Eating back exercise calories- will the exercise burn still count?
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Aaron_K123 wrote: »
I mean I imagine you know the answer to this right. The reasoning is that a lot of the exercise burn estimates are inflated and so rather than trust them and eat back exactly what they say you eat back half to avoid erasing part of your deficit. You err on the side of having a slightly larger deficit than you intended rather than a smaller deficit than you intended. Given that a lot of calorie burn estimates do seem to be a bit inflated I can see the logic there. That said the best thing to do would be to learn from consistant exercise and logging what exactly you are burning in your exercise personally and eat that amount back. That just takes a lot of time and in the meantime might want to eat back most but not all your estimated burn. Makes sense to me to be honest but willing to hear out why thats a bad approach.
That said, personally, in most situations I eat them all back. I tend not to though if they are excessively high. Like a day where my TDEE is 6000 I don't eat 5500 calories to maintain my 500 calorie deficit, I eat more like 4000 calories because for one, hard to believe that TDEE estimate, and two hard to eat 5500 calories. But a day where my TDEE is 3000 because I burned like an estimated 500 calories frome exercise then yeah I eat that all back.
Halving an exercise estimate is just a group-think on here. ("A lie told often enough becomes the truth" - Lenin.)
Actually makes very little sense, why not 33% or 65%?
If someone doesn't get the weight loss expected over an extended period then their food logging or base calorie goal is far more likely to be the issue. There seems a strange, almost Puritan view, that exercise calories are somehow special or different. They aren't, they are just one of many calorie needs of your body. They are also just one of many estimates to get to a desired calorie balance.
OP is using a HRM for cardio - unlikely to be accurate, but highly unlikely to be double.
"Safe" is not a good description of the practice on erring on a bigger calorie deficit by default.
Totally agree your point about consistency. When I used a basic HRM (Polar FT7) for cardio it was out by about 10 - 20%. But consistency in estimates and adjusting my calorie balance based on actual weight loss results gave me the desired (and safe!) rate of loss.
My current way of estimating my cycling energy expenditure underestimates significantly, would be silly to cut those estimates in half.1 -
Aaron_K123 wrote: »
I mean I imagine you know the answer to this right. The reasoning is that a lot of the exercise burn estimates are inflated and so rather than trust them and eat back exactly what they say you eat back half to avoid erasing part of your deficit. You err on the side of having a slightly larger deficit than you intended rather than a smaller deficit than you intended. Given that a lot of calorie burn estimates do seem to be a bit inflated I can see the logic there. That said the best thing to do would be to learn from consistant exercise and logging what exactly you are burning in your exercise personally and eat that amount back. That just takes a lot of time and in the meantime might want to eat back most but not all your estimated burn. Makes sense to me to be honest but willing to hear out why thats a bad approach.
That said, personally, in most situations I eat them all back. I tend not to though if they are excessively high. Like a day where my TDEE is 6000 I don't eat 5500 calories to maintain my 500 calorie deficit, I eat more like 4000 calories because for one, hard to believe that TDEE estimate, and two hard to eat 5500 calories. But a day where my TDEE is 3000 because I burned like an estimated 500 calories frome exercise then yeah I eat that all back.
Halving an exercise estimate is just a group-think on here. ("A lie told often enough becomes the truth" - Lenin.)
Actually makes very little sense, why not 33% or 65%?
If someone doesn't get the weight loss expected over an extended period then their food logging or base calorie goal is far more likely to be the issue. There seems a strange, almost Puritan view, that exercise calories are somehow special or different. They aren't, they are just one of many calorie needs of your body. They are also just one of many estimates to get to a desired calorie balance.
OP is using a HRM for cardio - unlikely to be accurate, but highly unlikely to be double.
"Safe" is not a good description of the practice on erring on a bigger calorie deficit by default.
Totally agree your point about consistency. When I used a basic HRM (Polar FT7) for cardio it was out by about 10 - 20%. But consistency in estimates and adjusting my calorie balance based on actual weight loss results gave me the desired (and safe!) rate of loss.
My current way of estimating my cycling energy expenditure underestimates significantly, would be silly to cut those estimates in half.
Yeah fair enough. Like I said I don't cut mine in half, but I understand the logic there. I get 50% is arbitrary and driven on a fear of calorie surplus mixed with a secret desire to have an even larger deficit. That said I can see people eating 100% of their wrongly estimated exercise calories back, reducing their deficit and becoming frustrated to the point where they stop eating back exercise calories entirely. Eating back half then adjusting upwards if need be makes some sense to me.
My diary is open. My "goal" in terms of net is 1650 but I average more like 2400 because of exercise. If I didn't eat those calories back I would be netting something like 900 calories a day which would be insane.5 -
MFP calorie burn numbers are wildly wrong. I use my Garmin and MFP for running and then Garmin and Map My Ride for bike rides. I cross check with runners world
MFP will give 2700 calories for a run, Garmin around 1300, and runners world about 1000
I would gain weight eating back the exaggerated calorie burn numbers from MFP.
I do eat back a reasonable amount as not to over do the calorie deficit. I can consistently eat back about 1/3 of my MFP calorie burn numbers and have been maintaining weight for a year.1 -
Hey I think the scale should be the judge, "when you are trying to lose weight" eating back 50 % is just an idea, if you lose more than 2 lbs (which I doubt it, when there is not much to lose) then eat a 100% or whatever...get my point???0
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Also when you are a guy and burn thousands of cals just for being you is NOT the same as being a girl and burning around 2,000 a day, so is NOT that easy to create and maintain a deficit needed to lose just 1 lb
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.Say you do a cardio workout and burn 500 calories in an hour (according to your heart rate monitor you wear around your chest). If you eat back said 500 calories burned, do you still get that deficit in your daily/weekly calories out? Or do you waste it by eating those calories back as long as you are not eating over the 500 cals burned?
I use a polar heart rate monitor to determine my burn, not MFP recommendation (probably not 100% accurate but it's better than using a generic calculator on the internet). Sorry if this sounds like a dumb/silly question, just a bit confused on the whole concept of eating some or all the cals back from workouts.
I am 5'3 135 lbs and still looking to lose some weight through exercise since its much more difficult for me to cut back on my daily food calories as I get closer to my goal weight.
Will eating back my exercise calories hinder my weight loss efforts when I am still 15-10 lbs away from my goal? Looking to lose 1/lb a week still. I will probably cut to .5/week when I get below the 10 or 7 lb mark.
Any insight is much appreciated.
Thank you all
I'm going to jump in here because OP's stats and mine are fairly similar and because of the bolded sentence above. I completely agree that a deficit is the only way to lose weight; however, if someone is already at half-pound per week and already has a low calorie goal, exercise calories may be the only way to get into a deficit.
Me: I'm 47, 5'4", 130 pounds, desk job, trying to lose just a few more pounds but already squarely in a healthy BMI and now it's just vanity pounds. My calorie goal from MFP is 1,260 at half-pound per week loss. There's absolutely no way I can do 1,260 and stay sane. So, I create my deficit by exercising. Even 200-300 extra calories a day in this case is the difference between being able to do this and just giving up.
If the OP had a lot of weight to lose, I wouldn't comment. But in this instance, exercise may not JUST be for fitness.8 -
Also when you are a guy and burn thousands of cals just for being you is NOT the same as being a girl and burning around 2,000 a day, so is NOT that easy to create and maintain a deficit needed to lose just 1 lb
The average guy burns around 1800 calories existing vs around 1400 for a female...the average guy isn't burning thousands upon thousands of calories...the average guy who does little in the way of exercise is going to burn around 2300 - 2500 calories per day...the average female is going to burn around 1800 - 2000....so don't know where you're coming up with these thousands of calories difference between men and women.2 -
Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.1 -
Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?5 -
cwolfman13 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?
Right...but it sounds a whole lot like you can't use exercise to create a deficit...which of course you can.
I agree that you can't outrun a bad diet, but it would be unfair to say you can't use exercise to earn a donut 5 -
Also when you are a guy and burn thousands of cals just for being you is NOT the same as being a girl and burning around 2,000 a day, so is NOT that easy to create and maintain a deficit needed to lose just 1 lb
The amount that guys burn versus women is greatly exaggerated to the point of being laughable. Guys burn more because we tend to have more lean muscle and lean muscle has a metabolic cost to upkeep basically. Also guys tend to be larger (taller, heavier) which also has a caloric requirement. If you compared a man and a woman who where the same height and weight the guy would probably only have a TDEE maybe 100 calories more from the extra lean mass he'd probably have. Its really not that big of a difference. If you were comparing everything equal (height, weight, lean mass) between a woman and man they'd be the same. Having a penis doesn't make you burn more calories somehow.
My TDEE is high because I am active and I'm 6 foot tall, not because I am a man. Guys don't just get some sort of free pass, still have to work for it.6 -
cwolfman13 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?
Right...but it sounds a whole lot like you can't use exercise to create a deficit...which of course you can.
I agree that you can't outrun a bad diet, but it would be unfair to say you can't use exercise to earn a donut
You CAN use exercise to create a deficit...but you are setting yourself up for some rather disordered behaviors which are not what you really want to make routinue. The idea of "going for a run" because you ate too much is kind of setting yourself up for disfunction in my opinion. It treats food like the enemy and exercise like self-inflicted punishment rather than a means to an end in terms of fitness.6 -
Aaron_K123 wrote: »cwolfman13 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?
Right...but it sounds a whole lot like you can't use exercise to create a deficit...which of course you can.
I agree that you can't outrun a bad diet, but it would be unfair to say you can't use exercise to earn a donut
You CAN use exercise to create a deficit...but you are setting yourself up for some rather disordered behaviors which are not what you really want to make routinue. The idea of "going for a run" because you ate too much is kind of setting yourself up for disfunction in my opinion. It treats food like the enemy and exercise like self-inflicted punishment rather than a means to an end in terms of fitness.
I disagree. I think of it more like, I work out so I can have what I consider a "normal" dinner with my family and not gain weight.7 -
Aaron_K123 wrote: »cwolfman13 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?
Right...but it sounds a whole lot like you can't use exercise to create a deficit...which of course you can.
I agree that you can't outrun a bad diet, but it would be unfair to say you can't use exercise to earn a donut
You CAN use exercise to create a deficit...but you are setting yourself up for some rather disordered behaviors which are not what you really want to make routinue. The idea of "going for a run" because you ate too much is kind of setting yourself up for disfunction in my opinion. It treats food like the enemy and exercise like self-inflicted punishment rather than a means to an end in terms of fitness.
I disagree. I think of it more like, I work out so I can have what I consider a "normal" dinner with my family and not gain weight.
<shrug> not going to claim my way of viewing it is the only way, just sharing how I see it. It is subjective so we can both be "right" in our own way. Personally I have found exercising to attain a fitness goal is much more sustainable and enjoyable than exercising to maintain a deficit. Funny thing is you get that same calorie burn either way.4 -
Aaron_K123 wrote: »Aaron_K123 wrote: »cwolfman13 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?
Right...but it sounds a whole lot like you can't use exercise to create a deficit...which of course you can.
I agree that you can't outrun a bad diet, but it would be unfair to say you can't use exercise to earn a donut
You CAN use exercise to create a deficit...but you are setting yourself up for some rather disordered behaviors which are not what you really want to make routinue. The idea of "going for a run" because you ate too much is kind of setting yourself up for disfunction in my opinion. It treats food like the enemy and exercise like self-inflicted punishment rather than a means to an end in terms of fitness.
I disagree. I think of it more like, I work out so I can have what I consider a "normal" dinner with my family and not gain weight.
<shrug> not going to claim my way of viewing it is the only way, just sharing how I see it. It is subjective so we can both be "right" in our own way. Personally I have found exercising to attain a fitness goal is much more sustainable and enjoyable than exercising to maintain a deficit. Funny thing is you get that same calorie burn either way.
That's fair enough, you know I respect your opinion...I suspect it may be a different mindset du to our relative sizes...Remember that 1200 calories is only a one pound a week loss for me. I need to work for my food 3 -
cwolfman13 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
You can create your deficit either through exercise or through diet, preferably both...don't listen to anyone who tells you because it didn't work for them it won't work for anyone...we are all different.
Nobody is saying that...like at all...
Expending more energy is a bi-product of regular exercise...not the purpose of exercise. If the purpose behind exercise was losing weight then why would so many healthy, lean, and fit people who don't need or want to lose weight be exercising regularly?
Right...but it sounds a whole lot like you can't use exercise to create a deficit...which of course you can.
I agree that you can't outrun a bad diet, but it would be unfair to say you can't use exercise to earn a donut
If you think about it, it still comes down to your diet. Regular exercise is going to increase your energy expenditure...but if you have a deficit, it's because you're taking in less than you're expending...it still comes down to diet. If you exercise regularly and eat to maintenance, you're not going to lose weight...If you exercise regularly and you eat more than you expend, you're going to gain weight...it still ultimately comes down to what you're taking in...it's just that regular exercise lets you take in more than you otherwise could.2 -
queenliz99 wrote: »Fiftyls2looz wrote: »what????
exercise is not for losing weight??? Ive never heard of that....ever
I've tried it, doesn't work. Started calorie counting, got into a deficit and finally lost weight.
I've tried it, it works. Calorie counting also works but I stopped doing that and continued to maintain. All this goes to show that different people can succeed even taking different paths.
But the CICO math is unambiguous that exercise is beneficial to weight loss and maintenance.
So do all the surveys that show that people who start commuting by bicycle lose an average of 10 lbs in their first year.3 -
I think the reason some people phrase it as "exercise isn't about weight loss" its because there is this expectation that if you exercise that somehow the deficit comes easily. Fact is if you exercise you are going to require more food and you are therefore going to get hungrier unless you eat more. To satisfy that hunger you eat more and you end up basically at the same deficit had you not exercised at all.
Now you can exercise a lot to create a larger deficit and try to will yourself through that hunger but....ick.
I do undertand by the way that if you are much smaller that it is harder to create large deficits...but if you are smaller you probably shouldn't be creating a large deficit. I think sites like MFP would benefit by having the goal to be to lose a certain percentage of your weight each month rather than just "1 pound" or "2 pounds". It suggests that somehow a 5'2 woman with little muscle is supposed to expect to lose at the same rate as a more muscular overweight 6'2 man which is silly. If you weight 140 and the guy weighs 280 then his 2 pound a week loss is equivalent to a 1 pound a week loss for you.7 -
Ok. Fine. I get it...but telling people exercise doesn't help with weight loss is overly simplistic to the point of creating a non-truth. Just like gold doesn't weigh more than feathers because a pound is a pound.
This was in response to wolfman2 -
Aaron_K123 wrote: »I think the reason some people phrase it as "exercise isn't about weight loss" its because there is this expectation that if you exercise that somehow the deficit comes easily. Fact is if you exercise you are going to require more food and you are therefore going to get hungrier unless you eat more. To satisfy that hunger you eat more and you end up basically at the same deficit had you not exercised at all.
Now you can exercise a lot to create a larger deficit and try to will yourself through that hunger but....ick.
I do undertand by the way that if you are much smaller that it is harder to create large deficits...but if you are smaller you probably shouldn't be creating a large deficit. I think sites like MFP would benefit by having the goal to be to lose a certain percentage of your weight each month rather than just "1 pound" or "2 pounds". It suggests that somehow a 5'2 woman with little muscle is supposed to expect to lose at the same rate as a more muscular overweight 6'2 man which is silly. If you weight 140 and the guy weighs 280 then his 2 pound a week loss is equivalent to a 1 pound a week loss for you.
Yeah...the hardest time I've ever had with my weight management was when I was training for my first century ride...I was near the end of my weight loss and just figured I'd pretty easily drop those last 10 Lbs or so with all of those miles...I ended up maintaining due to being hungry as all hell from training and also wanting to perform well and recover from those training bouts...I actually do a lot better with weight loss when I'm doing light to moderate amounts of regular exercise vs actually training.0
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