Best way to work out my daily calorie goal now I'm at my target weight

stephenmakin1
stephenmakin1 Posts: 17 Member
in Goal: Maintaining Weight
Hi all

I finally got down to my target weight (w00t) - and I'm trying to work out my calories goal to maintain. Just a starting point, then I'll see how I do for me, and adjust up.

I've currently set MFP at 1940 for a sedentary man at my weight, and then I add on the calories I burn cycling to work or running (about 800) a day as I cycle 20 miles. That seems an awful lot. Most days I just seem to eat about 1700 calories out of habit, as that's what I was eating before. This week I lost another 1kg doing this.

I've managed to gain quite a lot of muscle with all this cycling and I don't really want to loose it - it makes me faster, I haven't really got any spare fat to loose so I don't want to loose more weight. I may start trying to gain some in the upper half of my body as I'm a bit pear shaped at the minute.

Is there an good TDEE equation I could use. I saw one where you worked out the number of hours a day you spent doing moderate, easy and intense activity, but I can't find it again.

Replies

  • JJ250
    JJ250 Posts: 23 Member
    http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

    This should work pretty well. It has the level of activity which most I've found don't have. If you find yourself gaining or losing weight just don't be afraid to add or subtract 100 calories to see how many you need to maintain. Hope this helps.
  • SideSteel
    SideSteel Posts: 11,068 Member
    I wouldn't use a TDEE equation at this point because you have logging/tracking data. I would just start adding in calories and monitor results and adjust calories up or down based on that.

    So for example you could incrementally increase calorie intake, wait a week, repeat until you start gaining weight and then back down slightly from that point using your data.

    Example would be to add 200-300kcals/day for 1 week, monitor bodyweight. If you still show a loss, add another 100-200kcals. If you remain weight stable you could stay there for another week or so and then gently nudge calories upwards again.

  • Go_Mizzou99
    Go_Mizzou99 Posts: 2,628 Member
    SideSteel wrote: »
    I wouldn't use a TDEE equation at this point because you have logging/tracking data. I would just start adding in calories and monitor results and adjust calories up or down based on that.

    So for example you could incrementally increase calorie intake, wait a week, repeat until you start gaining weight and then back down slightly from that point using your data.

    Example would be to add 200-300kcals/day for 1 week, monitor bodyweight. If you still show a loss, add another 100-200kcals. If you remain weight stable you could stay there for another week or so and then gently nudge calories upwards again.

    +1

    This method worked well for me.

    Congrats on getting to maintenance! It is awesome.

  • daynerz
    daynerz Posts: 227 Member
    JJ250 wrote: »
    http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

    This should work pretty well. It has the level of activity which most I've found don't have. If you find yourself gaining or losing weight just don't be afraid to add or subtract 100 calories to see how many you need to maintain. Hope this helps.

    Decent page, thanks very much for posting this :#
  • stephenmakin1
    stephenmakin1 Posts: 17 Member
    Great

    Thanks.

    To loose I've been eating at 1200 calories a day + my exercise which works out at 2100 + on most work days and 1200 on my rest day. I mostly eat my calories from exercise but sometimes don't.

    I calculate my exercise calories using 'map my ride' or my runner's GPS NOT the MFP calculator which is a bit weird.

    I wonder if it's worth carrying on like this - most people who maintain seem to just work to their TDEE rather than adding on exercise calories.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
    daynerz wrote: »
    JJ250 wrote: »
    http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

    This should work pretty well. It has the level of activity which most I've found don't have. If you find yourself gaining or losing weight just don't be afraid to add or subtract 100 calories to see how many you need to maintain. Hope this helps.

    Decent page, thanks very much for posting this :#


    Excellent link, thanks for posting, informative and useful ☺

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