Power-to-weight ratio sounds like an engineering term, and it is. It’s used to describe the performance of an automobile, a plane, or even a rocket. It’s also a term applied to athletes. Power-to-weight ratio is the amount of power you’re able to generate per pound or kilogram of body weight. Having a high power-to-weight ratio is what allows an unimposing and almost gaunt-looking cyclist to power up a steep mountain grade leaving bigger, well-muscled competitors in the dust. A higher power-to-weight ratio is important to cyclists and triathletes that need to propel their bodies and bikes up and over hills and steep mountain grades. These athletes strive for the most muscle mass on the leanest frames.
In his autobiography, Lance Armstrong relates that the debilitating chemotherapy he endured to fight cancer inadvertently contributed to his unprecedented success in the Tour de France. Chemotherapy caused him to lose significant weight, and in the process, literally reshaped his body. In making his comeback from cancer, he competed at a body weight that was 15 pounds lighter than his previous competition weight. Carrying less weight, he was able to conquer mountain stages at a pace that overwhelmed his competitors. Case in point: On the tortuous Alpe D’Huez, his coach estimated that if he’d added back those 15 pounds, he would have also added a whopping 3 minutes and 47 seconds to his finishing time! In competing at a lower weight, Lance had increased his power-to-weight ratio, which dramatically impacted his hill-climbing ability. And as they say — the rest is history.
Why it works
Okay, Lance is Lance, but what about the rest of us? Is there really something to this power-to-weight ratio concept? The answer is yes. A reduction in body weight has a substantial effect on your ability to ride or run up a hill. Gravity is the culprit. Gravity is the force that pulls you back down to earth when you jump. Without it you’d fly off into outer space. Gravity is also at work as you ascend a hill, and the more you weigh, the greater the gravitational force is pulling you downward. In order to counteract the force of gravity, you need to generate enough of an opposing force to propel the weight you’re carrying up and over a hill. The fact is, a lighter-weight cyclist or triathlete zipping past you on the hill is not only overtaking you, he or she is probably having to generate less power in the process. The bottom line is that your faster competitor doesn’t need to generate as much power as you because he or she has less weight, and therefore less gravitational force with which to contend. So while 6 feet and 185 lbs may get you high marks for physique, 6 feet and 145 lbs is what gets you to the top of the hill the fastest.
Not surprisingly, achieving a lower body weight, and specifically a lower level of body fat, as a way to increase power-to-weight ratio is a goal of many endurance athletes. All sorts of combinations of training and dietary strategies have been employed for trying to achieve this goal. We’ll take a closer look at them.
Avoid interfering with weight-loss success
If you’re new to a sport like cycling or triathlon, you may have some weight to lose to get into race shape. Ideally, that’s accomplished by reducing body fat while minimizing the loss of muscle. Heavy training burns calories, and it will tend to gradually chip away at the extra weight you are carrying. But you can help the process along by avoiding pitfalls that interfere with success in achieving your weight-loss goals. Dietary impediments to weight-loss success include eating too much food, eating too much fat, eating too many high-calorie foods that don’t fill you up, and not knowing how to eat.
Eating too much food
Reducing body weight is tough enough. Do yourself a favor and avoid the common pitfalls that make it even more of a challenge. Factors that cause us to overeat include:
- Eating the same amount as others — Your calorie needs are unique to you. Don’t eat more just because everyone else is. Eat for your needs and stick to your plan for meals and snacks
- Allowing yourself to become very hungry — This is a sure-fire route to overeating
- Eating at all-you-can-eat buffets — These places are a sea of calories, and it’s easy to get lost at sea. A handy rule-of-thumb: Limit yourself to one plate of food
- Eating too fast — Give yourself time to feel satisfied. If you scarf down your food, you don’t allow enough time for your body to signal that you’re full
- Supersizing — Ordering jumbo sizes is pretty much a guarantee you’ll overeat. Stick to small and medium sizes
- Being around food all day — Don’t make the temptation to eat even worse. If you’re surrounded by food, it’s easy to lose track of how often you’re snacking
- Mistaking fatigue from overtraining, dehydration, or lack of sleep as a lack of fuel — Overeating doesn’t make up for other causes of fatigue, but it will make you heavier and reduce your power-to-weight ratio
- Overconsuming alcohol — Alcohol is loaded with calories, and like most beverages, doesn’t fill you up. It also tends to reduce your inhibitions, including those that tell you not to over-indulge. A drink or two occasionally is a treat. Don’t make alcohol a staple of your diet
- Failing to cut back on food intake when you cut back on training — During the off-season or when injured, dial back on your consumption of food
- Eating too much during recovery — You trained hard to burn those calories. Don’t make the mistake of consuming so much after training that your recovery calories exceed the amount you expended. Feel free to use recovery foods and beverages, but substitute them for other calorie sources. Don’t add them to your usual calorie intake
Eating too much fat
Fats are loaded with calories, and overconsuming them can cause your daily calorie total to bulge. Factors that cause us to eat too much calorie-laden fat include:
- Eating fried foods — If the food is fried or deep-fried, it’s cooked in fat, and you can be pretty sure it’s high in calories. Cook with minimum amounts of fat by grilling, steaming, microwaving, or stir-frying with small amounts of healthy vegetable oils, such as olive oil or canola oil
- Drowning in dressings — Gravies, sauces, and dressings can be high in fat. Use low-fat dressings and lower-calorie gravy and sauce alternatives, such as mustard, tomato sauce, salsa, and citrus juice. When making creamy sauces, use nonfat milk
- Full-fat dairy foods — Make the switch to low-fat and nonfat milk, yogurt, and ice cream, and reduced-fat cheeses
- Spreads — Replace butter and margarine with mustard, low-fat mayonnaise, or a few slices of avocado. Use smaller amounts of peanut butter and other nut spreads
- Marbled meats — Replace fatty cuts of meat with leaner versions, and trim any visible fat
- Pastries and desserts — Choose breads rather than pastry items at bakeries, and smaller portions when you indulge in a dessert. Treat chocolate as an occasional treat, not a staple
Eating too many high-calorie foods that don’t fill you up
Choose foods that help to fill you up and avoid those that deliver calories but have little filling power. Factors that cause us to eat too many high-calorie foods include:
- Drinking your calories — Beverages aren’t very filling. So if you’re drinking your calories through regular sodas, energy drinks, blended coffee drinks, and large amounts of juice, chances are that you’re adding rather than substituting calories. Stick to lower-calorie fluids
- Not eating enough whole fruits, vegetables, salad, and whole grains — Fill up on these foods. They get the green light because they are lower in calories and higher in fiber. Translated: They fill you up with fewer calories. Load your plate with vegetables and salad (but go light on the dressing). Feel free to pile high vegetable toppings onto sandwiches. Eat whole pieces of fruit in place of fruit juices, and choose whole-grain cereals for breakfast or as a snack
- Not pairing carbs with protein — Carbohydrate foods in combination with some protein can be more satiating or filling than carbs alone. So when you’re not training, consume a little protein along with your carbs for extra satisfaction
Not knowing how to eat
We’re not talking how to use a fork or chopsticks; we are talking about eating in such a way that you are in control. Factors that cause our eating to be out of control include:
- Not having an eating routine — Eat meals and snacks that are planned. In between, put distance between you and food
- Eating to stay awake, fend off boredom, or deal with emotions — Come up with non-food alternatives to get you through the day. Get up and move around if you don’t feel alert. Have activities you can turn to when you’re ready for something new. Deal with stressful issues rather than using food to deal with your response to stress
- Restrictive eating — Not eating is not good. It usually just leads to overeating or binge eating later. This includes being “good” in the morning to offset overindulging at night, or being “good” during the weekdays so you can binge all weekend
Timing and target rate of loss
There are a couple other basics to keep in mind when you’re trying to drop weight. First, don’t try to restrict calories during heavy training or intense competitions. That’s a good way to get sick and to perform poorly. Instead, use the off-season or early-season to trim the fat. Second, don’t think you can lose the weight in a week or two. If you achieve a 500-calorie deficit daily, you lose about 1 lb (0.5 kg) per week. That’s a good target rate of weight loss.
Eating/training strategies to promote body fat loss
Besides the basics, athletes often want to know what else they can do to promote weight loss. And in fact, there are strategies that cyclists and triathletes commonly employ in conjunction with training to trim that extra pound of body fat. However, the concept of eating to lose fat is often in direct opposition to eating to perform at your best. Also, athletes differ in their responses to these strategies. Therefore, if you’re already lean and looking to shed that last pound or two of fat, you can carefully experiment with these different fat-burning strategies, but recognize that if you don’t strike just the right balance, strategies to burn fat can backfire and burn you during a competition.
- Extra training or cross-training — The advantage of this strategy is that it burns more calories and thus helps promote fat loss. Also, if you’re busy exercising you spend less time around food. The disadvantage of doubling up on training is you get more fatigued and you may be more prone to injury, and this can negatively affect your primary workouts. Also, all that extra exercise can leave you feeling like you deserve to eat whatever you want, and you may end up consuming more calories than you expended from the extra training
- Training in the morning on an empty stomach — Normally, you would consume a pre-exercise, high-carb meal 2–4 hours before training, or at least a snack about an hour before. But with this strategy, you work out for about an hour on an empty stomach. Exercising in a fasted state burns more fat as a fuel source, and this can help promote loss of body fat. On the downside, you need carbohydrate fuel to train at your best. If you’re low on carbs, you won’t be training at full capacity or effectiveness, and you may have to cut short your training due to fatigue, which would mean fewer calories expended. If you decide to try this route, view fasting workouts as fat-loss training sessions, and reserve them for less-important periods in your overall training schedule
- Training with no or minimal refueling — Usually, you would consume about 30–60 grams of carbs as fuel during every hour of exercise. However, with this particular fat-trimming strategy, you consume the minimum level of carbs needed to meet your training goals. The carb shortage increases the burning of fat as fuel, and helps to promote loss of body fat. But here again, if you’re running low on carbs, you won’t be training at full capacity or effectiveness, and you may have to cut short your training due to fatigue, which would mean fewer calories expended. Also, if you go too hard, you risk injury; you also may break down protein as an energy source, which would reduce your muscle mass. Again, approach these workouts as fat-loss training sessions, and reserve them for less-important periods in your training. Also, don’t forget to fully hydrate during these workouts
- Postponing eating for recovery — Normally, you would consume carbohydrates along with some protein as soon as possible after exercise to kickstart recovery. However, if you postpone eating and remain carbohydrate-depleted after exercise, your body will tend to burn more fat. The disadvantage of this strategy is that you may experience severe hunger and overeat when food is available. Also, this strategy reduces the effectiveness of your recovery, and can interfere with the achievement of your training goals or impair performance at your next workout
Putting it into perspective
Increasing your power-to-weight ratio is an effective strategy for improving your hill-climbing ability. You can increase your ratio by reducing your body fat. Basic strategies for trimming extra body fat are to avoid those factors that interfere with success in achieving your weight loss goals, including eating too much, eating too much fat, eating too many high-calorie foods that don’t fill you up, and not knowing how to eat. In addition, don’t try to restrict calories during heavy training or intense competitions. Instead, use the off-season or the early-season to work on reshaping your body. Also, plan on losing the weight gradually. A target deficit of about 500 calories per day should translate to losing about 1 lb (0.5 kg) per week. There are other strategies that already lean cyclists and triathletes commonly employ in conjunction with training to trim another pound or two of body fat. However, the idea of eating to lose fat is often directly counter to eating to train or perform at your best. Thus, it’s helpful to keep separate your optimal strategies for workouts during key training sessions and when competing on race day from what works to promote fat loss during occasional, less-important training sessions and during periods when you are getting in shape.
References:
1. Burke L. Road cycling and the triathlon. In: Practical Sports Nutrition. Human Kinetics, Australia, 2007:71–107.
2. Armstrong L, Jenkins S. It’s Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life. Putnam Publishing Group, New Jersey, 2000.
Topics:
General, Research, Muscle, Dieting, Endurance, Nutrition, Nutrition advice, Performance, Sports nutrition, Training
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