Calorie Counting & Exercise

oXGetFitBabeXo

So is it better to count the steps you burn or not count the steps you burn?

HermanLily

If I had my heart rate up while I was walking around, I might count them. Every day walking around, no.

shadow2soul

I guess it depends on what you mean by that. I use an activity tracker to adjust my calorie goal based on my activity.

So on days I am inactive I might have calories taken away.
I will only see extra calories added when I am more active than my activity level setting regardless of how I achieved the activity.

In other words:
Do I get extra for every step? No. Even sedentary accounts for some of the steps you take in a day.

Do I get extra for some of my steps? Sure. If that activity is above what I set my activity level to. For example if I am set to sedentary that is around 3000 - 5000 steps or less (for me I start seeing adjustments after 3000), but if I say had 10000 steps I should eat a little more since I wasn’t sedentary that day.

Justin_7272

If you're trying to lose weight I wouldn't eat back calories burned due to walking. They might be helpful for goal setting purposes (e.g. walking 5 miles a day), but for caloric deficit purposes there are many other factors that have a greater role (weighing food, working out/exercising, etc.).

shadow2soul

Justin_7272 wrote: »

If you're trying to lose weight I wouldn't eat back calories burned due to walking. They might be helpful for goal setting purposes (e.g. walking 5 miles a day), but for caloric deficit purposes there are many other factors that have a greater role (weighing food, working out/exercising, etc.).

I lost weight just fine eating calories from walking. Having too large of a deficit because people don’t account for this type of exercise/activity can actually make it harder for people to stick to their calorie goals.

Justin_7272

shadow2soul wrote: »

Justin_7272 wrote: »

If you're trying to lose weight I wouldn't eat back calories burned due to walking. They might be helpful for goal setting purposes (e.g. walking 5 miles a day), but for caloric deficit purposes there are many other factors that have a greater role (weighing food, working out/exercising, etc.).

I lost weight just fine eating calories from walking. Having too large of a deficit because people don’t account for this type of exercise/activity can actually make it harder for people to stick to their calorie goals.

To each their own. If you find you lack energy when you do not eat back your walking calories, have at it - think of it as having "banked" those walking calories for use that day if need be. If you feel fine not eating them back (as I am), then it's just that much more of a deficit for the day.

The takeaway-I guess-is there's no clear answer (do or do not count them); try one way, try the other, and find what works for you.

NorthCascades

Of course I eat mine.

I picked an activity level when I signed up here, just like you did. (I picked sedentary because I have a computer job.) MFP expects a certain amount of movement from us based on our activity levels. You don't start getting extra calories from your steps until you meet that. It's not going to break your weight loss.

I don't think of walking as exercise for me personally. I go for a walk to feel good, or for calories. If I've got 20 minutes to kill, I can go for a nice mile walk, and earn about 75 calories. A few times a day and I get an extra snack. I don't have a step goal. I have a ride my bike 100 miles a week goal, and literally don't care how many steps I get. The only way it's useful for me to know my step count is for calories.

75 pounds lost.

AnnPT77

HermanLily wrote: »

If I had my heart rate up while I was walking around, I might count them. Every day walking around, no.

Heart rate is only marginally related to calorie burn. If I walk all day, I'll burn a lot of calories, even if my heart rate stays low. If I work out super hard on my rowing machine, and put my heart rate up near HRmax for 2 minutes, it won't burn many calories at all. Work (in more or less the physics sense), burns calories. If high heart rate burned calories, we could lose weight watching lots of scary movies. Sadly, we can't. (Heart rate is a proxy used to roughly estimate calorie burn for some activities, via its statistical relationship to oxygen usage . . . that's all.)

Taking exercise calories as an extra deficit is fine, if one's weight loss rate target is moderate (slow). If weight loss goal is already aggressive for one's current size, then not eating exercise calories can be a health risk, like any other form of major under-eating.

Keep in mind that once you reach maintenance, you'll need to eat back exercise calories, or you'll keep losing weight. Why not start trying to get a handle on them now? It's good practice.

Signed,

Year 3 of maintenance, after decades of obesity

spiriteagle99

I don't sync my Garmin with MFP, so steps as such aren't counted. I do log deliberate walks since I walk the dog 2-3 miles every day plus a once a week short hike. I log my runs. I eat back all my exercise calories.

sijomial

I didn't actually count the number of steps but the steps that were just part of my lifestyle boosted my activity level from my sedentary (keyboard jockey) job to at least Lightly Active so my calorie goal did reflect and include calories burned from my steps. My walking is to be active and simply to get places rather than being purposeful exercise for its own sake.

That general activity can be significant, when I retired I had to bump up my activity level again as I wasn't chained to a desk anymore.

I also ate back all my large volume of purposeful exercise calories and lost weight on schedule.

Including steps and other exercise may be optional while losing weight but effectively becomes compulsory when maintaining, your body "counts" them even if you don't.

My view would be that ideally your weight loss phase should also prepare you for successful maintenance at goal weight long term.

MikePTY

Justin_7272 wrote: »

shadow2soul wrote: »

Justin_7272 wrote: »

If you're trying to lose weight I wouldn't eat back calories burned due to walking. They might be helpful for goal setting purposes (e.g. walking 5 miles a day), but for caloric deficit purposes there are many other factors that have a greater role (weighing food, working out/exercising, etc.).

I lost weight just fine eating calories from walking. Having too large of a deficit because people don’t account for this type of exercise/activity can actually make it harder for people to stick to their calorie goals.

To each their own. If you find you lack energy when you do not eat back your walking calories, have at it - think of it as having "banked" those walking calories for use that day if need be. If you feel fine not eating them back (as I am), then it's just that much more of a deficit for the day.

The takeaway-I guess-is there's no clear answer (do or do not count them); try one way, try the other, and find what works for you.

Walking is exercise, MFP goals do not incorporate exercise in them. If you do not account for walking in either you activity level or as exercise, you are not eating properly to the calorie goal MFP sets for you. That's certainly up for you to do, but it is basically the same thing as putting yourself as a foot shorter, or 50 pounds lighter than you are in your MFP goals in order to generate an artificially low calorie goal so you have a larger deficit. My guess is that you wouldn't do those things, but intentionally not accounting for your exercise has the same type of impact.