Can marathons really make you fat?

ON NEW Year’s day, I started training for the London Marathon and have since become your archetypal running bore, reeling of statistics about my state of body and mind to anyone who will listen. Come race day, on April 17, I will have run for 107 consecutive days, totting up an average 45 miles a week and regularly clocking 15 miles or more in a single hit. The more running I’ve been doing, the more virtuous my lifestyle has become. My alcohol intake has been negligible on account of the fact I am too knackered to socialize and I have given up croissants and cakes. Yet despite the monumental physical effort and the accompanying dietary straight jacket it entails, there is one factor of my training that has confounded me: I have yet to lose a single, solitary pound. Surely, pounding the streets in preparation for the ultimate test of human endurance should guarantee the pounds melt away? But John Brewer, professor of sport at the University of Bedfordshire, who is running his 13th marathon in London, says too many runners wrongly assume weight will drop off once they start training. “In reality, it’s not that easy,” he says. “To lose 1kg in body fat, you need to burn about 8,000 calories more than you consume. Most people burn about 100 calories per mile, so that's around 80 miles of running just to lose one kilo in weight, even if you don't eat any extra food.” Read more at The Times

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Get Fit For The Games
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