"Eat back half your exercise calories"
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I honestly would only eat back if you are at maintenance or during a bulk, but that is just me.
But how did you come up with your calorie allowance? MFP numbers, or a TDEE calculation? You really need to specify that before making a blanket statement like that, as the two situations are totally, completely different.5 -
jammer1963 wrote: »CattOfTheGarage wrote: »I see a lot of people saying "eat back half your exercise calories" or "eat back a third" or whatever. Am I the only one who thinks this is a super complicated way to approach things? Seems like it would involve a lot of mental arithmetic at the moment of deciding whether to eat something or not.
If I'm worried mfp might overestimate exercise calories, I just enter fewer minutes - so maybe I walked for 20min but I'll only enter 15. That way I can still just look at the calories remaining and know whether to eat the thing or not. No on the spot mathematical gymnastics.
Anyone else? When you say "I only eat half my exercise calories", what do you mean? Do you enter half the minutes or are you always juggling the numbers from your latest workout in your head? I feel it could be helpful to get this clarified, especially for beginners.
And a related question: what is your basis for thinking mfp overestimates burn (as opposed to users overestimating intensity or length of workout)? I've seen a lot of people say it but I don't know what they're basing it on. Fitbit readings? Experience with slower than expected loss? Personally if I under-log exercise it's because I reckon I overestimate intensity or time - my own experience has not pointed to any issue with mfp's numbers for exercise. But then I eyeball my food, so I can't use my results as scientific evidence of anything.
I used to read comments about eating back the calories that were burned during exercise and I used to think everyone was crazy. To me, the point of busting my *kitten* working out and exercising was help accelerate my weight loss. Then one day, after reading about eating back calories for the 10th time, it finally clicked.
When you diet, you are already at a calorie deficit. If you typically ate 2000 calories a day, and you want to lose a pound a week, you cut your caloric intake to 1500 a day. Great, you are going to lose weight... but now you start exercising and burning more calories..lets say 200 from moderate bike riding... now instead of the planned 1500 a day, your at 1300. So if you want to maintain your 1500, you have to eat back the 200 you burned. If you set your calorie intake low in the first place to lose as much weight as possible without starving yourself....now with the added calorie deficit from exercising, your body could go into starvation mode and you won't lose any weight at all.
Anyways, that's my take on "eating back calories". I don't always follow it, but I do sometimes... especially when I want a treat lol
Good luck with your weight loss!
Unless you are eating a bowl of food once every five days in some third-world country, the odds of you triggering “adaptive thermogenesis” in your average diet are near impossible. It's a myth in terms of normal dieting.4 -
Wynterbourne wrote: »jammer1963 wrote: »CattOfTheGarage wrote: »I see a lot of people saying "eat back half your exercise calories" or "eat back a third" or whatever. Am I the only one who thinks this is a super complicated way to approach things? Seems like it would involve a lot of mental arithmetic at the moment of deciding whether to eat something or not.
If I'm worried mfp might overestimate exercise calories, I just enter fewer minutes - so maybe I walked for 20min but I'll only enter 15. That way I can still just look at the calories remaining and know whether to eat the thing or not. No on the spot mathematical gymnastics.
Anyone else? When you say "I only eat half my exercise calories", what do you mean? Do you enter half the minutes or are you always juggling the numbers from your latest workout in your head? I feel it could be helpful to get this clarified, especially for beginners.
And a related question: what is your basis for thinking mfp overestimates burn (as opposed to users overestimating intensity or length of workout)? I've seen a lot of people say it but I don't know what they're basing it on. Fitbit readings? Experience with slower than expected loss? Personally if I under-log exercise it's because I reckon I overestimate intensity or time - my own experience has not pointed to any issue with mfp's numbers for exercise. But then I eyeball my food, so I can't use my results as scientific evidence of anything.
I used to read comments about eating back the calories that were burned during exercise and I used to think everyone was crazy. To me, the point of busting my *kitten* working out and exercising was help accelerate my weight loss. Then one day, after reading about eating back calories for the 10th time, it finally clicked.
When you diet, you are already at a calorie deficit. If you typically ate 2000 calories a day, and you want to lose a pound a week, you cut your caloric intake to 1500 a day. Great, you are going to lose weight... but now you start exercising and burning more calories..lets say 200 from moderate bike riding... now instead of the planned 1500 a day, your at 1300. So if you want to maintain your 1500, you have to eat back the 200 you burned. If you set your calorie intake low in the first place to lose as much weight as possible without starving yourself....now with the added calorie deficit from exercising, your body could go into starvation mode and you won't lose any weight at all.
Anyways, that's my take on "eating back calories". I don't always follow it, but I do sometimes... especially when I want a treat lol
Good luck with your weight loss!
Unless you are eating a bowl of food once every five days in some third-world country, the odds of you triggering “adaptive thermogenesis” in your average diet are near impossible. It's a myth in terms of normal dieting.
Near impossible?
Hardly.
Not difficult at all if you are aware of how many start a new diet & exercise regimen.
Perhaps you need more current research. Though some rather old studies showed it happening too.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/heybales/view/reduced-metabolism-tdee-beyond-expected-from-weight-loss-616251
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1077746-starvation-mode-adaptive-thermogenesis-and-weight-loss3 -
Koldnomore wrote: »I think the oddest thing I have seen logged is meal prep.
I used to do monthly cooking. Cook all my meals for the month over a weekend. I have also cooked professionally and when you are chopping & slicing for 6-8 hours at that speed it's not 'incidental' I think I logged half of it. For a 'normal' day I would say no, but if they were doing what I used to do I would say they were fine to log it.KaylahDemi wrote: »When I used MFP religiously and logged every drink, meal, or exercise for EXACTLY that many minutes (no rounding), I found I lost exactly as much weight as it told me I would. I was thrilled! I am unsure how accurate calories burned from exercise are accurate for all MFP users, but mine certainly appear to be.
Mine are nowhere near right. This is my second time going through this. The first time I picked sedentary, logged all my exercise and ate most of it back. That worked great for about 60 lbs, then I switched to TDEE and that worked for another 10 or so, then nothing I could find worked. Since I am now 60 lbs lighter than I was the first time and doing WAY LESS activity I went with lightly active with 1 workout / week and I normally don't eat back the calories. On occasion if I want a treat or something I will but I found that eating them all back does not work for me when I get down to a certain weight. I eat @1200-1500 calories in total and it's currently working. When it stops I will re-*kitten* again.CattOfTheGarage wrote: »@DebSozo I will be in exactly the same boat when I get closer to my goal, and I know I will need to increase my activity and make it a regular part of my life as I do not plan to eat 1200 calories a day for the rest of my life!
That would be horrible!
There is no way around this, you age, your metabolism slows, you don't weight much - you DON'T NEED to eat as much food. If I am lucky, I will have built up enough muscle mass that I 'might' be able to go up to 1300 but in the general population I don't see many old ladies (like over 60) who are eating much more. If you're short, you're going to eat even less.
I can agree with lighter = less food needed, but I'm not so sure about the implications of 'older', if muscle & activity level are good. If you run the calculators, they assume only a small number of calories less per year older, and they assume the muscle loss/activity slowdown, it seems to me.
I don't know about "many old ladies", but at 5'5", 60 y/o, I've been maintaining at around 2100 calories (net, not gross) for 4 months or so now at 120 pounds plus or minus 3. I'm not stupid enough to expect that to last forever, but since most of the calculator estimates give me around 1500-1600 for sedentary (which I am, outside of intentional exercise I eat back separately), the 2100-ish is pretty astonishing IMO.
Can't tell you my TDEE, I purely do NEAT because my exercise is unpredictable/uneven. And yes, it's only 4-5 months, but don't sagely assume I'm creeping up in weight without realizing it. I'm still hitting new low weights periodically, and adjusting upward by small increments. Most recent new low was this past week.
Obligatory comment on topic for thread: I've always eaten back all of my exercise calories - after estimating them carefully - and lost like a house afire. For me, MFP is usually fairly close to HRM, in cases where HRM is a rational tool, and MFP has reasonably effort-graded entries.
And adaptive thermogenesis - as heybales pointed out, with references - is a very real risk under conditions I see people set up often here on MFP, though it may not work exactly the way most people think.2 -
@AnnPT77 seems like you might be a bit of an outlier!
In my case, the NEAT figure mfp gives me leads to reliable weight loss using their deficit, with reasonable tracking and eating back exercise, which means at my goal weight I will have a NEAT around 1200. But why that means I should accept that and eat like a mouse, I don't know. If I increase activity, I'll be able to eat more, whatever way you slice it, and at any age.1 -
CattOfTheGarage wrote: »@AnnPT77 seems like you might be a bit of an outlier!
In my case, the NEAT figure mfp gives me leads to reliable weight loss using their deficit, with reasonable tracking and eating back exercise, which means at my goal weight I will have a NEAT around 1200. But why that means I should accept that and eat like a mouse, I don't know. If I increase activity, I'll be able to eat more, whatever way you slice it, and at any age.
You are saying MFP predicts your sedentary maintenance calories to be 1200? I think you need to rerun those numbers. I've never seen anyone with a maintenance goal that low. That would mean in order to lose 1 lb/week you'd be eating 700 cals/day.
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NorthCascades wrote: »Ready2Rock206 wrote: »CattOfTheGarage wrote: »But if you've done several bits of exercise during the day and logged them in full, you're going to have to remember how many calories to leave uneaten at the end of the day. So if I burned 100cal walking and 50 gardening and 150 at the gym and 75 cycling to the shops, and I log all that in full but only intend to eat half of them back, I have to be carrying in my head that I have to leave my calories in the green by 183 at the end of the day, and then if I log another 50 calories I have to remember to leave 208 uneaten now, and it just seems very complicated to me.
Two things - 1) I'm not logging every single time I get out of my chair during the day and 2) so when you log it and it says 100 calories -just change it to 50 right there. Nothing to remember later.
Right. I've read elsewhere that we shouldn't eat back any calories from activities that aren't an exertion because they are pretty much daily normal activities-based. That's why I was getting confused why someone adds gardening or gentle walks. Those don't burn too many calories above the regular given activity level.
Now, for instance, jogging, heavy cycling or exercise that raises the heart rate and causes one to get out of breath, on the other hand, my doctor said counts as "exercise". I've also read not to include weight lifting for eating back exercise calories. But one hears a lot of conflicting stories in MFP.
For the record (I say this because more data is usually better than less): I burned 1,306 kCal on my bike on Saturday without breaking a sweat. It took 3:20 (hours:minutes), covered 34 miles mostly on dirt roads, and involved 2,021 feet of vertical. That's only about 400 kCal per hour and only 60 feet of rise per mile. But it was a pretty good number of calories (and measured with 95+ % accuracy), there are people who eat less than that in a day. You can put a lot of energy into a mild to moderate level of exertion, as long as you spent some time doing it.
Then you are in super great shape. I would consider that above and beyond a casual walk down the street or doing the dishes.
I always take the baby for long walks (for 2-4 hours or so) and counted the calories and my weight loss has been exactly on track at 2 pounds a week up until recently when I decided to slow down...I think that it's just time. I don't often break a sweat but I'll agree with the previous poster, it's amazing how it adds up if you keep at it for a while.
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CattOfTheGarage wrote: »@AnnPT77 seems like you might be a bit of an outlier!
In my case, the NEAT figure mfp gives me leads to reliable weight loss using their deficit, with reasonable tracking and eating back exercise, which means at my goal weight I will have a NEAT around 1200. But why that means I should accept that and eat like a mouse, I don't know. If I increase activity, I'll be able to eat more, whatever way you slice it, and at any age.
Yes, to my astonishment, I seem to be. But that suggests that the quote I responded to, "There is no way around this, you age, your metabolism slows, you don't weight much - you DON'T NEED to eat as much food." is not a universal.
I only wish I knew why my NEAT is so much higher than expected. I could speculate, but that's all it would be. (I asked my friends if I'm a fidget-y person; so far, everyone I asked said "no".)
There seems to be some anecdotal evidence that reverse dieting (slow increase of daily calories), in a context of regular quite-vigorous exercise, might be helpful for some, but I haven't been able to find supporting research. Other possibilities may be more muscle, higher percentage of protein in one's eating, more whole/raw food - all anecdote, no substantial research I've found for any of it (and not all true for me BTW).
And yeah, 1200 NEAT sounds really low unless you're very petite - which you may be. That would be about my estimated BMR at 5'5"/ 120lbs/60 y/o/sedentary. I have to use a weight below 80 pounds to get a NEAT that low.0 -
Maybe I need to re-run the numbers. I'm sure I calculated that before but maybe I did it wrong.0
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The "eat back half your exercise calories" seems to have become frequent, and is obviously usually coming from people looking to lose weight and place any error on the side of weight loss.
I personally think that taking that approach is potentially just as harmful as any other method of guessing. If someone wanted to nail it down they could calculate TDEE based on logging and weight trends. Or better yet, if they want to use the MFP NEAT method, just spend a little time figuring out more reasonable calorie burns for the activities they are involved in.
If I only ate back half my exercise calories, I'd have days of very large deficits even when I'm at maintenance. Not a good idea for most.4 -
robertw486 wrote: »The "eat back half your exercise calories" seems to have become frequent, and is obviously usually coming from people looking to lose weight and place any error on the side of weight loss.
I personally think that taking that approach is potentially just as harmful as any other method of guessing. If someone wanted to nail it down they could calculate TDEE based on logging and weight trends. Or better yet, if they want to use the MFP NEAT method, just spend a little time figuring out more reasonable calorie burns for the activities they are involved in.
If I only ate back half my exercise calories, I'd have days of very large deficits even when I'm at maintenance. Not a good idea for most.
A big, serious +1. Excessive deficit is not healthy.1 -
Wynterbourne wrote: »Unless you are eating a bowl of food once every five days in some third-world country, the odds of you triggering “adaptive thermogenesis” in your average diet are near impossible. It's a myth in terms of normal dieting.
Nearly EVERYONE who restricts calories either through diet or through a combination of diet and exercise WILL experience adaptive thermogenesis. The only questions are the percentage of adaptation they will experience and how to minimize it, and the percentage of adaptation they will recover from, as well as the conditions and time frame for that recovery to take place.
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Wynterbourne wrote: »Unless you are eating a bowl of food once every five days in some third-world country, the odds of you triggering “adaptive thermogenesis” in your average diet are near impossible. It's a myth in terms of normal dieting.
Nearly EVERYONE who restricts calories either through diet or through a combination of diet and exercise WILL experience adaptive thermogenesis. The only questions are the percentage of adaptation they will experience and how to minimize it, and the percentage of adaptation they will recover from, as well as the conditions and time frame for that recovery to take place.
I'm talking about when everyone throws around, "You're eating 1199 calories a day??? No, you're going to go into... dun dun dun... Starvation Mode." That gets thrown out ridiculously often when it is just not the case. I wasn't referring to the legitimate scientific 'adaptive thermogenesis.' And I stand by my statement that the average dieter is not going to go into "starvation mode."3 -
Wynterbourne wrote: »Wynterbourne wrote: »Unless you are eating a bowl of food once every five days in some third-world country, the odds of you triggering “adaptive thermogenesis” in your average diet are near impossible. It's a myth in terms of normal dieting.
Nearly EVERYONE who restricts calories either through diet or through a combination of diet and exercise WILL experience adaptive thermogenesis. The only questions are the percentage of adaptation they will experience and how to minimize it, and the percentage of adaptation they will recover from, as well as the conditions and time frame for that recovery to take place.
I'm talking about when everyone throws around, "You're eating 1199 calories a day??? No, you're going to go into... dun dun dun... Starvation Mode." That gets thrown out ridiculously often when it is just not the case. I wasn't referring to the legitimate scientific 'adaptive thermogenesis.' And I stand by my statement that the average dieter is not going to go into "starvation mode."
I'm hearing ya. I've seen posts on here from 300lb folks eating 2000+ calories, or even 1500 fearing they are in starvation mode and they won't lose a pound because of it. They fear it in the sense that they think their body will hold on to every ounce of fat because they are starving themselves.2 -
Yes, the myths that go with actual starvation being applied to AT don't help, neither do the myths with no basis at all help.
It's just as bad as saying "I'm sure you aren't losing weight because you are turning fat into muscle" - with no knowledge of what is being done for workouts, and is likely far from the reason.
But you also can't throw out the baby in the bathwater because there is mis-application and disbelief.
There are many people on MFP that even with potentially inaccurate food logging (not dishonest, but measuring instead of weighing inaccuracies) are easily hitting 50% deficit or more at first.
To think that won't have negative impacts to their weight/fat loss & maintenance - even if not the myth reasons handed out, but real reasons - would be missing a potential issue with their program.
But more info is indeed needed to figure that out as potential reason - the end result isn't enough to confirm the effect.2 -
This has been an interesting read. I thought I was supposed to eat my "exercise Calories". I will reduce that by half and see if there are any changes as I'm not losing any weight at all. I've been really good at logging food and just using the estimates for exercises given.0
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@heybales can you explain "50% deficit"? Do you mean someone who has a deficit that is half of their TDEE, so they're eating half as much as they need?0
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headtotoetherapy wrote: »This has been an interesting read. I thought I was supposed to eat my "exercise Calories". I will reduce that by half and see if there are any changes as I'm not losing any weight at all. I've been really good at logging food and just using the estimates for exercises given.
If you are confident that your food logging is accurate (which would mean using a scale to weigh the foods) then this would indicate that your activity level settings and/or exercise calories have been over estimated. Sometimes some homework on the exercise types will help you find better numbers, but in any case you are taking a good approach.
Here is a great tool by @EvgeniZyntx that can help you find your longer trends in TDEE and adjust as needed.
community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1289716/what-is-your-mfp-report-card-and-score#latestCattOfTheGarage wrote: »@heybales can you explain "50% deficit"? Do you mean someone who has a deficit that is half of their TDEE, so they're eating half as much as they need?
I won't speak for @heybales but I think you have it correct. I see it as well, people that are in such a hurry to lose weight that everything they do pushes them towards losing it faster. Long term rapid weight loss isn't a good thing, and can have negative consequences in regards to metabolic changes.
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I like to go on half-day and all-day bike rides. If I didn't up my calories on those days, I would literally die. I know, I tried it and I died. (I got better.)
Yuk yuks aside, and at the risk of stepping on toes, my feeling is that if you're *capable* of not eating any exercise calories back, then you're not actually exercising that hard. Which is fine; any and all exercise is good. But if you want to say, work towards competing in a triathlon or some other high-endurance activity, you had better start seeing food as fuel if you don't want to crash and burn.
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