thinking, so they feel like they have to be super restrictive.
And most diets out there tell you that you can’t ever eat sugar again. It’s the worst thing in the world. You can never have a Diet Coke, you can never have a piece of pizza. You gotta stay away from all carbs or all grains or all meat or all dairy or whatever. And so when we have this all or nothing thinking, what happens is we, we tend to rebel against that.
When somebody tells you, you can’t do this, what do you want to do? You wanna go and do it more, right? So that all or nothing thinking, which a lot of diets. Preach and, and the principle, but behind a lot of diet advice is like, you can never eat this stuff again. I can’t tell you how many accounts on Instagram and Facebook, whatever that I follow, where it’s just all or nothing.
Like let’s say it’s a carnivore person and it’s just like you have to eat. You know, rib eye steaks every day, and that’s it. Like, that’s your whole life is just rib eye steaks. You know, that’s the only way you can be healthy. And I’m like, yeah, I, I’m not sure about that. You know, I don’t really think that’s the way I wanna live my life, and I want to eat that piece of pizza occasionally.
Hey, it’s somebody’s birthday, I want to eat the birthday cake and celebrate with that person. So. We tend, when we have this all or nothing thinking, we tend to rebel against that. We, we tend to just binge out on stuff. Um, and, and, and it’s really an unsustainable strategy if you really think about it. So that’s one of the main reasons, um, I wanted to talk about this today, is that I think a lot of us have this.
Idea that losing weight has to be frustrating. It has to make you crazy. You know, it has to be, uh, very, very restrictive. Um, but all those things are very unsustainable and the key with any sort of. You know, change in your nutrition plan. Your diet has to be something that is sustainable for you. Okay? Now, if you’ve answered yes to any of these things that I’ve talked about, or you can relate to any things I just talked about, just to understand that, that’s totally cool.
Nothing’s wrong with you. This is just normal. We all kind of go through this, but what you need. Is a, a better framework. Okay, so before I get into the framework, which I love this framework, um, but um, before I get into that, I wanna talk about a little bit of a mindset shift. So, uh. The mindset shifts that are gonna help you to stay sane, right?
We’re, we’re talking about not going crazy when we’re trying to lose weight. The first is a shift in your identity. You gotta remember that you’re not on a diet, you’re a lean, strong runner in training. You are an athlete. Your decisions today are what an athlete would do. You train like an athlete, you should eat like an athlete, and this is what it means to shift your identity, adopt the identity of an athlete, and then your decisions just become super obvious.
So we gotta make that shift in your identity. The second is. Choices over rules. Okay? Rules can fee feel very restrictive. Choices feel empowering. You choose your plan on purpose. When you have that mindset of choosing your own plan and making your own decisions, you are in charge. You have autonomy, uh, you feel in control, you feel calm, you feel centered.
You’re not. Crazy because somebody says you can’t ever eat oatmeal again in your life, or something like that. So instead of having all these, you know, restrictive rules, make choices. Make choices that feel good for you, ones that can make you feel kind of calm inside. Okay? And then remember that the process beats perfection.
So this isn’t about. Uh, perfection. Nobody does this perfectly. I don’t do this perfectly. I don’t know one person I’ve ever worked with that does all this stuff perfectly. So we wanna remember that it’s more important to adhere to the process, to to show up and commit to the process on a daily basis, rather than trying to, uh, ace everything every single day and trying to be perfect every single day.
When you try to be perfect, what happens a lot of times is you beat yourself up. ’cause you weren’t perfect. I failed because I had a cookie, uh, in the break room at lunch. ’cause they looked good. I’m a failure. Look, I can’t do this. Hey, listen, 90% of the day you did amazing. 98% of the day you did amazing. You had a cookie.
Who cares? Let’s aim for like b plus work here people. Okay? If you put 10 b plus days together in a row. That’s amazing. That’s gonna beat one a plus day, followed by a complete meltdown. And you, and you have a, a D minus or a F for the day, you know? So, um, one of my coaches told me this a long time ago, uh, aim for B plus work, you know, aim for B plus.
And I’m like, I can do that. I can do that. ’cause A plus feels. Very hard to attain. It feels very out of reach for a lot of us. So let’s go for that B plus. Um, remember that. Uh, remember to think about your future self as the person sort of calling the shots. Okay? Pretend your future you is the boss of you before you, um, want to go snack on a bunch of junk food from the pantry.
What’s the future me gonna tell me in this moment? Like, go out into the future, think about your future self and let that future self dictate what you’re gonna do in this moment. Is this something that’s really gonna help me to become that person or not? ’cause future, you knows. They know everything ’cause they’re from the future.
Um, but just like listen to that little voice in your head and say, you know, probably not, probably not eating this whole sleeve of Oreos is gonna help me become. That future me. Okay. Um, and then the last little shift in your mindset is, um, something very simple and, and we talk a lot or I hear a lot of people talk a lot about setting big goals and trying to accomplish 25 things every single day.
This can feel very overwhelming. You know, you’re trying to, you know, get your strength point training on point every single day and get your running plan together and stick with it every single day and get your food plan and be perfect with that. Listen, let’s chunk it down to like making one promise to yourself every single day.
Pick one thing you know you can do. Make that promise to yourself, I’m gonna do this today. Uh, it may be a little bit hard, it may make me feel uncomfortable to do it, but I’m gonna do this one thing today. Keep that promise to yourself. Stack up those wins. You’re gonna build so much trust and confidence in yourself over time, it’s gonna be amazing.
Okay, so that’s kind of the mindset shifts we need to make. Lemme talk about this framework. So. The backbone of getting lean, of, of, of losing weight and eating like an athlete. It’s not a detailed meal plan. I’m gonna tell you that right now. It’s a framework. So instead of thinking that, oh, you know, how many grams of carbs should I eat every day?
’cause I get people that ask me these questions, how many grams of protein should I eat every day? And you know, I will answer some of those questions with people and we’ll talk through that stuff. But instead, I want you to think about this framework, and I’m calling this the SANE framework. Okay? Instead of going crazy, SANE.
So just remember that. So the S is. Simple. Your plan needs to be super simple. Think about few. The fewer decisions you make, the less friction you have in in your day. Okay? So default to meals that you like. Have a short list of go-to proteins, veggies, good sources of fat, some good carbs that you like. Um.
You, you want to get into a predictable rhythm. I’m gonna talk more about that in a second. Um, but your plan needs to be really simple. The plan that I have for daily meals is stupid simple. You know, I have a, a protein shake. I might have some eggs, some avocado, maybe some bacon or something like that.
This is like meal number one. Meal number two. Um, might be some, uh, something I had last night, which was, uh, pre-made skewers with chicken wrapped with bacon. Oh my gosh, how good is bacon? Um, with a little bit of barbecue sauce on there. I just threw those on the grill. And some sweet potatoes like that.
How simple is that? Like that’s so. Stupidly simple, right? Um, now I’m not saying you need to eat those foods, that’s not what I’m saying at all. But what you do for yourself has to be something that is simple. It cannot be complicated. You don’t have to like get all your macros right and try to figure all that stuff out.
Eat what feels good for you. It has to work for you, obviously. And that’s the A in the SANE framework. So that’s gonna be a meaning that you know what you eat, your meal plan has to be aligned with your. Goals, your training, your schedule, your food preferences, your lifestyle. You don’t have to copy anyone else’s plan.
The best plan is the one that you can follow sustainably. So what? Whatever works for you has to be aligned with your goals and it has to work for you long term. So don’t let anybody tell you you’re doing it wrong. I can’t tell you how many people will say, Hey, uh, you know, I’m really struggling with my weight.
Well, here’s what you should eat. Just do this, this, and this. You know, and that’s such a dumb response to that because we’re so different. Like, I don’t even like those foods, or I’m allergic to those foods, or, you know, my culture says I shouldn’t eat those foods. Okay, well then the, you know, they don’t have an answer for you.
My answer is always what? Your plan should be. Simple. It should be in alignment with your goals, and it should be something you can actually follow. Okay? So make sure it’s in alignment with your goals. That’s the A. The nane in my SANE framework is that your food needs to be nutrient dense. Think about real food.
Mini minimally processed foods. That’s easy to say. Protein focused. Get some vegetables in there. Some good sources of fats, some good carbs that actually help you to serve a purpose, not necessarily just junk carbs, you know, some sweet potatoes, some, some rice, some oats, something that you can uh, uh, use around specific workouts.
When you adopt a a nutrition plan that is nutrient dense, you’re gonna feel more full, you’re gonna recover better, your cravings are gonna be lower. You’re not gonna probably eat as much as you used to because the food that you’re eating is very nutritionally dense and your body is getting everything it needs so you don’t have to keep stuffing your face with a bunch of empty carbs.
And that’s what a lot of people do, especially runners. I just eat whatever I want. I’m gonna eat all these Oreos. Well, then you’re hungry an hour later because that didn’t fill you up. All it did was just jack up your hunger signals. So when you’re eating nutrient dense foods, minimally processed foods, whole foods, foods that still look like foods, the foods our ancestors would recognize, this is what’s going to make you feel more full and give you the nutrient nutrients that you need and your satiety will be, uh, much more in check and you can lose a lot of weight this way.
And then lastly, the E of SANE in my SANE framework is it has to be enjoyable. If you hate it, you’re not gonna do it. If I tell you you have to eat nothing but Brussels sprouts and you hate Brussels sprouts, you won’t stick to that plan, I promise you. Now, if you love Brussels sprouts, you are gonna thrive with that plan, but obviously that’s not gonna be a plan that I would ever suggest.
Um, your plan must include foods that you enjoy. And a sane way to eat fun foods is to eat them on purpose, without the guilt, without the drama, without beating yourself up. In other words, you gotta enjoy the food that you’re eating. I enjoy the food that I eat. I really enjoyed my, my dinner last night.
Chicken breasts wrapped in bacon with barbecue sauce on it, on the grill. Come on. That was so enjoyable. I love that so much. Um, or if you’re like, Hey, I’m gonna have a piece of cake, you know, tomorrow when I go to that party, you’re doing that on purpose. You’re gonna enjoy that and you don’t feel like you have to be restrictive while everybody else is eating the cake.
Just eat the piece of cake. It’s completely fine. Okay? So we’re trying to to to live a sane life, but we want food that is simple. Not complicated. It’s in alignment with your goals, nutrient dense and enjoyable. That’s the, that’s the food plan that’s gonna work for you. Okay. So I talked about rhythm. So, um, we want to talk a little bit about a flexible structured food plan.
Okay. So a rhythm means that, um, you want to get into a daily rhythm. So you want to decide ahead of time, you know what you’re gonna do as far as I’m gonna eat twice a day, I’m gonna eat three times a day. Um, you wanna reduce the decisions that you have to make. Throughout the day. So we’re not talking about counting calories, we’re talking about getting into a rhythm of planning your food and then sticking to that plan and planning your food and sticking to that plan.
The other part of a of flexible structure is that we wanna make sure we’re focusing on protein. This is very important. Protein is satiating, helps preserve lean muscle mass. It supports recovery. Um. Uh, how you do this is gonna be different for each person. You know, some people like plant-based proteins, some people like, you know, going with, uh, animal-based proteins or whatever.
Um, so whatever feels good for you, but make that the priority. Another way we can be flexible with our nutrition plan is to do smart carbs on purpose. So this is not about no carbs or. It’s not about all the carbs either. We want carbs that work for you. Okay? Time to support your training. Choose whole food carbs.
Use them strategically around key workouts. Um, we want to use carbs, but we want to use them to help us. To improve our running. Uh, we don’t want to just be eating all the carbs all the time because, hey, I’m a runner, so I get to eat all the carbs, and this isn’t about never eating carbs again, but it’s about timing them mo for the most part, around key workouts.
Um, natural fats for satiety. That fat helps you to stay full. Protein helps you to stay full fat, helps you to stay full. Add enough to, uh, your diet, to make sure your mood and your hunger are stabilized. Um, you know that you’re gonna be on the right track when you’re not constantly thinking about food.
You know you’re eating enough, okay? If you’re constantly thinking about food. You’re probably not eating enough protein, probably not getting enough fat. Don’t be afraid of fat. We don’t need to eat a super low fat diet. Um, but fat is something that will help you to, uh, feel more full for longer. And again, it kind of helps you to not eat as much in general.
Um, things like fiber, micronutrients, hydration, these things are all important. Make sure you’re eating colorful veggies. Drink plenty of water. Get your electrolytes in, especially when you, when it’s really hot out or you’re doing some super long runs. Um, this just needs to be something that is part of our, our diet.
And then plan your joy. You can eat for joy. The key word is that you’re planning it. Decide ahead of time what you’re gonna do, when you’re gonna do it, how much, and enjoy it, and then move on. There’s no guilt, there’s no I blew it or anything like that. Okay? So that’s what it means to be flexible with this and to have some structure, but flexibility around that structure.
So when you’re looking at different food choices. Think about these quick little filters. There’s these three decision filters. There’s is this, is this real? Is this mostly real minimally processed food? Is it purposeful? Am I doing this on purpose or am I just feeling like I have to eat this in the moment?
You know, is this supporting how I wanna feel today? Uh, is this supporting how I’m going to feel tomorrow? Okay, so is it real? Is it purposeful? And then is this plan, did I, did I decide this ahead of time? Or am I just reacting to how I’m feeling in the moment? Oh, I’ve had a, you know, stressful day at work, so I just want to eat a whole pizza by myself.
No, uh, make sure that it’s real food, that you’re doing it on purpose, and that it’s something that is planned. Okay. And, um, something that, uh, I wanted to just kind of touch on really quickly, which is a big fear that people have, which is like, if I change how I eat, isn’t this gonna really affect my running?
And the short answer is not if you’re strategic about it. And this is what I do with a lot of my coaching clients, because we change your diet, but we don’t want it to affect your running negatively. So what to focus on would be make sure that you’re matching your fueling to your workout. You know, if this is an easy effort, you don’t really need to do much, uh, just eat what you’ve been eating, um, during your run.
Fueling can be something that is, uh, something you want to think about, and it’s conditional depending on how long you’re running, how hot the day is, how hard of your effort it is. So you might want some carbs. Post run fueling, though is something that I would say is just not negotiable. You need to eat something after running.
It doesn’t have to be, you know, directly afterwards. It can be within an hour or two, but get some protein in, add carbs when your, uh, session or your goals call for it. You know, some people like to just stay super low carb, which is completely fine. Sometimes adding some carbs in after a run, especially a super long run, can help replenish glycogen stores and help just promote a little faster recovery time.
Um, and then beware of the I earned buffet. Refueling is great, but it’s not a free for all. It doesn’t mean you should go and, and eat all the ice cream that, that you have in the, in the freezer. Okay. So, um, couple things just to kind of recap a little bit. Um. Uh, fat loss and performance, uh, are sort of the, if you fat loss and performance are your goals, you wanna make sure that we’re focused on food quality and structure.
Remember, real food, protein anchored meals, purposeful carbs, plan, joy, consistent rhythm around your diet. Um. Strength training runners need to get stronger, you know, um, focus on lifting heavy so you get stronger. One to two sessions a week is probably, you know, good for a lot of people. If you can get to three.
That might be ideal, but make sure you’re doing, I would say, at least two strength sessions a week. Uh, your running programming should also help you to improve your, uh, metabolism. You know, so if you’re, if you’re doing your runs properly, you’re doing a mix of easy, longer runs, some, some middle distance runs that are moderately harder than some short runs that are.
You know, pretty hard, some high intensity interval type of stuff. Um, making sure you’re getting enough recovery, uh, and sleep and keeping your stress low. All this stuff is gonna help you move the needle. It’s gonna help you to, uh, you know, lose the fat without losing your mind. Okay, so food quality, strength training, run programming.
And then the recovery. Um, couple quick wins. I want you to think about. Uh, here’s a couple of things that are gonna help you change the game for yourself pretty quickly. So these are things you can do this week. So just think about these. Plan your food 24 hours in advance. Write down what you’re going to eat and include something of joy, something that will bring you joy.
And write this down the day before. Focus on protein first at every meal. This is something you can do starting right now. Um, fuel certain workouts on purpose. Decide beforehand, again, what you’re gonna do. What’s your run? How, how are you gonna fuel, what are you gonna use for, for fueling before and during?
Make sure you have at least one or two strength sessions on the calendar. Book it ahead of time. You notice a theme here, right? Um, and then maybe create a, a simple and effective bedtime routine so that you can start to get better quality sleep. So just. You know, focus on maybe a lights out ritual. Start getting the lights out an hour or so before you’re planning on going to sleep.
Dim the lights, maybe read a book or something. Get off your screens, turn off the tv. You know, get the, the room nice and dark and cold, and that’s gonna help you to sleep better and promote, you know, less stress. So if you’re hearing all this and you’re thinking, yes, I want all of this, Patrick, but I want somebody to help dial it in for me, for my training, for my preferences, for my lifestyle, that’s what I do inside my coaching program.
We take this framework, we build your plan. You know, we want make it simple. We want to help you achieve your goals. Uh, we want it to be nutrient dense and. Something that is enjoyable for you. Okay? We also work on the mental side of all this so that your plan feels something that is easy and repeatable.
It doesn’t feel like punishment. So when you’re ready, just go to my website, running lean coaching.com, click on work with me, and we’ll talk about what it looks like for you. You can absolutely lose weight as a runner without losing your mind. You just gotta keep it simple, aligned with your goals, nutrient dense and enjoyable.
Tune these levers, okay? And then make that one promise to yourself today, and then keep it. Okay? That’s all I got for you today. Love you all. Keep on running lean, and I will talk to you soon.
You’ve probably heard it a million times: “Abs are made in the kitchen.” And while nutrition definitely plays a role in fat loss, the truth is… it doesn’t start there. In this episode of the …
Continue Reading about 293. Fat Loss Doesn’t Start in the Kitchen →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner sports nutritionist, master life coach, and weight loss coach. For runners, I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you, properly fuel your body and your mind so you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought.
Possible. This is running Lean.
Hey there and welcome to episode 293 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners. And today fat loss doesn’t start in the kitchen. So you’ve probably heard this a million times. ABS are made in the kitchen. And while nutrition definitely plays a role in fat loss, the truth is it doesn’t start there.
So in this episode of the podcast, I’m flipping that outdated advice on its head. You’re gonna learn while focusing only on food is a losing strategy. And how factors like your mindset, sleep, stress training, all have a massive impact on your ability to lose fat and keep it off. So if you’re stuck in the cycle of eating less and running more, but still not seeing results, it might be time to take a bit of a different approach.
So this is the stuff nobody’s talking about when it comes to fat loss. This is what I’m talking about today, and I’m gonna tell you right now, this is gonna change everything for you. But first, listen, if you’ve been struggling with your weight, if running feels harder than it should, if you’re just not where you want to be physically, there’s a reason for that.
Chances are you’re doing all the right things, trying to eat better, running more miles, maybe even doing a little bit of strength training. All that is awesome. But if it’s not really clicking, you may be just working hard and you’re just not getting the results. The truth is there’s a missing piece to your plan.
What you need is a comprehensive approach, one that addresses not just your nutrition, but also your mindset, your training, your recovery, your lifestyle. You need a program that’s built specifically for runners like you. People who want to get leaner, get stronger, and become the best versions of themselves.
And that’s exactly what we do in my coaching program. You’re gonna get the structure, the support, and the accountability that you need to finally break through and start seeing serious progress physically and mentally. So if you’re ready to stop spinning your wheels and start making real lasting change, have head over to my website, running lean coaching.com.
Click on work with me. Let’s get you on the path to becoming a leaner, stronger, faster runner starting today. All right, cool. So again, there’s this, uh, old adage, and I’ve been seeing this recently that abs are made in the kitchen and yeah, there is some truth to that for sure. Nutrition does play a role, but really when it comes to fat loss, sustainable, healthy, long-term fat loss, it doesn’t necessarily start.
In the kitchen. If it did, then all we’d have to do is eat a bunch of grilled chicken and broccoli and we’d all be walking around with six pack abs. But that’s just not how it works. There’s a lot more going on behind the scenes mentally, emotionally, and even physically. That has to be in alignment before the food can even make a difference.
Okay, so I’m gonna break this down. There’s like four essential foundations of fat loss. They really have nothing to do with what’s on your plate. So we’re gonna be talking about your mindset, your sleep, um, stress levels, and even how your training can have an impact on your fat loss. Um, and these things are paramount if you’re not doing these things.
What you’re eating isn’t really gonna matter. Okay? So this is where everything should begin for you. Okay? Not necessarily in the kitchen. So first, let’s just start with the obvious. That whole thing, abs are made in the kitchen. It sounds cute, it’s catchy, um, but it’s a little bit misleading. It’s this kind of advice that basically just says like, eat less and have more willpower.
Like if you could just meal prep better or stop eating carbs at night, then boom, fat just magically disappears. But if you’ve ever tried to lose weight just by changing your diet, you probably know that it’s really not that simple. ’cause you can clean up your e eating, you can start, uh, seeing the scale moving, drop a few pounds.
But then what happens? Like you stall out, you plateau, um, people get burned out, they quit, and then they gain the weight back and they say, well, whatever. That didn’t work. That whatever I was eating didn’t work. But they were only looking at one. Piece of the puzzle here. They, they addressed the food part of it, but nothing else.
And the real problem isn’t necessarily what you’re eating. A lot of it has to do with what you’re thinking. You know, you started in the kitchen and that’s fine, but your fat loss starts with your mind. It really does. So that’s number one that you have to, uh, change your mind. If you want to change your body, you have to change your mind first.
I always talk about mindset. A lot of the episodes of this podcast talk about mindset. Why, why do you think I do that? It’s because it’s, it’s so important. It’s probably the most important thing that you need to change. In order to see real lasting change in your body composition, your running performance, your strength, anything that takes a while and that is somewhat challenging to accomplish, requires a shift in your mindset.
Mindset is everything. You can’t hate yourself thin. You can’t bully yourself into losing weight. You can’t force yourself to do things you hate for the rest of your life. And expect to be successful long term. You just can’t do that. When I work with runners, we always start with mindset. Why do you wanna lose weight?
Like, why do you wanna lose fat? Why do you wanna change your body composition? What are you really trying to accomplish here? Who is it that you want to become ultimately? So fat loss, it really starts with identity. And if you see yourself as someone who’s, you know, always stuck, always struggling, always stopping and starting over, then that’s exactly what you’re just gonna keep repeating.
But if you start showing up as the future version of yourself, that strong, lean, confident runner that you want to become, everything can shift for you. So this is that identity shift that we’re, that we need to make in order for everything else to kind of fall into place. You have to change how you think about yourself.
And who you think yourself to be, because when you can start to do this, your, your thoughts begin to change, your decisions begin to change, and then your actions start to line up. With those long-term goals, with that version of yourself in the future that, that you’re ultimately working towards. So yeah, fat loss doesn’t start in the kitchen.
It starts in your mind. It starts between your ears. Okay. So that’s number one. Number two is that fat loss happens while you sleep. So the next big piece of the puzzle is gonna be all about sleep. So you could be doing everything right during the day, so you could be eating clean, following your training plan, lifting weights.
But if you only get four or five hours of really crappy sleep every night, you are working against yourself. ’cause when you don’t sleep enough. Things like your hunger hormones get completely out of whack, so ghrelin will be increased. Ghrelin is the hunger hormone. Um, and when you don’t get enough sleep, that puts your body into a state of chronic stress, and that will cause hunger hormones to go up.
So your body’s like, just feed me, feed me, feed me. So you’re gonna be hungry all the time. Also, leptin goes down, so that’s your fullness hormone. That’s the hormone that says, Hey, I’m full. Stop eating. Well, that, that gets suppressed so that you feel, uh, you don’t feel as full when you do eat, so you never really feel full enough.
You know what I mean? So being hungry. All the time and never feeling full enough. That is a bad combination right there. So you end up craving more food, especially sugar and carbs. Um, and at this point your willpower can’t keep up with that. So your willpower just tanks. You start to make bad decisions, and your body’s just gonna be holding on to fat.
It’s gonna be holding onto fat like it’s prepping for the apo apocalypse. You know what I mean? It’s like your body’s like, we need to be ready for. For this danger that we’re experiencing here. And so your, your body gets into that fight or flight mode. So, um, sleep is so important. It’s when your body repairs recovers it, when it’s when your, your body regulates, especially hormones get regulated properly.
Your metabolism resets. It’s when your muscles grow, it’s when your brain clears out all the junk. So if you wanna burn more fat and you wanna burn fat more efficiently, start by getting good sleep. We’re talking. Seven to nine hours of high quality sleep every night. This has to be a non-negotiable for you.
If you’re not getting good sleep, focus on that right now. Turn off Netflix, put your phone away early. Um, create a good sleep, high hygiene. Routine, cold, dark room. Start dimming the lights, you know, an hour or two before bed, no food, a couple hours before bed if you need to take a, a warm bath or shower before you go to bed.
That helps. Um. But get yourself into a sleep routine because when you prioritize sleep, um, the easier it’s gonna become for you to lose the fat and to burn more fat. Okay? So you have to prioritize sleep. And then the next kind of thing we need to focus on kind of the third part of the, the puzzle here is stress.
So stress and sleep are very closely related because when your body is stressed, um, you, uh, secrete more glucose. Again, you’re, you’re putting your body into that fight or flight mode and acute stress. Is okay for us. Like we, we experience acute stress when we do things like, uh, high intensity interval training.
So you go out there and you, you run, uh, 32nd, uh, wind sprints or something like that, that is putting a lot of stress on your body, but it is very short-lived. It’s acute, it’s very short, uh, short term stress, maybe 30 seconds at a time, and then you’re done. Even if you go for a long run, you know, you might be out there for three or four hours, that’s a lot of stress on your body, but then you recover from that, you repair, um, and again, you recover and repair a lot of it at night.
So sleeping is so important, but, uh, chronic stress, that’s when we’re just, we’re constantly ruminating on the past or the future. We’re worried about. You know, things at home or at work. Um, and, and our mind can never really shut off and we’re, we put ourselves into that same fight or flight mode. Your cortisol levels are elevated.
Cortisol is the stress hormone. Um, when cortisol is high, fat loss basically shuts down. And again, when you’re stressed, you’re probably not sleeping well. And when you’re not sleeping well, you put your body into a state of stress. So these two things are very closely related, so you gotta work on both of these things.
Okay. But think about this from your body’s perspective. If you’re constantly stressed, your brain thinks that something dangerous is about to happen, and the last thing you want to do, the last thing your body wants to do is burn fat. Your body wants to hold onto that stored body fat. Again, this is like survival mode for your body.
Your body says, okay, we’re stressed. We need to conserve energy, slow everything down, slow down the metabolism, hold onto this energy store, the fat ’cause we’re gonna need it. And the kicker is that you could be eating pretty well, but if your stress is outta control, your body will not cooperate. It’s gonna be very difficult to lose weight if you’re, if you’re chronically stressed.
Okay. So self-care is important. It’s not something that you can take for granted. It’s not a luxury. This is a strategy, a long-term strategy for you to be a healthy human being. And if your goal is to lose weight and burn fat, stress management, self-care has to be a priority. Okay? So whatever you need to do, meditation, breath work, going for a walk, doing some yoga, journaling.
Talking to someone instead of bottling everything up. It feels so good to talk to someone about things that are on your mind, right? Even if that person is just going. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That’s, it is great to have that outlet, you know, that sounding board, maybe saying no to things that drain you. Maybe having better boundaries, maybe taking some actual rest days.
Yes, I’m talking to you, the person that never takes a rest day, take an actual rest day and just do a whole lot of nothing. Let your body and your mind, uh, your, your physical, emotional, and, uh, mental states. Calm down. So actual rest days are really important, but these things matter. You know, managing stress is very important.
They help regulate your nervous system. They create the condition where fat loss can actually happen. So if you’re finding yourself, you’re doing a lot of the right things, but you’re not seeing results work on stress. Okay. And then the fourth kind of part of the puzzle here to uh, make sure that that fat loss is actually working, um, is to, uh, make sure you’re doing smart training.
So let’s talk about training for a minute, because it does play a role in fat loss. Um, maybe not in the way that you think, so you don’t need to go out and run. You know, a hundred miles every week. You don’t need to do hours and hours of cardio every single day. In fact, too much cardio can work against you.
Too much cardio can put your body into that state of chronic stress. Now we call that chronic cardio. When you’re doing chronic cardio, you actually never properly recover from your workouts, and you’re just constantly stressed all the time. So people think, oh, I’m doing cardio. I should be able to lose weight.
Hmm. It’s very difficult if you’re doing it constantly and you never give yourself the rest that you need. But when I talk about smart training for fat loss, that means doing running, that is intentional. Not just putting in a bunch of miles or, you know, uh, running every day because you’re on some kind of streak or something like that.
Be intentional about your running. Um, strength training. Strength training is it’s key for so much. It helps to improve your metabolism. Um, helps to reduce stress, you know, by kind of overloading your muscles and then your muscles have an, uh, an adaptation to that and it does help to reduce stress. Um, you get that release of the good hormones, you know, like dopamine and oxytocin and serotonin and endorphins when you do strength training.
Um, but strength training, you know, is the, is the right kind of training that that helps you to build muscle, boost your metabolism, um, and gets that fat burning engine just cranked up even a few more notches. Doing the right kind of training, uh, that helps you to become more metabolically efficient, uh, from a running standpoint, meaning that you want to be doing a combination of some shorter.
Duration, higher intensity running. So that should be at least one day a week. Shorter intensity, uh, I’m sorry, shorter, higher intensity runs. You want to have some moderate distance, moderate intensity runs, so some kind of medium runs in there. So we got high intensity intervals. We got, uh, modern intensity, think of like tempo runs, that kind of thing.
And then we have our long, slow distance. So that’s where you’re gonna be out there for longer amounts of time. It’s kind of what people call, like zone two training. But when you break up your training in this way, you are, you are creating the most, um, efficient system, metabolically speaking for your body to be able to, to burn fat really effectively.
Okay. The training is very important, but also rest days are very important. You gotta allow your body to absorb all that training and you want to avoid burning out and getting into that state of chronic stress. Okay, and here’s something a lot of people miss, though. Exercise isn’t just about burning calories, that’s not really the whole point here.
There’s a little bit of that, but it’s not really the whole point. It’s about changing your physiology, so you train to improve metabolic flexibility. You, you gotta teach your body how to burn fat more efficiently. Um, if you wanna become a stronger, more durable, uh, runner. And with improved, uh, uh, metabolic flexibility with improved, uh, endurance, then you have to train properly.
And if you can get into those different types of runs, like I mentioned, and make sure you’re doing strength training. Ah, this is gonna be key for you. It’s gonna be key for you, okay? This is the long game. Remember, you don’t wanna just lose fat. You wanna be able to keep it off and perform better as a runner.
So all of these things combined, you know, especially the smart training, um. Not just adding more miles, but doing, you know, intention, being very intentional, very mindful about each of your workouts during the week. All these things combine to help you to become that more efficient fat burner. Okay, so let’s bring this all together here.
If you wanna lose fat and keep it off, don’t start in the kitchen. Start with your mindset. Start with how you think. How do you see yourself? What do you believe is possible for you? Who do you want to be? Like? What is that identity shift that you need to make in order for you to believe that you can become that person?
That’s that’s where everything needs to start from. Next, take a look at your sleep, making sure that you’re getting good quality sleep every night, and that you’re serious about rest and recovery. Okay? Take a good look at your stress levels and learn how to manage them. Start practicing proactively some sort of stress management.
What a lot of people do is they go, oh, I’m really stressed. I better work on some stress management stuff. And then they, you know, start, you know, trying to meditate, but they’re super stressed. Well, that’s not when you need to start some kind of stress management thing. You need to do it every day. Just needs to be part of, you know, what you do every day.
Um, and then lastly, train with intention. Run smart, lift heavy. Don’t skip rest days. Okay. Once you do all these other things, yeah, then what you’re eating is really gonna make a difference. Okay? So yeah, of course what you eat is going to have something to do with this, but when all these other systems are running smoothly, then food truly does.
Become fuel, then food truly does become a more powerful tool to help you burn more fat. Okay? And we wanna stop using food to cope. We wanna stop using food to, you know, battle our cravings. And we want to create an environment where fat loss feels easy, and eating the right foods feels easy, but you gotta have all these other things in place as well.
Okay? That’s how you become that leaner, stronger, faster runner that you wanna become. Okay. And again, if you’re tired of spinning your wheels, if you’ve been stuck in this cycle of eating less and running more, it’s just not working for you. Maybe it’s time for a different approach. Remember, this is what we do in my coaching program, the Running Lean Coaching project.
It’s, we just go be on food. You know, we fix all the stuff under the surface. So that fat, fat loss actually works and actually sticks. Okay? So if you’re ready to change your mind, your habits, your body for good, go to my website running lean coaching.com, click on work with me. That’s all I got for you today.
Love you all. Keep on running lean, and I will talk to you soon.
Let’s be real—eating healthy can feel like a total drag sometimes, especially when all your favorite foods seem to be off-limits. But what if I told you that you don’t have to give up everything …
Continue Reading about 289. 10 Food Swaps to Help You Eat Healthier (Without Hating Your Life) →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner sports nutritionist, master life coach, and weight loss coach. For runners, I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you, properly fuel your body and your mind so you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought. Possible. This is running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 289 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today 10 food swaps to help you eat healthier without hating your life. So let’s be real. Eating healthy can often feel like a total drag sometimes, especially when all your favorite foods seem to be off limits.
But what if I told you that you don’t have to give up everything you love in order to eat healthy E in order to lose fat and still feel totally satisfied? In this episode, I’m gonna share 10 food swaps to help you eat healthier without hating your life. Uh, these aren’t bland or boring substitutions either.
These are gonna be kind of lower carb, whole food or alternatives that taste amazing. They’ll actually leave you feeling full and feeling energized. If you’re a runner who’s been struggling to stay on track with your eating. This episode is gonna show you that eating healthy doesn’t have to suck. You’ll learn how to make small, sustainable changes that can lead to big results without feeling like you’re on some sad, restrictive diet.
But first, if you’re listening to this and you’re thinking, man, eating healthy always feels so hard. Or I keep trying to lose weight, but nothing ever sticks. I hear you. Most runners I talk to are putting in the miles, but they’re not seeing the results that they want. They’re frustrated, exhausted, and they’re not sure what to do next.
That’s exactly why I created my coaching program to help you dial in your nutrition, get stronger, improve your running, and finally feel like you’re in control of your health and fitness again. You don’t need another generic meal plan. You don’t need to train harder or run longer. What you do need is a proven, personalized approach that works with you, with your lifestyle, with your goals, and with your body.
Inside my program, I will guide you step by step so that you can lose weight. Build muscle boost, endurance, and become the healthiest, strongest version of yourself. Yet. If you’re ready to stop struggling and start thriving, just head over to running lean coaching.com. Click on work with me. Let’s get started.
Cool. Cool. Okay, let’s get into this episode. Listen, I get it that when you decide you want to start eating healthier, it can kind of feel lame. I hear people tell me this all the time, this is why a lot of people just don’t ever try to lose weight or, or try to change their diet because it just, it, it feels so restrictive and it feels terrible, and it just feels like you’re gonna be eating.
You know, kale and cardboard, you know, all the time. Um, it feels like you’re going to give up everything that you’ve grown to love. You know, pizza, ice cream, beer, pancakes. You just gotta eat salads and chicken breasts and, you know, broccoli and that’s it. Like those are your only choices, you know. But that’s not what we do.
That’s not what I do with my coaching clients. That’s not what we do in my program. Healthy eating doesn’t have to suck. Losing weight doesn’t mean you have to eat like a bird, you know, like seeds and nuts and that’s it. Also, becoming a fat adapted, high performing runner doesn’t require cutting every carbohydrate out of your life.
You can make smarter food choices that support your fast loss, fat loss goals that still taste good. This still tastes pretty amazing actually. You just have to make a few swaps. Nothing crazy. This isn’t about some extreme one way or the other. Um, I just wanted to put something together to help you start to see that you can make some simple changes.
Uh, and start actually eating some foods that are healthy for you and delicious and satisfying, and will help you accomplish your weight loss and your running goals. Okay, so I tried to concentrate on Whole Foods, low-ish carb options. Some of these have some carbs in there. We’re not afraid of carbs though, right?
You just gotta do ’em in moderation and try to stay away from some of the refined carbs. But they’re satisfying, they’re delicious, and they actually work for runners who are trying to feel better and, and lose some weight, and gain some muscle and things like that. Um, but a lot of runners tell me that, you know, I really want to eat better, but I just don’t want to give up all the foods that I love and I totally get that.
Uh, and you don’t have to a hundred percent give up all the foods that you love. You can still enjoy food. You can still have variety. You can still enjoy good flavor from food. You can even have what I would call dessert, but instead of eating. The processed high carb, sugar laden stuff that just keeps you packing on fat.
You just gotta swap out some of that stuff for something better. Just healthier choices. And you’d be surprised how easy this can be once you kind of get the hang of it. Okay, so I’ve got 10 options here. Listen, there are way more than 10 healthy swaps that you could do for things that you love. I couldn’t possibly fit these all into one episode.
Like there’s thousands of them really. But I picked a few that I think address some of the foods that people tend to miss the most. At least this is the kind of stuff that I miss the most. Um, so let’s start with number one. Um, and that would be ice cream. Okay. I am an ice cream junkie, or at least I used to be.
Um, I still do enjoy some ice cream here and there, but what I do instead most of the time is I substitute something healthier for ice cream. Now you can actually find, and I’m gonna, I’m gonna talk about a couple different things here today. I’m gonna talk about some i items that you can purchase at the store that might be substitutes, and then something that you can kind of make at home that’s more of a whole foods type of thing.
Okay? So ice cream is one of those that falls into both categories where. You can go to the grocery store and you can find some decent kinda lower carb, uh, ice cream brands that don’t have a bunch of sugar in them. It, it’s still kind of processed food, so just keep that in mind. But there are some healthier alternatives to ice cream.
Just look in the ice cream section for things like Halo Top or Rebel Creamery. Um, there’s a couple other brands out there that are pretty decent. You know, they’ve got, they use whole ingredients, but some of these have thickeners and things like that in ’em. So if you’re not interested in that, one of the, the best alternatives to just eating ice cream or something store-bought, that’s a, like a lower carb option would be just do some Greek yogurt, uh, get some plain Greek yogurt, add some berries to it.
I love blueberries and strawberries. Mix that with a little Greek yogurt. Sometimes I will put a little tiny drizzle of, uh, honey or some maple syrup on top of that. Um, not much, um, just a, you know, teaspoon or two. Um, and this is something that you can do after eating dinner. It’s a wonderful, like, very satisfying dessert type of food option.
Um. It tastes like a dessert, but it’s higher in protein, it’s low in sugar, it’s way more satisfying. It’s gonna keep you full. Um, you can even add a little bit of cinnamon in there, maybe some chopped nuts on top that this is such an awesome substitute for ice cream. So this got me through for a long time ’cause I just quit eating ice cream altogether.
I used to eat a lot of ice cream. Um, so I quit eating ice cream. And so then I would just do the Greek yogurt and berries. Um, and I just did that for a long time and then occasionally I would add a little bit of honey or something to it, but you don’t even really need that if, if the, uh, berries that you got are in season and they’re nice and sweet.
So that’s one. Another one is, um, a lot of people, you know, they want to give up some of the high carb. Staple foods like rice. And a good option for, for substituting would be something like rice, cauliflower. And this is a item again that you can get at the store. It’s pre rice. Um, you can make this yourself as well, but if you just go in the frozen food section and you look for like where the vegetables are, a lot of times you can find like brown rice and, and white rice, but also cauliflower rice, riced, cauliflower.
And this is super low in carbs. It’s got the same kind of texture as rice. It does taste a little bit different. Um, but it’s got few, just a few calories you can really load up your plate with this stuff. And, um, uh, it, it’s such a great substitute. You can use it any in, in, just use it in place of rice, stir fries.
Um, I would get like, uh, Indian takeout. I love Indian food. Um, but super high in carbs, right? But I would get something. That was kind of a low carb dish. And then instead of using the rice that they give me with it, I would just heat up some, uh, cauliflower rice and have that with it. It’s super delicious and I can feel good about what I’m eating.
I’m, I’m not eating this huge load of carbohydrate. Um, so again, you can, you can get this at the store. You can make it yourself. I have riced it myself. Um, to be honest, it’s a little bit of work and it’s very messy. Like stuff’s just flying everywhere. But if you’re cool with that, make it at home. It’s pretty easy to do.
If you’ve got, uh, like a, I don’t know, like a cheese shredder or something like that, that you can use to do it, the stuff they have at the store, it’s awesome though. Okay. So, and you can use, I mean, just think about anywhere that you use rice and you can just use this instead. Um, okay. Number three is substituting something for wheat flour.
I know one of the biggest things that people freak out about when, um, they start going kind of on a lower carb, um, journey here, um, is wheat flour. So wheat flour is one of those things that is. Is a refined carbohydrate and it actually spikes your blood sugar more than eating actual sugar does. Because it’s such a fine ground powder, it does have a higher impact on your blood sugar.
So just keep that in mind, like it’s going to be problematic to eat regular wheat flour. So instead there’s, there’s low carb options that are actually. Pretty good. And again, you can buy this stuff at the store. I would kind of recommend that because, you know, creating flour is, is, is a little bit of work.
Um, but you can do it in a, uh, food processor, a blender or something like that. But a couple options might be something like almond flour, so that’s gonna be pretty tasty. A little bit different texture though. So if you’re using it in recipes and stuff like that, you can kind of substitute it for wheat flour, but it’s gonna be, it’s gonna give you a little bit of a different consistency.
Um, and the one that I’ve been using lately that I really love is oat flour. Now I get it, oats are gonna be a little bit higher in carbs, but I consider this kind of a whole food type of substitution. Um, and if you’re okay with some carbs, then this is not a bad way to go. Um. But when you’re baking or making breads, um, even doing things like um, pizza crust, you can use almond flour to make pizza crust.
Um, if you guys wanna Google something like fathead pizza crust, I think it uses a mozzarella cheese and some almond flour and an egg or something like that, and it creates this amazing pizza crust that’s super delicious. But pancakes, muffins, all kinds of things. I make this really healthy. And very delicious, uh, pancake.
I’ve been doing this recently, um, cooking ’em on the Blackstone outside, which is super fun. So we’re just making pancakes outdoors and it’s, uh, oat flour, or I’m sorry, it’s just oats, but I grind it up in the, in the food processor. Um, so it’s oats and uh, cottage cheese and eggs. Those are really the only three ingredients and then you just blend it up and, and it makes a really awesome, um, very healthy, uh, pancake batter that you can just cook up like you would.
Normal pancakes, you know, they’re not as fluffy as the flour pancakes, but I don’t care. They taste so good. Um, and again, that’s gonna be a little bit higher on the carbohydrate side if you’re doing the oat flour. But almond flour, great alternative. You can also look at the store. They do have. Low carb flower blends that you can get that are pretty good too.
So don’t think like you can never have another muffin or another pancake. Again, there are options out there. Some are gonna be a little bit higher in carbs, and then if you’re okay with that, that’s fine. Some you can get very low carb options. Um, here’s another one that a lot of runners freak out about giving up, and that is beer.
I know so many runners who just love beer. They love drink a beer, especially after they run. So they finish running. This’ll be like eight, nine o’clock in the morning, and immediately they’re all drinking beers. And I’m just kinda shaking my head like, I don’t think that’s really what you should be doing, but hey, no judgment whatsoever.
Now, full disclosure, I used to drink beer. I used to love beer. I probably would’ve been one of those people that’s drinking at nine o’clock in the morning. Um, but I haven’t had alcohol in 18 and a half years or something like that. So for me, I just don’t want to be drinking alcohol. Um, alcohol plus the carbs that you get from the beer.
Just, you’re just storing fat at that point. You know, it makes it very hard to lose weight if you’re drinking alcohol. Um, but if you love the taste of beer, why not try something like a non-alcoholic beer? You, you will be surprised even at the regular grocery store, how many non-alcoholic beer options they have that taste really good.
So I have been enjoying some of these on occasion. Um, the, the one that I kind of recommend would be like athletic, athletic brewing. They make all non-alcoholic beers. They have, um, a few that are pretty low in carbs. I. Pretty low in calories. Um, they taste like, uh, an IPA or a golden Ale or something like that.
Um, from what I remember anyway, um, people that do drink beer, they say they taste great. Um, and this is a great option to have. And honestly, I’ll have one of these and I’m completely, completely satisfied. We’re in the past when I used to drink beer. You know, I drink five or six of these things, you know, and I, I’m, I’m, that’s a lot.
It’s a big carbohydrate load, big alcohol load, big stressor on the system. Don’t need to do that. Have a non-alcoholic beer. Enjoy yourself and you can still hang out with your friends and you don’t have to give up the things that you love. Okay? A hundred percent. Um, we’re, we’re enjoying the taste without having the negative side effects that come along with it, with the alcohol.
Cool. So that’s a good one to try. Uh, let’s see. We’re up to number five. Number five is potato chips. If you’re somebody that loves chips and you just can’t imagine giving those up, let’s try something else. You can actually do, um, something like roasted chickpeas. You know, put some chickpeas on a, on a sheet pan.
Put a little seasoning on there. Roast ’em up in the oven for, I don’t know, 10 minutes or something like that. Um, you can actually buy these at the store as well. You can buy roasted chickpeas. Um. Or veggie chips. Sometimes they have something that is like sweet potato, kale, um, zucchini. You can actually make these yourself too.
Put ’em in the air fryer, put a little drizzle of, uh, you know, olive oil on them. Uh, maybe a few, uh, little seasoning, a little salt or something like that. Fry ’em up in the air fryer, do some sweet potatoes or kale or zucchini or something like that. Oh, that sounds delicious. Now, nuts is one of those things where it’s a, a lot of people like to eat nuts and that’s fine if you want that crunchy thing, you’re missing potato chips or whatever.
Problem with nuts is that they are very high in calories. Um, high in fat, not such a big, that’s not such a big problem. But what happens is when you start eating nuts, people tend to like eat a lot of them. If you’re like me, if I get a bag of roasted almonds or cashews or something like that, technically cashews or legumes, I get that.
But I can eat a ton of that stuff. Like I can eat my body weight in nuts in a day, so I have to be careful of that one. So something like chickpeas, you’re not gonna, you’re not as tempted to overeat it or like the, the kind of veggie chips that you make yourself. Give it a try. You never know. It might be something that is, uh, a really good substitute for you.
Um, another one is sandwich bread. So people are, oh my God, I can’t believe I can never eat sandwich bread again. Listen, you can, and again, there are some good options at the store that you can get that are kind of low in, in carbs. Um, some of them I am, I question just there, there’s a lot of ingredients in there.
It’s kind of a highly processed. Item, honestly. Um, some of them are pretty good. Try ’em and see what you think. It’s up to you. Like, I just tend to not get a lot of these things because they just have a lot of ingredients that I’m just not totally sure about. Some of them use wheat flour and then they just add a bunch of fiber to help, um, offset the carb impact, you know.
So if you’re eating a bunch of W wheat flour anyway and they’re just adding fiber in the form of, you know, flax seed or something like that, is that really how we wanna be doing this? Like, I don’t know. ’cause you kind of can subtract the fiber from the food if it’s a whole food. But since it is a processed food and you’re just adding two ingredients together, is that really kind of.
Good for you. Jury’s out on that one. I don’t have a, a direct yes or no answer to that, but I tend to kind of stay away from some of the low carb breads out there. I’ve tried a few of ’em and honestly, they’re, they’re okay. Um, but you can do things, um, like when I go to restaurants, sometimes I’ll get a burger and I’ll just ask for an extra patty.
And no, no bun. So I just eat it like naked, you know, eat it with like a knife and fork. It’s delicious. Or you could do lettuce wraps. A lot of places will do the lettuce wraps, or they, they wrap it in like collard greens or something like that. But if you want a a, a, a delicious kind of sandwich. Type of thing and you don’t really want to do the bread, try something like a lettuce wrap or make your own using, you know, the almond flour or the wheat or the oat flour.
You know, that might be a good idea too. You can get tons of recipes online. That’s another thing I’ll just say, go do a little bit of research, you know, drop your, your questions into Google or chat GPT or something, and. Find out what options are available for you, um, because there’s so many things out there that you’re probably not even aware of.
Okay? Um, another one is sugary cereal. I know a lot of runners love to eat cereal. I don’t know what that is. They just like, love the cereal. Like it’s an excuse to eat a bunch of junk food, honestly. Oh, I’m a runner and I got a car blow, so they’re eating Captain Crunch or whatever. Don’t get me wrong, I love some Captain Crunch.
I used to eat that stuff all the time. Haven’t eaten that in God. 10 year, 15 years. I don’t know. It’s been a long time now that I’m thinking about it. Now I need to go get me some Captain Crunch. I probably won’t do that, but instead of sugary cereal, you could do something like, uh, chia seed pudding with berries and some nuts in there.
So you can just make a quick chia pudding with, you know, milk or almond milk, maybe a little s. Little Stevia. A little sweetener. Top it with some berries and nuts. You can even do like the sugar-free jello pudding mix or something like that. It doesn’t have to be complicated, you know, but that’s a good way of like, you know, starting your day with, you know, a little bit of pudding.
Um. Some berries, some nuts, some seeds, um, instead of the sugary cereal, and it’s gonna help you, it’s gonna give you fiber, it’s gonna be good for your digestion, help you to stay full longer. Again, a lot of these foods we’re trying to like, maintain satiety and a lot of the. Super, um, carby foods, they, they actually do the opposite.
They make us feel more hungry and we have more cravings during the day, so we tend to overeat. But when you’re eating higher protein, good sources of fats, you tend to not eat as much. You’re more satisfied throughout the day. Um, again, trying to lose weight. We gotta stop the overeating thing. Um, soda. If you’re a soda drinker and you just can’t imagine giving up your Dr.
Pepper or Mountain Dew or whatever it is that you drink, um, which, you know, by the way, those, those cans have something around 40 grams of sugar per per can. That’s a lot of sugar. You know, that’s gonna be, I think the equivalent is something like 28 teaspoons of sugar or something. It’s ridiculous. Do not drink sugar.
Try to stay away from liquid sugar as best you can. Um, much healthy alternatives would be something like sparkling water. Um, couple things there. I get, uh, LaCroix or Polar or whatever, you know, brand Waterloo, whatever kind of brand is on sale at, at the grocery store. I’ll pick up a bunch of those. I love the taste of, of some of those sparkling waters.
No calories. There’s no. There’s a little bit of flavoring in there, but they, they taste fine. I love those things. I also have a soda stream here, so I just make my own sparkling water with no, uh, flavoring at all. That’s a nice thing to do. I’ve had that for God, about 15 years or so, and I use that pretty much every day.
Um, the other suggestion, especially for US runners would be, uh, some electrolyte mix. Do some electrolyte powder, get some elements, some Redmond, relight, you know, some, uh, liquid iv, anything like that that’s going to, it’s gonna have a good flavor and it’s gonna give you some nutrients that you actually need, you know, uh, some minerals you got.
Sodium, magnesium, potassium, calcium. You need that stuff anyway. Why not drink that a couple times throughout the day? Um, but the sparkling waters are so much better for you. And listen, if you feel like you need to have that diet Coke every now and then, I. Yeah, don’t worry about it so much. It’s not that big of a deal.
I know some people are so adamant about never eating, uh, or never drinking anything like that because it’s like, oh, it’s got, what is it got in there, aspartame or something like that. You know, the occasional diet Coke instead of drinking 40 grams of sugar. I would say that’s a much better choice. Okay. We don’t need to go crazy with this stuff.
Have the Diet Coke if you want it. Um, pasta. If you’re somebody that loves pasta, and I do, I love pasta. There’s lots of alternatives there. Some of these you can get, uh, but you can make your own too. I, I think there’s some options at the store I haven’t checked lately, but there used to be some good low carb sort of pasta options, but you can make your own with like zucchini noodles or spaghetti squash.
Um, there’s even a new one that I, uh, kind of read about recently, paulini, which is like using um, uh, palm. Uh, root, you know, um, so that’s something that you can try. Um, you know, hey, whatever works, you know, but you can just like use it in place of, uh, regular wheat noodles, you know, um, roast up some spaghetti squash, kind of pull a, pull a stringy stuff out of there.
Then you’ve got a nice kind of substitute for, uh, pasta there. Okay. Um, and then number 10 would be salad dressing. So a lot of people love salads and, and I think this is a really healthy alternative to eat. Uh, a lot more salads. I love a big salad with, you know, some nice veggies on there. I’ll throw some avocado, maybe some hard boiled egg, a little bit of cheese on my salad.
And then you, you can use a dressing that is healthier. So instead of the store-bought dressings that have. Seed oils and a lot of sugar in there. You can make your own, um, add some olive oil, some vinegar, maybe a little Dijon mustard, put a little seasoning in there. Boom, you’ve got a nice homemade olive oil based dressing.
You can, and, and the the, the ways you can do this are endless, like you can make your own. Also at the grocery store, there’s a brand that I love called Primal Kitchen. Now Primal Kitchen has a whole line of salad dressings that are mingled with avocado oil. And zero sugar. And they are all delicious. They are a little bit more expensive, but to me it’s worth it.
I love that stuff. I don’t, I always have time to make my own dressing. I was making my own dressing there for a while. Um, you know, I just make it up ahead of time. Blend a bunch of ingredients up in the Vitamix, throw it in a mason jar, throw it in the fridge, and it would last for weeks, you know. But that’s up to you.
You know, you can buy some, some decent stuff at the store. Very delicious, primal kitchen, or make some of your own, you know, it doesn’t have to be, uh uh, you don’t have to be, uh, subject to eating all the seed oils and consuming all the sugary salad dressings that you get at the store. Okay? All right, so there you go.
10 food swaps that are simple, tasty, and sustainable. You don’t need to flip your entire diet upside down overnight. Start with a few of these swaps and then you can kind of build from there. The point is you can eat real food, lose fat, fuel your running, and still love what you’re eating. It is possible.
And if you’re ready to stop struggling and start getting real results, head over to my website running lean coaching.com, click on work with me and let’s you and I get to work. Alright, that’s all I got for you today. Love you all. Keep on running lean and I will talk to you soon.
One of the biggest myths in the running world is that you can’t lose fat and keep running strong at the same time. Well…I’m here to tell you that’s just not true. The key is learning how to fuel …
Continue Reading about 287. How to Eat for Fat Loss Without Losing Performance →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner sports nutritionist, master life coach, and weight loss coach. For runners, I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you, properly fuel your body and your mind so you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 287 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners, and today how to eat for fat loss without losing performance. So one of the biggest myths in the running world is that you can’t lose fat and keep running strong at the same time.
Well, I’m here to tell you that that is just not true. The key is really learning how to fuel your body so that you burn fat efficiently and support your training and recovery. So in this episode, I’m gonna break it all down for you how to eat so that you can. Continue losing fat without losing your running performance.
In the process, you’re gonna learn exactly what types of foods promote fat loss. In which promote fat storage. Uh, why you don’t need all the carbs all the time, how to time your carbs around your runs for maximum fat burning, and how to hit the right calorie intake without totally crushing your energy.
If you wanna drop fat, get leaner and keep running strong. This episode is for you, so listen up. But first, if you’re struggling to drop the weight, if your energy is low, if your runs feel like a grind and nothing you’ve tried is working, listen, I get it. Most runners are following outdated advice. Eat all the carbs, train more, eat less, and hope for the best.
But that’s not a real strategy, that’s just guesswork. What you need is a clear proven plan that actually works for you. One that’s built around real food, smart fueling, consistent training, and the mindset required to keep it all going for life. This is exactly what I do with my coaching clients. We take the guesswork out, we simplify your nutrition, we dial in your training and build the best habits that actually help you to lose fat, that help you to get stronger and make running easier without really feeling deprived or burned out.
So if you’re ready to stop spinning your wheels and start seeing actual results, go over to my website, runningleancoaching.com. Click on work with me. Let’s get you leaner, stronger, and running better than ever. Okay, so today’s episode, why I wanted to talk about this today. Um, how to eat for fat loss without losing performance.
Um, I decided to talk about this because this is one of the most common concerns that I hear from runners that I talk to. Which is, you know, I want to, I wanna lose weight, I wanna lose fat, but I’m afraid it’s going to completely tank my running. And I’ve heard that you can’t do both. If you wanna lose weight, your running is gonna suffer.
Or if you want to keep running strong, you gotta forget about losing weight. But listen, that’s just not true. The truth is you can do both. You just have to be intentional about how you fuel your body and how you structure your training. So that’s what we’re talking about here today. I want to clear up the confusion.
I want to give you an approach that is proven. This works for, I’ve worked with like around 500 clients now, 500 runners who have lost weight and improve their running at the same time. I would say that’s a proven approach, okay? You don’t have to lose running performance in order to lose weight. Okay. But I wanna start today by addressing the biggest myth around all of this when it comes to nutrition and fat loss is that you, you, you know this one that I’m just started talking about, which is you just can’t lose weight and run strong at the same time.
Um, the truth is that there is a delicate balance there. You need to be intentional about what you’re doing, and that’s kind of what this whole episode is about. It’s gonna be showing you how to do this, okay? Um, it is 100% possible. Like I said, 500 of my clients have done this, and you can do it too. What you can’t do is under eat, overtrain and, and somehow expect to perform at your best.
That’s the fast track to injury burnout, and just plateauing your progress. Okay. But this is what most people think of when they think of losing weight. That you gotta undereat, you have to cut your calories way back, and that you need to run more. So train more and eat less. But that’s a recipe for disaster and that’s where most people, good intention to people, good in intentioned coaches, that’s where they’re operating from.
That’s the standard, you know, uh, uh, operating procedure for people who wanna lose weight, cut your calories and in increase your cardio, you know, run more, eat less, run more, and that’s not a good plan. So that will tank your running performance. Absolutely. But that’s not what we’re gonna do. That’s not the approach that I take with people.
I never encourage people to undereat. I never encourage people to overtrain. Okay? That’s not the approach that we’re gonna take. So losing weight, fat loss, and running performance or not mutually exclusive, right? You have to have a smart approach though, to, you have to take a very smart approach to your nutrition and to your training.
Okay. So there are certain foods that will, um, promote fat loss and there are cer certain foods that kind of promote fat storage. So when it comes to losing fat, um, what you eat is probably just as important, even more important as how much you eat. Okay? So the right diet is gonna be the one that supports your, uh, fat loss goals and your running goals.
And again, this is, this is one of those things that’s kind of individualized and there’s no one answer that’s gonna fit everybody okay? But. There are certain foods, generally speaking, that will help you to lose fat and there are certain foods, generally speaking, that will cause you to hold onto that fat or to increase your fat stores.
So we, we, we are either choosing foods that, uh, diminish our fat stores. That, that help promote fat burning, or we’re eating foods that add to our fat stores that promote fat storage. Like we don’t, we don’t necessarily want that one. Okay. Also, keep in mind through this whole conversation we’re having today, that burning fat is an amazing fuel source for, uh, endurance athletes.
So if you’re a runner who wants to improve your endurance, burn more fat. So that’s kind of the, the over. Arching, uh, uh, topic here today, which is we wanna be burning the fat. We don’t wanna be storing the fat. We want to be burning the fat. ’cause when you’re burning the fat, you’re losing the excess weight, the excess fat.
When you’re burning the fat, you have this unlimited, virtually unlimited supply of fuel on board, on your body all the time. So there are certain foods that kind of promote fat loss. These are typically nutrient dense foods that are high in protein and lower in refined carbohydrates. So think about things like meat and fish and eggs and Greek yogurt, vegetables, berries, nuts, seeds, certain, you know, good fats, like, uh, uh.
Olives and olive oil. Um, and, and berry, uh, I’m sorry. And dairy, uh, like, uh, uh, butter and, uh, coconut oil and avocado oil, avocados, all those things. Okay. Low, high, high end protein, lower and refined carbs. Nutrient dense foods, and then we have uh uh, and that’s by no means an exhaustive list. This is just some examples.
Then there’s foods that promote fat storage. So pro foods that promote fat storage are typically ultra processed carb heavy. And low in nutritional value. So they’re not nutritionally dense. Um, they’re not high in protein and they’re high in those refined carbs. So think about sugary snacks, breads, pasta, soda, granola bars, baked goods, even a lot of these so-called like health foods.
They’re just loaded with sugar, seed oils, refined carbs, um, that stuff. It actually promotes fat storage. That stuff raises insulin in your body. It raises your blood sugar by a lot, spikes in blood sugar, spikes in insulin. Insulin seems to be the, the driver of fat storage. And as long as your blood sugar is high, your insulin is high, you’re, you’re storing fat.
If we can focus on a diet that is, um, lower in, in, uh, the. Nutrient, you know, diminished carbs in the, um, refined carbs if we’re eating more, um, high protein, nutrient dense foods, like I mentioned. Then your body is not producing as much blood sugar, not producing as much insulin. You’re keeping your blood sugar low essentially, and your body can burn the fat.
So high blood sugar means you’re just gonna be burning off that blood sugar. Essentially. You gotta, you gotta burn that off before you can do anything else. And if you’re eating a very high carbohydrate diet constantly, you’re just gonna be fighting a losing battle here. You’re always going to be storing fat.
Whereas if you’re eating a lower. Uh, blood sugar kind of diet, then your body can actually, uh, burn the fat. Okay? So that’s just something you have. If, if you wanna lose fat, then stick with eating these, uh, whole foods, these real foods, foods that keep you full, that support your workouts, that don’t spike your blood sugar every time you eat.
Okay? So let’s talk about carbs for a minute, because this is where a lot of runners get tripped up. We’ve been told for decades that runners need to constantly be loading up on carbs. You know, pasta before a long run, gels every 30 minutes, bagels before and after every workout. Here’s the thing though, your body doesn’t need a constant influx of carbs to run well.
In fact, if you’re constantly fueling with carbs, your body never learns to burn fat efficiently. And if fat loss is your goal, you want to be burning fat efficiently, especially during those long, steady state runs. So I’m not saying you have to go like full keto, you don’t have to be super low carb, but what I am saying is that you don’t need all the carbs all the time.
Again, once you train your body to start burning fat effectively, you’ve got a ton of fuel for running. And this is where a lot of runners just don’t understand this and they’re just stuck in this old mentality of having to eat all the carbs all the time. ’cause that’s what they started teaching us back in the eighties, you know?
And it’s just kind of, it’s all the same information. Since the 1980s. Well, I think it’s time to maybe change that or maybe add some other options to the mix and getting fat adapted, adapting your body to using fat as fuel, as opposed to just carbohydrates as fuel is a great way to improve your running and to lose the fat.
And why not? Why wouldn’t you want to do that? As a runner, why wouldn’t you want to be a better fat burner? It’s just one more tool that you have available to you. I, I don’t know why you would leave that on the table. So, and when we talk about carbs, I’m not saying like, you gotta, like, again, we’re not talking about going full keto.
Like keto typically is like 20 grams of carbs or less per day. That is very hard to do. It’s very hard to sustain that. Um, and we’re not talking about eating, you know, 300 grams of carbs a day either, but somewhere in between there, you know, a lot of people do well with 50 or a hundred or 150 grams of carbs, something like that.
That’s still considered kind of low carb, you know, and everybody has to figure out what works for them. I. But we wanna find that sweet spot and we want to include carbs in our training. We want to include carbs as part of our, um, a strategy to, you know, improve our running performance. And, but there are, but not all carbs are, you know, the same, there, there are some carbs that I, I want you to kind of include and maybe try and there’s some that I want you to kind of avoid.
So some of the carbs that we can use around our training would be things like. You know, root vegetables, sweet potatoes, beets, that kind of stuff. Um, squash, you know, like acorn squash, butternut squash, berries, beans, lentils, some oats. Um, ideally something like steel cut oats, and then whole fruits, you know, whole kinds of fruits.
You don’t need to like blend up all your fruit into a smoothie, but, you know, eating whole fruits, um, because these are. Nutrient dense, slow digesting carbs that provide energy without completely spiking your blood sugar, like just eating gels and stuff like that. Um, carbs to avoid or maybe just really limit.
I, I never say like, you can never eat bread again or something like that, but just kind of limit this stuff ’cause it does have a high impact on your blood sugar. It’s interesting that. When you look at the spikes of blood sugar and everybody’s a little bit different, but generally speaking, um. Uh, white flour will spike your blood sugar more than like table sugar does because you’re, you’ve, you’ve refined this grain into a fine powder, and so there’s like more surface area for the, I don’t know, enzymes to work or something like that.
And so it actually, you know, white flour will spike your blood sugar more than just eating plain table sugar. Well, that’s crazy, right? So when people are like, oh, you know, you’re being o overly. Uh, cautious by avoiding all these carbs, all these bread, like you can eat bread. Dude, listen, it’s like eating sugar.
It, it’ll spike your blood sugar more than sugar will. So just be mindful of that. I’m not saying not to do it, just be mindful. So some of the carbs I say to kind of avoid or limit would be white bread, pasta. Anything made with flour, really. Cookies, crackers, um, things like potato chips, all the processed energy bars, sugary drinks, cereals, ultra processed foods, ultra processed snacks, like all that stuff.
Okay. These kinds of carbs are delicious. I get it right, but they’re easy to overeat. They don’t satisfy your hunger. They’re they’re devoid of nutrients, and they’re going to sabotage both your fat loss and your performance over time. You might think you’re doing yourself a favor by eating four bagels before you run.
But over time you’re just gonna be storing more fat. You’re not gonna be a good fat burner. You’re diminishing your running performance, in my opinion. So you’re not allowing your body to function properly. Um, and that stuff can have a negative impact. There’s a lot of runners who are. Um, what’s considered tophi, TOFI thin on the outside, fat On the inside, they’ve got, they look like they’re in good shape.
They’re pretty healthy and lean, but on the inside there’s a lot of fat, uh, like, um, uh, visceral fat that’s around their organs and things like that. I know that some runners, ultra runners and things like that who have been diagnosed with pre-diabetes or diabetes, um, but they don’t look like they’re overweight or anything like that, but they have a lot of.
Internal fat around their organs, which is the kind we really don’t want. That’s not good for you. So we have subcutaneous fat. That’s the fat that you can see on the outside, and then we have that visceral fat on the inside. That’s the, that’s the bad stuff there. Okay? We don’t want to be adding to that store, okay?
We want to be burning that fat. Okay? Now another question that comes up a lot is, okay, well when should I be eating these carbs? How do I time carbs? To, you know, around my workout so that I can burn fat and support my running because I’m all for using carbs for running. I think you should. Um, so if you’re gonna eat carbs, uh, do it in a strategic way.
And, and here’s a couple rule of thumbs we want to. We wanna time your carbs around your workouts, not just randomly throughout the day. You don’t wanna wake up and eat 16 pancakes and then, you know, later on in the day eat, you know, 12 bagels and then go to sleep with, you know, half a gallon of ice cream.
I. As good as that sounds. It’s ridiculous. I don’t know why I came up with those numbers, but whatever. So your body is primed to use carbs for fuel and for recovery, like before and after you train essentially. So that’s when your muscles are like sponges. They soak up glycogen. Um, rebuilding is, is a, is a, the process of rebuilding muscles is stronger.
Uh, recovery is faster, so you don’t wanna just be snacking on carbs all day while you’re sitting at your desk or watching Netflix. Um, those excess carbs are probably gonna get stored as fat. So if you’re using. Carbs as fuel before a workout, you’re gonna burn those carbs. Um, if you’re using ’em after a workout, that’s a good too because your, your body can like, use those to replenish glycogen stores and rebuild muscles.
You do need some carbs and protein to, to rebuild muscles. Um, so we wanna use carbs like a tool, right? It’s just not a thing you can do freely all the time. Um, I know people are like, well, I run so I can eat whatever I want. It’s like, okay. But if you’re like. Gaining weight in the process. Maybe you can’t eat whatever you want, you know, but again, everybody’s an individual.
Um, but we wanna use carbs like a tool. So we wanna fuel our workouts, we wanna recover well, and we wanna try to stay in that fat burning mode for as long as possible. That means we don’t eat carbs, you know, all throughout the day, every day. So time ’em around your workouts. Um, another question that comes up a lot.
Is calorie deficit, and I hear so many people say the only way to lose weight is being in a calorie deficit. It. So I think that without getting into this too much, I think that there is some truth to that, that I think you have to be in a slight calorie deficit in order to lose some weight and lose fat.
But most runners take this too far, and most coaches. Push this too much with people and that’s why they suggest, you know, don’t run if you’re trying to lose weight. ’cause all they’re doing is cutting calories aggressively. When you do that though, your performance suffers. So you don’t want to do that. We don’t want to, you know, drastically cut our calories.
You’re gonna be tired, your runs won’t suck. Your recovery’s gonna tank worse. Your body’s gonna be holding on to fat and breaking down muscle in this process. So we don’t want that. We do not wanna be breaking down muscle. We wanna be building up muscle. So what we want to aim for is a, a modest calorie deficit, just enough to promote fat loss, but not so much that it tanks your training.
Now a lot of people will say, well, what does that mean? How much should we, you know, lower our calorie deficit by? That is a good question and everybody’s different. And this is where I hate putting numbers out there ’cause I get people coming back to me and they send me messages, you said this and that doesn’t work for me.
I’m like, so it’s hard for me to put these numbers out there. I. Generally speaking though, I know I’ve said that a lot today, but just keep that in mind. Generally speaking, a ballpark number might be like a 10% calorie deficit, you know, so that might be where you’re focusing on eating lots of protein.
You’re getting good healthy fats, you’re doing some carbs, you’re timing, some carbs are on your runs, and if you’re in about a 10% or so calorie deficit, then you’re probably gonna be good. You’re. That’s probably gonna work for you. Maybe that doesn’t work for you though, and you need to do crank that up to like 15%.
Or maybe you can go like right around your maintenance calories and that’s works for you and that helps you to, to lose weight. Okay? Again, there’s no right answer here. Um, how, how many calories should you be eating? Again, I kind of use this as a ballpark number. I usually say take about 10 times your body weight.
So if you weigh, you know, 190 pounds, then 1900 calories is probably good for you. And we don’t really need to factor in running and all this other stuff because all, all that does is, is that, um, you’re trying to do some math. You’re trying to do math on like, well, but I, I run and I burn a thousand calories a day, so that means I get to eat a thousand calories more.
Hey. Try that and see if it works for you. Most people I talk to that does not work for them, but hey, give it a try and see. See how that works. I tried that four years with an app. I was trying to, I was logging all my food. I was counting all my calories. I was counting all my workouts. Couldn’t lose a pound doing that.
Not a pound. Um, so what I tell people is just focus on eating plenty of protein, good, healthy fats, some carbs, you know, eat, you know, things like, uh, meat and eggs and vegetables and some fruit and nuts and seeds and, and some dairy. If you can handle it and all that stuff is good. Whole Foods, focus on whole foods.
Eat until you feel kind of satisfied, but don’t go beyond that. So be mindful not to be overeating and you should, your calories should just kind of stay where they are supposed to be. They should, you should be able to eat in a way that feels good for you without overeating. You know, if you’re somebody who’s like a chronic over eater, you may want to count your calories.
You may want to use that approach, but I don’t think it’s necessary for everybody, and I, it’s not really sustainable for most people too. Really though protein is gonna be kind of your secret weapon, okay? Um, if you’re not getting enough protein, you’re making fat loss way harder than it needs to be.
’cause protein helps you to maintain lean muscle while you’re losing weight. It helps you to recover faster from workouts. It helps you to stay full and satisfied, so you’re not tempted to be snacking all day long. How much protein should you get? Again, I’m gonna give you this disclaimer, it’s different for everybody.
Point seven to one gram of protein per pound of ideal body weight per day seems to be where, you know, most people do. Okay? Um, spread it out over, you know, two or three meals. You know, you don’t need to be eating 12 times a day, uh, two or three meals a day. Um, prioritize high quality sources of protein, meat, eggs, fish, Greek yogurt.
If you need to supplement, do something like whey protein. That seems to be great. Or if you, if you’re plant-based, then do like a pea protein. Those teams, that seems to be pretty good too. But protein is gonna be your best friend during, during this process. Okay. So the bottom line with all this is you’re an individual.
You gotta kind of figure out what works for you. I’m trying to give you some guidelines. Um, so try some of this stuff, see how it works. I mean, you’re, you’re an experiment of one. We, we all are. And so you have to kind of figure out what is the right formula for you? How much protein do I need to eat? How many calories should I be eating?
What supports my running and my, uh, fat loss? Because there’s an answer there, you know, and everybody’s a little bit different, but you can lose fat and run strong at the same time. You don’t have to choose one or the other. You can do both. You just have to be smart about it. You gotta fuel wisely, you gotta train smart.
I. You gotta give your body what it needs to thrive. So don’t fall for the myths. Don’t follow what every running guru out there magazine is telling you. Whatever fuel like an athlete, burn fat efficiently, eat real food, train hard. Yeah, but then rest. Well this is how you get lean or get faster and become the strongest, most badass version of yourself.
Okay, and if you want help putting this into practice, if you’re ready to lose the fat for good and keep running strong, then I’ve got you. This is exactly what I do with my coaching clients. Every single day, we’re gonna dial in your nutrition, optimize your training, and build the habits that you need to stay consistent for life.
Just go to my website, runningleancoaching.com to learn more. You can apply for coaching. We’ll have a conversation, see if this is a good fit. Cool. All right. That’s all I got for you today. Love you all. Keep on running lean and I will talk to you soon.
Want to run longer, feel stronger, and avoid hitting the wall? Then you’ll definitely want to check out this week’s episode of the Running Lean Podcast: “Unlock Metabolic Flexibility: Become a …
