Anyone else logging big miles while on reta?

octopusthorpe

octopusthorpe

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Hey everyone — calling on the high-mileage crowd for some input.

Background on me: I hike long distances most weekends, typically somewhere in the 25-35 mile range with 2000-2800ft of climbing, and I also train powerlifting 3x/week. Perimenopause gifted me a fair amount of extra "fluff" over the past year, so I got on reta, and honestly it's been a runaway success. My start date was March 25th at 162lb (height 5'10.5"), dosing 1mg/week as two 0.5mg shots, and as of today I'm at 148.

Lifting-wise nothing has really suffered — my numbers look like what I'd see during any ordinary cut. Nearly 4 weeks into reta and my RHR/HRV have barely budged (RHR moved from 46bpm up to 49-51, HRV dropped a few points). I'm eating less, as you'd expect, but the macro breakdown is still decent.

I've pulled off long-distance efforts while cutting before without issues, though I figure the deeper deficit I'm running now compared to a standard cut means hitting the wall sooner is just going to happen. Case in point: yesterday I went out, and with the great weather plus my normal pre-hike fueling I'd have easily cleared 25 miles — instead I stalled at 15, completely drained. Sleep that night was actually okay (score 88, RHR 50).

Writing it all down makes it obvious that a bigger deficit would hit endurance, sure. Mostly I was hoping to find some company among people training similarly so we can all commiserate together 🤣
 
Since I’m only getting going, I don’t have a real basis for comparison yet. That said, my guess is that being in a calorie deficit is going to take some toll on both strength and endurance. I’ve got a backyard Ultra lined up tomorrow, so it’ll be interesting to find out how it plays out. Like I mentioned, though, I’ve only just begun at 0.25 mg of Reta, so I doubt it’ll hit me very hard.
 
Dremy said:

Since I’m only getting going, I don’t have a real basis for comparison yet. That said, my guess is that being in a calorie deficit is going to take some toll on both strength and endurance. I’ve got a backyard Ultra lined up tomorrow, so it’ll be interesting to find out how it plays out. Like I mentioned, though, I’ve only just begun at 0.25 mg of Reta, so I doubt it’ll hit me very hard.
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People who take on backyard ultras never stop amazing me. My own hikes stretch on for hours because the landscape and elevation keep shifting - so watching folks grind out the same loop past 30 miles really drives home how much grit and mental fortitude that takes. A buddy of mine who runs ultras completed a 100 mile backyard ultra last year, and honestly it made me wonder about his mental state. 🤣

Definitely report back on how it turns out!
 
Make sure you carb up the day before and the morning of. You don't want to bonk halfway through and have to limp back to the station with a stomach full of whey and water!
 
birdwhacker said:

Make sure you carb up the day before and the morning of. You don't want to bonk halfway through and have to limp back to the station with a stomach full of whey and water!
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For more than 10 years I've followed a low carb way of eating to manage my epilepsy - my system now burns ketones and fat very efficiently as fuel. Once I was fully fat adapted, I noticed my hiking endurance actually went up. Plenty of folks in this community claim carbs are required for reta to do its job, but that hasn't matched what I've lived. My best ever hiking distance, 45 miles, was completed while fasted. As I mentioned, this seems to come down more to how many calories you take in each day and how you fuel yourself rather than anything to do with reta 🙂
 
Someone who rides bikes here, working out how to keep energy up on longer rides. 25 today, so nothing to write home about. My idea: take a few gels a couple of hours before the ride, because they get absorbed more slowly. What you eat before a hike might work the same way as what you eat before a ride. Stay ahead of it. Gels, honey, that sort of thing.
 
Quick intro since I'm new to Reta and I'd call myself a distance runner.

My schedule is 6 days a week of running, and over the last 6 months my weekly average sat at 50-60 miles. The longer efforts usually land on Saturdays.

Leg problems have been nagging me for the past couple months, so my mileage dropped.

After starting Reta, my RHR has felt elevated in a way that bothers me and triggers some anxiety, though things appear to be settling down and it isn't as pronounced now.

Staying in zone 2 while running is definitely a challenge, but the spikes aren't as big as they were in my first month on Reta. Since I began, no single run has gone past 12 miles - if I've got the energy this weekend, I'd like to get 16 miles done.

My dose right now is 2mg weekly (technically every 6 days, since I aimed for Monday and that's where it landed).

I'm thinking about splitting the dose, because around day 5 I can feel the effects fading, but I'm still looking into it.

So far my experience has been pretty positive.
 
Fusoya said:

Quick intro since I'm new to Reta and I'd call myself a distance runner.

My schedule is 6 days a week of running, and over the last 6 months my weekly average sat at 50-60 miles. The longer efforts usually land on Saturdays.

Leg problems have been nagging me for the past couple months, so my mileage dropped.

After starting Reta, my RHR has felt elevated in a way that bothers me and triggers some anxiety, though things appear to be settling down and it isn't as pronounced now.

Staying in zone 2 while running is definitely a challenge, but the spikes aren't as big as they were in my first month on Reta. Since I began, no single run has gone past 12 miles - if I've got the energy this weekend, I'd like to get 16 miles done.

My dose right now is 2mg weekly (technically every 6 days, since I aimed for Monday and that's where it landed).

I'm thinking about splitting the dose, because around day 5 I can feel the effects fading, but I'm still looking into it.

So far my experience has been pretty positive.
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That more or less matches what I've run into with hikes in the double-digit mileage range, except my RHR has ticked up just a touch across the 7 weeks I've been on reta (1mg, taken as two split doses).

Most of my hiking sits in zone 2-3, climbing pushes me into zone 4-5, and around the 10 mile mark I'm suddenly wrecked - where before I could grind through 25-30 miles before hitting that wall.

On the plus side, my lifting hasn't taken much of a hit - no PRs at the moment, but I'm still able to keep the volume up.

Given that I'm 20lb lighter now and my BF% is down to 16, maybe the hike bonking is just my body asking me to ease off and actually eat like I should 🤣
 
What's your Max HR like, or do you avoid going into the upper zones altogether?

The HRV and RHR shifts have been the same for me too, but my maxHR moved up as well, matching my RHR in proportion.

Most of my riding is MTB, which ends up being either LSS or HIIT depending on if I'm doing a distance ride or a V02 max ride.
 
I have no experience with Reta—Tirz is the only one I have used, and my dose has stayed at 2.5 mg, never higher. At this point I am simply holding steady; my weight has not budged for roughly 6+ months. My weekly routine includes running 40+ and cycling 100+, plus lifting on 3 days. The only effects I have picked up on are a lower HR and quicker times, and so on. That said, I also get my fueling and hydration right and make them a priority. During long runs, for example, I take in 70-90g per hour, and so on.
 
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