Prof PT (not mine) said not to eat exercise cals back
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Hanibanani2020
Posts: 523 Member
So I usually only eat a small percentage of exercise cals back if I workout as that works for me but I was told by a professional PT it’s best not to know how many calories I’m burning working out as it will stall my weightloss if I eat them back. I’m quite near target weight and my system is working for me but I’m wondering if that sounds right? What if you have a super heavy workout day and are genuinely hungry and need extra? I’m just wondering if this info is correct? I’m a bit confused. Thanks.
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Replies
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The short answer is that if what you’re doing is working, keep doing it. The longer answer is that eating exercise calories or not depends on whether your deficit is calculated by TDEE or not: or if you’re using the MFP calculator and you have been eating exercise cals and losing, then don’t change it. You do need to fuel your workouts and as you said, if you had a v hard long workout, it would not be good for your body if you starved it.
Also - if he’s not your PT - why is he giving advice without knowing your history, goals or stats?7 -
claireychn074 wrote: »The short answer is that if what you’re doing is working, keep doing it. The longer answer is that eating exercise calories or not depends on whether your deficit is calculated by TDEE or not: or if you’re using the MFP calculator and you have been eating exercise cals and losing, then don’t change it. You do need to fuel your workouts and as you said, if you had a v hard long workout, it would not be good for your body if you starved it.
Also - if he’s not your PT - why is he giving advice without knowing your history, goals or stats?
It was just in general to a group of us who were Working out together and asked what the workout would have burnt and we got a lecture about not eating them back. Never did find out how many calories we burnt because “it’s dangerous knowledge to have” whatever that means. I wondered the same thing tbh.6 -
You let someone you employ give you lectures who also thinks you aren't adult enough to deserve straight forward answers to a simple question?
TDEE method - takes exercise into account.
MyFitnessPal - takes exercise into account.
All day trackers - takes exercise into account.
Your PT would seem to be the anomaly as well as having dreadful interpersonal skills.
Maybe ask him/her how you will be able to maintain at goal weight if you aren't in some way eating your exercise calories. (By luck perhaps?)16 -
You let someone you employ give you lectures who also thinks you aren't adult enough to deserve straight forward answers to a simple question?
TDEE method - takes exercise into account.
MyFitnessPal - takes exercise into account.
All day trackers - takes exercise into account.
Your PT would seem to be the anomaly as well as having dreadful interpersonal skills.
Maybe ask him/her how you will be able to maintain at goal weight if you aren't in some way eating your exercise calories. (By luck perhaps?)
This isn’t my PT. Just one that was in the same place. I think they are PT for a lady in the group.3 -
TDEE method - takes exercise into account.
MyFitnessPal - takes exercise into account.
All day trackers - takes exercise into account.
Sorry just to clarify - @sijomial is right, I meant that you don’t eat extra calories after exercise if using the TDEE method as that’s factored in, whereas the MFP calculations assume you eat additional exercise cals. So I use TDEE and eat roughly the same cals every day regardless of whether I train or not, as it averages out over the week for me.
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- Track what you eat
- Monitor your macros
- Monitor your metrics (weight and measurements)
- Then adjust as needed
- As you lose weight, your body is going to change, not only in appearance, but also in how it reacts to different foods.
I turned off the adjust your intake calories for your burned calories and then I started losing. Reading the response above I understand why — it’s because MFP calorie intake calculator already includes your level of activity. Plus I don’t do really heavy workouts.
I’ve read other articles that indicate determining the number of calories burned is difficult and varies person to person.
If you’re hungry: first drink some water. Thirst is often mistaken for hunger. If you’re still hungry — eat and make a healthy choice that is going to satisfy that hunger.3 -
Hanibanani2020 wrote: »You let someone you employ give you lectures who also thinks you aren't adult enough to deserve straight forward answers to a simple question?
TDEE method - takes exercise into account.
MyFitnessPal - takes exercise into account.
All day trackers - takes exercise into account.
Your PT would seem to be the anomaly as well as having dreadful interpersonal skills.
Maybe ask him/her how you will be able to maintain at goal weight if you aren't in some way eating your exercise calories. (By luck perhaps?)
This isn’t my PT. Just one that was in the same place. I think they are PT for a lady in the group.
Sounds like he’s hoping for new clients! 🤣 you’ve lost weight, you’re training well so keep going. You don’t need him as what you’re doing is clearly working!5 -
The information is incorrect, as common sense would tell you. If you are eating at a deficit, based on no exercise, then eating back exercise calories will not stall weight loss. The only way eating back exercise calories would stall weight loss is if you were incorrectly calculating your exercise calories and eating back too many calories (which does happen to many people, thus the frequent advice to eat only half of them back until you learn your rate of loss). Eating the same number of calories you burn is a zero sum proposition, and you will continue to lose the same amount of weight based on the daily deficit you are carrying.
It sounds like this PT is one of those who hopes to increase the rate of loss by working out extra hard and not fueling. That’s a recipe for burnout and injury.
As others have already said, don’t fix what ain’t broke. If you are losing at the expected rate, keep doing what you’re doing.6 -
PT as in Personal Trainer, not Dietician? It takes remarkably little education to be a PT, so I would take that with a grain of salt.
Not to say there aren’t some remarkably knowledgeable individuals in that profession, but the random PT in your story doesn’t sound like one.5 -
Thanks all. I appreciate the input as it was very forceful and they were not open to discussion so brought it here. I feel more educated now.14
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Hanibanani2020 wrote: »You let someone you employ give you lectures who also thinks you aren't adult enough to deserve straight forward answers to a simple question?
TDEE method - takes exercise into account.
MyFitnessPal - takes exercise into account.
All day trackers - takes exercise into account.
Your PT would seem to be the anomaly as well as having dreadful interpersonal skills.
Maybe ask him/her how you will be able to maintain at goal weight if you aren't in some way eating your exercise calories. (By luck perhaps?)
This isn’t my PT. Just one that was in the same place. I think they are PT for a lady in the group.
You dodged a bullet by the sound of it!!
They wouldn't be my PT for long.
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Hanibanani2020 wrote: »Never did find out how many calories we burnt because “it’s dangerous knowledge to have” whatever that means.
Oh my word this kind of thing makes me irrationally angry. Don't tell me what I should and shouldn't know, wtf? If he's withholding knowledge because "he knows best" or he's dodging the answer because he doesn't know, either way it's red flags everywhere here. Oof. No.12 -
Whether or not to eat back exercise calories "depends." Every number we are dealing with is an estimate. Our TDEE, exercise calories, food log calories all are estimates. If you walk a mile or two like me, you are only talking a couple hundred calories of exercise. To eat these back assumes I am "perfect" in my food logging and my numbers of calories expended are exactly right. So, I don't. I watch how I am losing. If I am fairly consistently losing a pound or so a week, I figure I'm "doing it right." If I don't, I consider lowering my daily calorie total. Unless and until my exercise is truly a major factor in terms of calories, I'm not going to worry about it.
On the other hand, if you are exercising hours a day and therefore burn many hundreds of calories in exercise, then you'd better adjust so you are eating enough to keep up your pace. If you find you are exhausted, something is wrong. Make sure you are getting enough nutrition and enough sleep.4 -
I was told by a PT that the earth is flat. Asked if Mars is flat too, he said no. 🤯13
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Do what works for you. I eat my cardio calories back but not my strength training calories. Cardio makes me extra hungry, strength training doesn’t.
My mom used to be a PT and she also was generally in the camp of don’t eat back your calories but I know that view didn’t come from any of her training it just came from her personal experience with weight loss and her personal philosophy of how it should be done. And I always thought her views were too narrow to be effectively helping all of her clients. So I wouldn’t say that just because this PT is a PT that his opinion on this comes from any place more valid than your own personal experience.2 -
Exercise calories are a MFP thing. Many other programs work from TDEE which considers exercise already.1
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I think it's dangerous to say 'this workout burns off X calories' because everyone listening will burn off different amounts, and you don't want them taking an average as gospel.
Someone who is a size 6 is going to burn fewer calories than someone who is a size 16. It would be different if it was a one-to-one session.
Eating back your calories only works if you have a good idea of what that number is. If you estimate with a fitness tracker, that's obviously more accurate than if you google an average calorie burn for that exercise, without taking into account your height, weight and how much effort you put in.
Giving the benefit of the doubt, the PT's intended message may just have come out really badly?3 -
Shortgirlrunning wrote: »Do what works for you. I eat my cardio calories back but not my strength training calories. Cardio makes me extra hungry, strength training doesn’t.
My mom used to be a PT and she also was generally in the camp of don’t eat back your calories but I know that view didn’t come from any of her training it just came from her personal experience with weight loss and her personal philosophy of how it should be done. And I always thought her views were too narrow to be effectively helping all of her clients. So I wouldn’t say that just because this PT is a PT that his opinion on this comes from any place more valid than your own personal experience.
Same, I eat cardio back but not strength training—so whatever extra bit I burned there but didn’t account for balances discrepancy in my cardio calorie count (in my mind, and apparently in reality, as scale tells me so. But then again I’m doing steady state cardio like walking or running, so perhaps that is easier to calculate than something like a HIIT workout or an aerobics class).
If I never ate any exercise calories back I would be eating waaay too little (I’m on 1350 to lose, usually burn 300-500 a day on intentional cardio, plus no counted strength training). That’s a recipe for badness.2 -
If you are exercising for weight loss, don't eat them back. If you are exercising because you enjoy exercising, don't eat them back.0
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If you are exercising for weight loss, don't eat them back. If you are exercising because you enjoy exercising, don't eat them back.
It depends on how intensive a workout it is. If you're not usually active and have set your weight loss goals accordingly, you should eat some of those calories back as you'll be ravenous otherwise. I would never eat back 100% of the calories though, even if maintaining and not losing, mainly because you'll never know how accurate the burn is, so eating back a percentage like the OP is doing makes sense.
I find the problem with irregular exercise is my body gets spooked the next day and starts to demand more calories in the fear of being exercised again, so I have to choose my calories very carefully by eating foods which keep me fuller for longer. As with anything, if you make it regular, it becomes a habit, and your body adapts. It's the one-offs that cause a shock to the system!0
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