Eating more than the recommended calorie amount

Sarahrm25

Who else eats more than the recommended calorie amount and has manually set their calorie intake? Why did you choose to do this? Do you do anything special in order for it to work for you? Do you still track working out?

Please add me id love to talk to others who eat more than my fitness pal set them at

nowine4me

I eat 1800 which is what I set manually. My exercise is pretty consistent over the course of the week (run, lift, pilates) and I don't like having to earn calories. I log my workouts, but I have it set so they don't add back calories.

Theo166

You can play with the settings to tweak your calorie goal, it's just a target for you to aim at. If you are consistently over the daily goal, then chances are you will lose less weight per week than the desired loss you input into the web tool.

The real question is how do you work best towards goals. Do you need a goal that's almost unattainable that you come close to, or a goal you must exceed? I use the calorie goal as a hard limit so I targeted 1.5 lbs per week instead of 2 lbs. I thought the 2 lbs goal might be more demoralizing if I was consistently just missing it.

lightenup2016

I want to lose a lb a week. I feel like from my history that my activity level is somewhere between sedentary and lightly active before added exercise. So I picked a goal in between what MFP gives me for those activity levels.

Also, I bank calories for the weekend, and actually set my daily goal according to the day of the week. So for M-W I set it for 1200, for Thursday 1500, and for F-Sun 1800. That all averages out to 1500 per day, which is right where I want to be (before exercise).

RuNaRoUnDaFiEld

srhollands10 wrote: »

Who else eats more than the recommended calorie amount and has manually set their calorie intake? Why did you choose to do this? Do you do anything special in order for it to work for you? Do you still track working out?

Please add me id love to talk to others who eat more than my fitness pal set them at

MFP doesn't set anything, you do by choosing the rate you want to lose at.

MFP just applies the maths.

psuLemon

Since I consistently work out, I used a TDEE to get my starting caloric numbers, and then I modified based on actual results. Started at 1800 calories and and i average 2400 to lose. 1800 just made me tired.

mjbnj0001

Unless you're really diligent with weighing everything, which I'm not (but I AM diligent in logging), then you've entered the realm of approximations. How well you approximate will vary. As Captain Barbossa said in the movie, "Pirates of the Caribbean," "... these rules are more of a guideline ..." The bathroom scale is the true measure.

With this in mind, I typically set my "current" weight to my next lower goal (I think 10lbs at a time) to coerce the calculations to a slightly lower allowed value, and adjust a few of my macros to less than those offered by MFP (for instance, carbs, sugar and salt). That way, I won't lose my mind if I go over slightly on any given day. Yesterday, I came in under 63 cals to my target (amazing since we ate out), with some minor plus-and-minus macro values. I consider this a statistical tie, and meaningless; today's morning weigh-in had me at a loss for the week, so I'm happy.

This approach seems to work for me, I'm on a steady weight-loss trajectory. Fifteen pounds since Jan 1st.

cathipa

I calculate my goals based TDEE, where MFP focuses more on NEAT and eating back exercise calories. I also have adjusted the macros since MFP prefers to follow the RDA guidelines and I do better with lower carbs. My diary is open and feel free to add.