The short answer is:
Yes you fueled well. Create the calorie deficit outside of training by consuming in moderation farther from training times. Generally using a moderately-high protein, high-carb, high-volume-food, lower-fat dietary approach seems to both facilitate fat and weight loss, as well as sustain and enhance performance.
I wrote a book and calculator to help with exactly that, quantitatively, FYI.
I make money off them. Full disclosure.
The The RP Diet for Endurance (ebook) has been added to the Trainer Road Official Recommended Books / Reading Thread, so I suppose it’s okay to share here.
They’ll solve everything for you. Very step by step. I don’t really know where the boundary is here on TR for that sort of discussion so I’m just going to copy-paste a private response I wrote, which was well-received by another user who was already familiar with the company through which I sell the book and calc spreadsheet. (“RP”)
"Awesome. Yeah the RP Endurance Macro Calculator (EMC) is the best option for sure, if you have to pick between the RP App and the Calculator.
"The app has amazingly useful features and is beloved by many, though.
"It can absolutely be used alongside the RP Endurance Macro Calculator (EMC) , or the EMC can be used as a standalone.
"In very brief, with a bit of situational vagueness with regard to the quantitative side of things, here are my steps for dialing in diet as an endurance athlete:
- Figure out total macros for the day. (use RP Endurance Macro Calculator (EMC) or similar calculations)
- Define intra-workout carb needs. Use Table of Intra-workout Carb Needs Per Hour of Training
- Caveat: Add more workout carbs if no solid meal pre-training. Usually 20-70g carbs, added to intra-workout needs, as a pre-workout booster depending on the duration of the first session.
- Calculate remainder of carbs for the day, which will be “healthy carbs.” (just not junk, but sometimes sweet stuff is great too).
- Split relatively evenly about 60-80% of those healthy carbs pre- and post-workout. Allocate more heavily to “inter-workout” meals (between workouts), especially if there is only one meal between 2 workouts.
- Taper the rest of the carbs away from the training times.
"Protein allocation goal: spread throughout the day, and don’t interfere with training digestion.
"Fat allocation goal: spread throughout the day, but not inter-training or during training ever. Slows digestion.
"Veggie allocation goal: spread throughout the day, but occasionally not inter-training if I think digestion rates may be substantially slowed.
"The app is AMAZING for optimizing and streamlining if all you do is lift, or short-endurance stuff only, or just generally want body composition change. It’s much less optimal for endurance workout fueling and meeting macronutrient needs of endurance athletes. The best of both worlds is to use both the app + EMC, for sure. If picking one thing: EMC is your go-to.
"If your endurance activity ALL falls under ~75min per session, AND you train less than about 8 hr per week, then the app alone will work quite well.
“If you don’t need/desire the app for the meal-by-meal optimization, tracking, logistics side of things, then the EMC can be used very well as laid out above.”