Need Help Choosing Daily Net Calories

Stewie316

I keep reading thread after thread about how I need to eat all of my exercise calories, but doing the math, if I was to eat my exercise calories I would maintain or gain weight. Plus it seems like it defeats the purpose of working out to lose weight. My BMR is approx. 1300 and it takes 1600 to maintain my weight.

I stagger my calories somewhat, but I limit my weekly net calories to 7000/week. It should result in about a 1.2 pound loss a week. This is my current plan:

Monday-Friday: Net calorie of 800/day (eat 1200 calories and burn 400)
Saturday: Net calories of 1600/day (no exercise)
Sunday: Net calories of 1400/day (normally hiking, kayaking or no exercise)

If I was to eat my exercise calories, I would gain weight. Does this seem like a good plan?

sunflower0022

I think it is rather low though. I struggle to eat all my 1200 calories/day. I just can't seem to want to eat my burned calories... Oh.. I could.. but I don't want to eat cookies.. muffins.. and junk food! lol

Stewie316

I'm currently 125 pounds. Since my weight is so low, it's going to take me a lot longer to lose weight. MFP recommends a net calorie limit of 1200 calories a day which if I went my that I would only lose 3/4's of a pound a week.

TropicalKitty

I think the Mon - Fri thing might be a bit too low and then you have essentially a gorge on Saturday and Sunday by letting your body have twice as much as it normally gets. I don't see how that is going to help your body. Perhaps be a little more balanced, while still doing the staggering, but give a little more fuel for the heavier work out days than the lazy days. When you are working out you need to fuel your work outs otherwise you can make your body burn the wrong things: muscle not fat.

I don't really agree with you not eating the exercise allowance back, since you fall so low: to a point well below what your body needs just to exist. Remember that the BMR is what your body needs if you just laid in bed all day doing nothing. You may lose for awhile being below your BMR, but that most likely won't continue without other issues. There are plenty of threads on here that talk about that, though.

Stewie316

Hi Tropical, You're probably right about eating so much on the weekends. I'm going to work on changing that, but I need more calories on Saturday, so maybe I'll do between 800-1000 Sunday through Friday and 1600 on Saturday. But, I still don't get eating all of my exercise calories back. Since it takes so little calorie's to maintain my weight, if I was to let's say eat back my exercise calories, this will have me eating 1600 calories a day, which would just result in my maintaining my weight.

TropicalKitty

Since it takes so little calorie's to maintain my weight, if I was to let's say eat back my exercise calories, this will have me eating 1600 calories a day, which would just result in my maintaining my weight.

I'll try to explain as best I can, otherwise I'll have to find you another thread with a better explanation if it doesn't make sense.

You'd still have a deficit because you burned the 400 in working out. The 1200 is already BELOW what you need to maintain your weight. But then you went and worked out so you used more calories than you eat to merely exist. There is a difference between maintenance and the BMR. Your maintenance takes into account the activity level you have every day, walking around your house cleaning, working at your job, whatever, that are beyond sheer existance. BMR is the amount to just live, which means no doing chores, no job, no walking a dog, or whatever. Make sense?

So, if you are eating at your BMR you are already below what you need to keep your weight (read: you should lose because you are more active and you burn more calories just doing your normal daily habits). Then, if you go and work out, you are well below your BMR. You may have eaten 1600 calories, but that doesn't take you back to 1600 for your maintenance becuase of the calories you burned. Remember calories in minus calories out.

Example:
Food: 1200
Daily life: -1600
Gym: -400
Net Cals for the day: -800
In this case you'd be 400 below your BMR

Example 2:
Food: 1200
Daily Life: -1600
Gym: -400
After Gym Food: 400
Net Cals for the day: -400
And in this case you'd be at the BMR

So I'm sure you can see that to put you back to maintain your weight, you'd need to eat 2000cals on the gym day.

Does that help?

TropicalKitty

Here's a thread on the topic of the exercise calories

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo