Activity level and logging exercise

srs2019
srs2019 Posts: 1 Member
in Getting Started
Hi all,
I realize this question has been asked many times before, so I apologize in advance. Its just that I don't quite get it yet (fairly new to MFP).

I'm 43, 5'5, 118 lbs and want to maintain weight. I exercise 5-6 times a week for about 45 min, but nothing too crazy. I usually combine the treadmill with an online exercise strength class of some sort. I work from home, but am up on my feet a lot and move around. 

Here are my questions: 
1) I read the MFP activity level is based on every day lifestyle and does NOT count exercise activity, is that correct? However, MFP uses exercise in their description for the activity level so I find that confusing. What is the best way to judge your activity level if not taking any exercise into consideration? I must be somewhere between sedentary and lightly active, I would think - my steps (without exercise) average at around 7,000.

2) So IF the activity level in MFP is indeed not counting exercise, but I find it too tedious to log in my exercise every day, could I just go up an activity level? Maybe tedious is not the right word, I feel I can not trust my Fitbit to correctly sync with MFP or trust my treadmill to correctly count the calories burned. For example, my treadmill tells me I've burned 430 cals (was on it for 38 min and 1.65 mi, mostly at high elevation), but my Fitbit said I burned 127 cals. I know the treadmill is way off for sure, but what would I log in?  And I don't know how to log in my strength workout correctly because I like doing different online classes and it would just take up too much time logging in every single exercise and rep....    How do YOU log in your exercise? 

Thank you for your time. 

Replies

  • Unicorn_Bacon
    Unicorn_Bacon Posts: 491 Member
    Okay.. so there is a couple options here.

    1. You can find a TDEE calculator, put in your info and exercise and it will give you a calorie number to eat to, then you can go into the settings on mfp and change your calorie goal to that number.

    Eat to that number for a couple months and see what's happening over time, are you gaining? Losing? Maintaining? Then make adjustments based on the results by adding or subtracting 100 calories at a time and waiting a couple more months for results.

    2. Anyone walking atleast 10,000 steps is considered active, sedentary would be under 3000. Mfp uses NEAT, which does not include exercise. So you can either set yourself to lightly active or active, and then log your exercise in the diary, eat those calories back and see what the results are over a couple months and adjust as needed.

    Either way, ita going to take time to find your calorie balance, and also keep in mind that maintenance is a weight range, if you are 118lbs, then being a 1 or 2 pounds under or over is still considered maintenance
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 14,237 Member
    you do sound as at the top end of lightly active without exercise

    how do you know that your treadmill is wrong (though I agree that given your stats it sound high, incline does matter).

    how do you figure that your fitbit would know your treadmill inclination (hint: unlikely). It might figure out something from heart rate and step cadence but I would think inclination is a situation where it might under-estimate a bit.

    But I don't agree with you that you're more likely to successfully micromanage your logging as opposed to off-loading it to your fitbit and integration and MACRO managing the overall picture.

    If I were you I would do exactly that. OFF LOAD the calculations to Fitbit and MFP and integration.

    EVALUATE your ACTUAL weight trend over 4-6 weeks (if your log your weight into Fitbit you can connect fitbit to trendweight.com and look at your trend as being your actual weight for the purpose of calculating).

    EVALUATE your EXPECTED weight trend changes over the same 4-6 week time period based on your MFP food intake logging and purported deficits achieved as per integration (this will require reviewing your MFP and Fitbit logs and data)

    Estimate an error based on your Fitbit TDEE. Use that error to mentally (or on paper adjust your goals). Continue evaluating your % TDEE error over time.

    Many people have concluded that this error is small.

    In my case it ranges from 0% to a max of about 5% and it often has more to do with the quality of my food logging than the ability of Fitbit to figure out my caloric expenditure.

    That's quite workable in terms of setting goals and achieving results. Offloading to automation increases consistently since the caloric expenditures don't depend on my mood or self-evaluation

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