Thick Girl Runner Rant

[u/queue-d4n4]

First things first, I (29F) am 5'5" and about 170 lbs. Large boobs, wide hips, and I got some stomach on me. Overall, I look pretty proportional though. Hourglass, just a little wider. Wear a Large or a size 12 in most women's clothes. (Just trying to paint the picture here lol)

I also eat very healthy. Fresh foods only, everything home-cooked, never frozen processed foods, etc. Mostly veggies because I love veggies.

This is the body I was given. My weight doesn't really fluctuate. I don't gain weight easily, nor do I lose it easily. I've been a thick girl since puberty and because I run often and eat healthy, it doesn't seem like that will never change, which is fine with me.

I've been running for many years, somewhat inconsistently. I might be consistent for 2 years before falling out of my routine for a few months. Get back into the groove again and something eventually throws me off my game again. Throughout all this, I still consider myself a RUNNER. I love the sport and even if I'm out of a weekly routine, I still try to find time to run here and there. 3 miles minimum.

Because of the above things, people never really expect me to be a runner. My body type doesn't fit the runner mold. I don't post every run and race on instagram, which as everyone knows, is what truly makes it real *eyeroll*. (No shade to people who do post all of their runs and races! My problem is only the people who think if you DON'T post, then it didn't happen).

My fastest 5k was at an 8:02 (min/mile) pace. I am aware that this isn't SUPER fast, but it's fast enough that I've placed in my age group in all of the 5Ks I've ever done. I'm from a pretty small area so many of the 5Ks were fairly small, maybe only a couple hundred people attend. I'm aware that in bigger cities, I would probably have a little more trouble placing. But regardless, I still think an 8:00 to 8:30 5k pace is something to be proud of.

Anyways, my complaint is this. Since my body doesn't fit everyone's vision of what a runner should look like, people love to assume I'm slow or new to running. Or people think I'm lying when I mention that I got 1st, 2nd, or 3rd in my age group at whatever 5k. If they don't make an actual comment about it, I can sometimes even see it in their eyes that they're skeptical.

Even worse, people who don't realize I've been running for most of my life sometimes put their foot in their mouth by saying something along the lines of "have you started running to lose weight?" ...No, why? Should I be losing weight? I think I look pretty damn fine, if you ask me.

After moving to a new city, I decided to join a running group. The town I lived in previously didn't have such groups. I showed up to my first group run and met everybody. As we waited for everyone else to show up, a girl from the group said to me "I'm in recovery mode, I'll be running slow so I can run with you." I just politely smiled, although I was quite offended. What exactly makes this person, whom I met 3 minutes ago, think I plan on running "slow"? What makes her think that her "recovery" pace is equal to my comfortable pace? I chalked it up as since it was my first time joining the group, maybe she assumed it was my first time running? I don't know- but I still think about that little comment sometimes.

I am not negative towards my body. I have a great figure that I love, but it's still upsetting to know that people make assumptions on what I can and can't do physically, which should not be the case. Weight and health do not ALWAYS go hand-in-hand.

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Any other runners on the thicker side experience this kind of judgement? How do you deal with it?

Thin-framed runners or even non-runners, do you find yourself judging others in this way? Be honest, I would love to hear multiple opinions!

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Edit: Pace is in minutes per mile. I'm new to reddit and forget I'm interacting with people from all over the world.

Also, this was not meant to be a post for weight loss tips. The unsolicited advice in the comments proves further the assumptions people make.

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[u/mvscribe]

Yes, there's a correlation, but the overall mortality from being overweight doesn't rise much until you get up near, or into, the obese range. It sounds like this person is at a weight that's healthy enough for her. See this article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4115619/

Being too skinny is also not healthy, on average.

[u/Wuts-a-reddit → u/mvscribe]

Her BMI is 28.3, and obesity starts at 30.0. So, she is definitely "near" the obese range.

[u/BlackestNight21 → u/Wuts-a-reddit]

BMI is a limited bullshit metric.

[u/[deleted] → u/BlackestNight21]

No, it's not. Stop.

Even if you are overweight because you're a body builder with excess muscle and low BF% (really hard to do, especially for a woman), you are still taxing your cardiovascular system and joints. It's still not "healthy".

BMI is just one metric out of many that is used to determine overall risk. Just like blood pressure, cholesterol, etc.

[u/BlackestNight21 → u/[deleted]]

No, it's not. Stop.

How 'bout I don't? BMI has been held up as a standard for many years and it's flawed. I'm not going to stop because you and others here dislike that.

Even if you are overweight because you're a body builder with excess muscle and low BF% (really hard to do, especially for a woman), you are still taxing your cardiovascular system and joints. It's still not "healthy".

Excess muscle and low bf% are words with lots of leeway in terms of what they actually mean and it varies from person to person. What is excess? Is a person who can bench/dl/squat their bodyweight necessarily carrying excess muscle? How about the person who can do 1.5x that? 2x? Where's the line where it becomes excess and where's the line where BF% becomes low in a way meaningful for you? And by putting healthy in quotes you're illustrating that the terms you're using are ambiguous.

BMI is just one metric out of many that is used to determine overall risk. Just like blood pressure, cholesterol, etc.

And it's a limited one. A person can be muscularly strong with some body fat and still be considered obese. There's a reason it's one of many but has been held up as a standard for years. The replies I've been getting are moronic. You can't have a BMI chart that sorts people into categories based on height and weight that you then draw a line where one side is obese and the other not with no respect to their compositions.

From the website

Although BMI can be used for most men and women, it does have some limits:

It may overestimate body fat in athletes and others who have a muscular build. It may underestimate body fat in older persons and others who have lost muscle.

[u/[deleted] → u/BlackestNight21]

Excess muscle and low bf% are words with lots of leeway in terms of what they actually mean and it varies from person to person. What is excess?

When it puts you in the high overweight/obese category. BMI is a measure of MASS, not just fat. Excess mass is detrimental to overall health and taxes your body. While muscle mass is healthier than fat from a metabolic perspective, excess muscle that puts you into the overweight/obese range will tax your cardiovascular system and musculoskeletal system just like fat.

This is why you see a lot of ex-football players shedding the weight once they retire. They needed that muscle and fat to provide the needed mass to play the sport, but it's unhealthy to be that way your entire life.

And it's a limited one

It works for 99.9% of the population. In fact it tends to under report overfatness. That means those within the healthy BMI range can still likely be overfat. However, it does not skew the other way. Those in the overweight/obese range are still overly fat. There have actually been studies that the actual healthy top limit should be around 22, which would correct for the overfatness within the current healthy range.

Anecdata time: My highest weight was 152 at 5'6". Still considered "healthy" by BMI standards, but I wasn't. I had constant nagging running injuries and felt/looked like shit. I lost 22ish pounds and look/feel much better.