Eating your calories earned

kerrbearxxx

just wonder what others think on this?

Is it better to exercise and not "eat back" the calories earned straight away as in store up for a treat day at weekend or not use these earned cals at all?
Tks

tdatsenko

I usually don't, most of them tend to be way overestimated.

Charisma_Black

I wouldn't. I work my treat in as best I can with my daily intake. There is a good post on the forums with regards to this must try to find and link you it

Ohhim

I'll usually eat about 1/2 of them - mostly because the earned numbers are a bit sketchy if they don't come from my GPS/heart rate monitor, and because after taking off a reasonable amount of weight, my base metabolic burn rate started sucking.

sijomial

I eat mine otherwise I wouldn't be able to hit my fitness and weight goals.
Don't always eat them all on the same day though.

Jruzer

I eat 'em all, but my goals are not purely weight loss. My workouts suffer if I don't eat enough.

I'm also careful to get proper estimates of calorie burn and subtract 2 kcal per minute to account for BMR during exercise.

jacksonpt

Depends. Ultimately you want a reasonably healthy calorie intake on a day-to-day basis, that is suited to your goals. How you come to that number is largely up to you.

kerrbearxxx

Tks

Sephixteeo

I'm eating most of mine back. Still trying to find a sweet spot on how much to try to burn to keep a 250-ish calorie deficit a day. To me the burns on MFP seem pretty close to my HRM, but I don't think that is a net burn after factoring in your BMR rate. Hence, my window. I could be incorrect, though.

mwyvr

kerrbearxxx wrote: »

Is it better to exercise and not "eat back" the calories earned straight away as in store up for a treat day at weekend or not use these earned cals at all?

It "depends". Let's assume you log all your intake calories perfectly.

For sake of example I'm going to use two extremes here using easy walking vs a solid run for an hour. You can probably imagine other examples with your own preferred exercise in mind:

• If your exercise calories are as a result of gentle walking and you are racking up only a couple hundred calories burned, I'd be inclined not to replace them.
• If your exercise calories are as a result of a solid 10km run in ~60 minutes, you'll want to eat almost every one of them back. You'll want to eat some balanced foods to give your muscles the nutrients needed to recover and rebuild.

Most of the exercise I log is of the latter variety. I personally choose not to eat back 10-20% of them to "pay" for any logging mistakes I might make. If it is a shorter run/workout totalling under 500 calorie burn, I'm not that fastidious about eating back. Harder/longer workouts > 1,000 calories: I eat back a majority because my body needs that fuel to rebuild/repair any damage I've done so I can recover quickly and do it all over again tomorrow.

I'm lucky in that my running watch gives a very good accounting of calorie burn for that form of exercise. Estimates by other websites and even MFP tend to be quite a bit higher; I always log the lower, more conservative, calorie burn.

Losing 1kg (2.2 pounds) a week consistently - it's working for me.

kerrbearxxx

Thanks for your well thought out response

Lukyanenko

Depends if I'm hungry or not.

barryplumber

I'll eat some of im real hungry but try not to. Each person is different you can try say 50% and if you still lose your weight great if not cut down on what you eat back

cwolfman13

fueling your fitness is important to recovery and performance.

burnsgene42

I don't eat all mine back , maybe a third of them. There's no way I can eat them back the same day . The next day I find myself trying to stay under my daily goal.
I wish there was an easy way to keep a weekly average without all the math.
I think if I ate them all back I would gain weight. Either overestimating the exercise or underestimating the food calories. Long as the weight Is dropping and I'm not getting run down I'm satisfied.

kerrbearxxx

Tks for reply

kmab1985

I only started MFP last Monday and have eaten all my calories I earn through exercise. I log my Bodypump, Spinning and Insanity workouts but dont log my weight training on a Monday and Friday....I lost a pound on my first week which I was pleased about....I definately try and eat more on the days I work out because I genuinely do feel more hungry but I try and eat the good stuff i.e. today is bodypump day so this morning I had porridge and a homemade smoothie which kale, banana and kiwi just to keep my energy up!

SezxyStef

MFP is set using NEAT (non exercise activity thermogenisis) and it's designed for you to eat back at least some of your exercise calories. Most recommend 50-75% of them.

Why? to fuel your next workout.

I use this analogy often....your car has a tank of gas...you drive it far enough away from home to burn 3/4 of the tank...you don't put in just 1/4 of a tank of gas to get home you will run out and not make it home...exercise calories are like that...you will eventually run out of gas and not be able to do what you want....

kerrbearxxx

Wow that's a cool analogy

burnsgene42

SezxyStef wrote: »

MFP is set using NEAT (non exercise activity thermogenisis) and it's designed for you to eat back at least some of your exercise calories. Most recommend 50-75% of them.

Why? to fuel your next workout.

I use this analogy often....your car has a tank of gas...you drive it far enough away from home to burn 3/4 of the tank...you don't put in just 1/4 of a tank of gas to get home you will run out and not make it home...exercise calories are like that...you will eventually run out of gas and not be able to do what you want....

I agree, at least in theory. Last time I ask this question , someone suggested that we had it all backwards , trying to eat back lost calories. He suggested we should tailor our diet today ,eating enough so tomorrow's workout isn't on an "empty tank".

Probably good advise , I'm just not that good at planning anything (((;

cwolfman13

burnsgene42 wrote: »

SezxyStef wrote: »

MFP is set using NEAT (non exercise activity thermogenisis) and it's designed for you to eat back at least some of your exercise calories. Most recommend 50-75% of them.

Why? to fuel your next workout.

I use this analogy often....your car has a tank of gas...you drive it far enough away from home to burn 3/4 of the tank...you don't put in just 1/4 of a tank of gas to get home you will run out and not make it home...exercise calories are like that...you will eventually run out of gas and not be able to do what you want....

I agree, at least in theory. Last time I ask this question , someone suggested that we had it all backwards , trying to eat back lost calories. He suggested we should tailor our diet today ,eating enough so tomorrow's workout isn't on an "empty tank".

Probably good advise , I'm just not that good at planning anything (((;

it's not just about working out on an empty tank. it's about fueling exercise activity in general...eating appropriately for you activity not only provides the fuel for your workout, but provides for energy and nutrients for recovery after the fact. That is what part of eating back calories is supposed to teach people...working out like a crazy person and then not eating to support that is going to ultimately result in recovery issues, injury, fatigue, etc.