Calorie goals
evilpoptart63
Posts: 397 Member
I'm 5'8" 173lbs and I would like to lose between 17-27lbs (I've already lost 43lbs since I had my last baby a year ago!!!) I've been losing at a great pace by eating 1000-1400 cals a day and slowly adding in fitnessblender videos but I'm ready to start lifting weights again. Does anyone know how to figure out my calorie goals so I can still lose weight while lifting?
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Replies
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what did MFP recommend to you? go through their goal guidelines, set up a deficit of about .5-1lb a week, eat those calories and then factor eat back about half of your exercise calories0
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How do I know how many calories I burn lifting? I can only find cardio calories. Do I set it to sedentary and add back calories or set it to active?1
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Yeah, use the Goals wizard and the numbers it gives you. Keep good records of your food and activity for 4-6 weeks. Adjust when/if you don't get the results you expect. It's an experiment only you can run - and good data is the most important thing. If you jump around and don't use set numbers for a period of time, it's a guess at best. All the calculators do is get you in the ball park.0
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That's a pretty low calorie goal for your size (I am similarly sized and eat 1800). I'd set your goal to 1lb a week. You can find weight lifting under cardio.0
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If you have the funds, you could invest in a tracker like Fitbit and link the two accounts (Fitbit and MFP). I wear my Fitbit all day, including time spent lifting. Fitbit adjusts your calorie goal within MFP according to your overall activity that day.0
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julesEMS2016 wrote: »If you have the funds, you could invest in a tracker like Fitbit and link the two accounts (Fitbit and MFP). I wear my Fitbit all day, including time spent lifting. Fitbit adjusts your calorie goal within MFP according to your overall activity that day.
Sounds perfect! I love that idea! Thank you
I'll aim for about 500 deficit a day which would put me at a pound a week. 0 -
julesEMS2016 wrote: »If you have the funds, you could invest in a tracker like Fitbit and link the two accounts (Fitbit and MFP). I wear my Fitbit all day, including time spent lifting. Fitbit adjusts your calorie goal within MFP according to your overall activity that day.
fitbits are NOT good estimates of weight lifting. they are supposed to be used for steady state cardio. weight lifting burns very little calories compared to other activities.so with a fitbit your weight lifting calories will be inflated and not accurate. but then again activity trackers are only an estimate as well.0 -
CharlieBeansmomTracey wrote: »julesEMS2016 wrote: »If you have the funds, you could invest in a tracker like Fitbit and link the two accounts (Fitbit and MFP). I wear my Fitbit all day, including time spent lifting. Fitbit adjusts your calorie goal within MFP according to your overall activity that day.
fitbits are NOT good estimates of weight lifting. they are supposed to be used for steady state cardio. weight lifting burns very little calories compared to other activities.so with a fitbit your weight lifting calories will be inflated and not accurate. but then again activity trackers are only an estimate as well.
*kitten*. Ok. So how do I calculate my calorie goal then?0 -
Fill out mfp with accurate info. Are you sedentary or lightly active? Or even active? Pick 1 pound to lose until you get to 10-15 pounds to go.
Lift nd track it under cardio. Eat back your exercise calories. After a month if you aren't hitting the 1 pound lost a week, maybe only eat 50-75% of your exercise calories back.
Your calories now are a little on the low side now, you'll need to eat a but more if you want to lift.2 -
evilpoptart63 wrote: »CharlieBeansmomTracey wrote: »julesEMS2016 wrote: »If you have the funds, you could invest in a tracker like Fitbit and link the two accounts (Fitbit and MFP). I wear my Fitbit all day, including time spent lifting. Fitbit adjusts your calorie goal within MFP according to your overall activity that day.
fitbits are NOT good estimates of weight lifting. they are supposed to be used for steady state cardio. weight lifting burns very little calories compared to other activities.so with a fitbit your weight lifting calories will be inflated and not accurate. but then again activity trackers are only an estimate as well.
*kitten*. Ok. So how do I calculate my calorie goal then?
Did you read the first two replies?
All of this is an estimate.
Set your Goals at "Lose 1 pound per week." Log your food and exercise and get as close to (projected) calories as possible. In six weeks, adjust if they don't make sense. It's your experiment and your data that matter.1 -
Ok gotcha. Thank you1
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..and I don't think you're going to "burn" as much with a weight session as you think. Log it as 100 calories per 30 minutes to an hour and move on.0
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Ok thank you0
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Alright. It's all set up thank you for the input! I set it to 1.5lbs a week because it was giving me a lot if calories. So I'll aim for about 1400 + 100 on days I lift. I was really confused, thanks for clearing that up!! 0
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1.5 sounds too aggressive. You have around 25 pounds to lose. If you were to do this correctly, you would set it at 0.5 pounds per week. We are suggesting 1 pound per week because you are just starting and it is the recommendation and it's likely you'll make errors in your logging at first.
My guess is that 1400 is too low for a 5'8" 173 pound woman. I eat 1600+ Exercise calories to lose, and I'm in my sixties, retired and living a fairly sedentary lifestyle in a tiny condo. I'm 5'8" 142.1 -
evilpoptart63 wrote: »Alright. It's all set up thank you for the input! I set it to 1.5lbs a week because it was giving me a lot if calories. So I'll aim for about 1400 + 100 on days I lift. I was really confused, thanks for clearing that up!!
1650 calories is *not* a lot of calories for somebody of your height and weight.
Unless you have a history of underreporting your intake (in which case, you'd be better off fixing that), a recommendation to eat 1650 cals/day to lose 1 pound/week when you weigh 173 pounds is completely reasonable.0 -
Ok. I just thought it was a big jump. Like I said, the most I eat now is 1400 cals and that is probably less than once a week. Most days I stay under 1200 and I'm losing weight quickly so that sounded like a pretty drastic increase. But I came here for advice so I'll try it and adjust if I need to. Thank you.1
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evilpoptart63 wrote: »Ok. I just thought it was a big jump. Like I said, the most I eat now is 1400 cals and that is probably less than once a week. Most days I stay under 1200 and I'm losing weight quickly so that sounded like a pretty drastic increase. But I came here for advice so I'll try it and adjust if I need to. Thank you.
You're welcome!
The fact that the weight is dropping quickly is actually a pretty good sign that you're logging accurately and that you ought to be eating a little more. When I started logging my calories, I set a goal to lose 1 pound/week. When I instead lost 2 pounds/week, I took that as a sign to increase my calorie intake and slow my weight loss down to the goal rate. 40 pounds later, I'm still convinced that was a good decision.2 -
It will probably take a bit of experimenting to find the right balance, I just wasn't sure where to start. I've been losing 2.5lbs a week on average and I love seeing the number on the scale drop and my clothes fit so much lower so increasing my calories that much is scary but I want to look good at my goal weight and I know I look so much better when I lift. I don't want to just be flabby and skinny. So is the 1lb a week recommended because of weight lifting? Or is it just generally better?0
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And I'm not logging my meals. I have 550 cals a day in "fuelings" from my weight loss for dummies program so I only have to worry about one meal a day and it's a healthy one.the occasional times I eat 1400 calories is because after so many days of very low calories I don't function well and have to throw in another meal.0
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evilpoptart63 wrote: »So is the 1lb a week recommended because of weight lifting? Or is it just generally better?
1lb/week is generally recommended for people who have less than 40 or 50 pounds left to lose. There are a few reasons for that. One is that there is a limit to how much fat your body can burn in a given period of time (which is why leaner people need smaller deficits). Another is that you want to limit how much muscle you lose when you're losing weight; you want to mostly lose fat. While you can increase your protein to mitigate muscle loss, a conservative rate of weight loss also helps. The third main reason is hormonal; when some people run larger deficits for too long, their hunger hormone levels increase - so overly large deficits can lead to binging and therefore be counterproductive.
I can definitely relate to the "yay!" feeling of seeing the scale weight drop off fast though. These days, I'm within 10 pounds of goal and have slowed further to 0.5 lb/week so I only get that "yay! down 2 pounds!" moment about once a month. Mostly, that happened because I kept my calorie goal the same despite losing weight so my deficit slowly decreased.
Also, worth noting: when you first start weight lifting, you will retain water for several weeks. Do NOT freak out if the scale suddenly jumps up right after you start lifting! It's not fat!
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Oh wow, I had no idea! Thank you so much for explaining that. It helps if I know the reason, I don't like the "because I said so" answers lol. It's such a good feeling to have less than 50 Lbs to go lol. I'll start bringing my calories up. It will be a nice change actually, I'm always hungry! Lol 1
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evilpoptart63 wrote: »Ok. I just thought it was a big jump. Like I said, the most I eat now is 1400 cals and that is probably less than once a week. Most days I stay under 1200 and I'm losing weight quickly so that sounded like a pretty drastic increase. But I came here for advice so I'll try it and adjust if I need to. Thank you.
never eat under 1200 unless you are elderly,really short or sedentary and since you are neither of those you should be eating more.0 -
I didn't know that. A doctor designed this program with very low calories, I had no idea it was bad0
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So, it sounds like you're using some supplement as a meal? What are "fuelings"?
If you're hungry and not able to stick with the "plan" then that should be a sign that it isn't a sustainable thing.0 -
Yeah it's a meal replacement program. They send food every month and each fueling is 100-110 cals, I eat one of those every 2-3 hrs and have 1 real meal a day following specific healthy guidelines. It's very effective but I know it won't be enough to sustain weightlifting so I'll start eating 2 real meals a day for the extra calories/nutrition.0
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evilpoptart63 wrote: »Yeah it's a meal replacement program. They send food every month and each fueling is 100-110 cals, I eat one of those every 2-3 hrs and have 1 real meal a day following specific healthy guidelines. It's very effective but I know it won't be enough to sustain weightlifting so I'll start eating 2 real meals a day for the extra calories/nutrition.
eat what MFP gives you and about half of your exercise calories back. if you continue to lose too fast eat more calories back,if not losing or its really slow eat less of them.1 -
Hello Everyone! Iv been taking my diet serious for a short time now and I'm having trouble putting together a simple meal plan that meets my goals... 1800 calories, 40% protein 40% Carbs and 20% fat. anyone have a good plan?0
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ignacioa22 wrote: »Hello Everyone! Iv been taking my diet serious for a short time now and I'm having trouble putting together a simple meal plan that meets my goals... 1800 calories, 40% protein 40% Carbs and 20% fat. anyone have a good plan?
eat the things you like and make them fit into your calorie goal?0
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