Calories in and calories out
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FitnessFreak1821
Posts: 242 Member
So today I ate 1659 calories. With my work out , cleaning the house and going for a 40 minute walk today(including after burn from all these activities, I stop my fit bit once my heart rate is at resting rate) I burned a estimated total of 935. If I minus that from total I ate it gives me total of 724 cals I'm running off of? Is that bad should I be eating more ?
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Replies
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That's probably bad. I don't know for sure how a FitBit works, but I suspect that in the time you are using it, you are double counting your base calories (that is, the calories you would burn if you were just sitting around and not exercising), so it may not be quite as bad as it seems. What does your workout consist of?3
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lynn_glenmont wrote: »That's probably bad. I don't know for sure how a FitBit works, but I suspect that in the time you are using it, you are double counting your base calories (that is, the calories you would burn if you were just sitting around and not exercising), so it may not be quite as bad as it seems. What does your workout consist of?
I use the workout setting when I do the workouts or go for a walk. Any time I'm consistently moving and my heart rate is up I put it on. It only starts counting the calories I'm burning then..I don't think it includes the basic 393 it says I burned when I put it on first thing in the morning. 🤔
I do the Sydney Cummings work outs on YouTube. She does all kinds of workouts, hiit , Tabatta, strength/weight training,. Today I did a 45 minute full body workout that incorporated some weights. She's an amazing trainer. I lost all my pregnancy weight (45 pounds) two years ago and then got pregnant again last year, had my son this past April so I'm trying to get back to where I was before this last pregnancy(130s). I was 167-170 before I started now I'm down to 150s 3 months in this program.0 -
XoXashleighXoX wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »That's probably bad. I don't know for sure how a FitBit works, but I suspect that in the time you are using it, you are double counting your base calories (that is, the calories you would burn if you were just sitting around and not exercising), so it may not be quite as bad as it seems. What does your workout consist of?
I use the workout setting when I do the workouts or go for a walk. Any time I'm consistently moving and my heart rate is up I put it on. It only starts counting the calories I'm burning then..I don't think it includes the basic 393 it says I burned when I put it on first thing in the morning. 🤔
I do the Sydney Cummings work outs on YouTube. She does all kinds of workouts, hiit , Tabatta, strength/weight training,. Today I did a 45 minute full body workout that incorporated some weights. She's an amazing trainer. I lost all my pregnancy weight (45 pounds) two years ago and then got pregnant again last year, had my son this past April so I'm trying to get back to where I was before this last pregnancy(130s). I was 167-170 before I started now I'm down to 150s 3 months in this program.
935 seems kind of high for the incremental burn (excluding base calories already accounted for in your 1645) from a 45-minute workout that was at least partially resistance training (weights) pus a 40 minute walk. Were you moving heavy furniture during your housecleaning? Since you're only three months in to your program, I'm assuming you're not an extremely well conditioned athlete able to maintain extremely high calorie burning during a 45-minute workout.
In any case, in answer to your initial question, MFP is designed for you to eat back your exercise burns. Undereating, especially extreme undereating, is not a good idea. I just don't feel like I have enough data to know how much you're undereating, but since you're not accounting for any of your exercise, I'm reasonably confident that are undereating to some degree.3 -
lynn_glenmont wrote: »XoXashleighXoX wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »That's probably bad. I don't know for sure how a FitBit works, but I suspect that in the time you are using it, you are double counting your base calories (that is, the calories you would burn if you were just sitting around and not exercising), so it may not be quite as bad as it seems. What does your workout consist of?
I use the workout setting when I do the workouts or go for a walk. Any time I'm consistently moving and my heart rate is up I put it on. It only starts counting the calories I'm burning then..I don't think it includes the basic 393 it says I burned when I put it on first thing in the morning. 🤔
I do the Sydney Cummings work outs on YouTube. She does all kinds of workouts, hiit , Tabatta, strength/weight training,. Today I did a 45 minute full body workout that incorporated some weights. She's an amazing trainer. I lost all my pregnancy weight (45 pounds) two years ago and then got pregnant again last year, had my son this past April so I'm trying to get back to where I was before this last pregnancy(130s). I was 167-170 before I started now I'm down to 150s 3 months in this program.
935 seems kind of high for the incremental burn (excluding base calories already accounted for in your 1645) from a 45-minute workout that was at least partially resistance training (weights) pus a 40 minute walk. Were you moving heavy furniture during your housecleaning? Since you're only three months in to your program, I'm assuming you're not an extremely well conditioned athlete able to maintain extremely high calorie burning during a 45-minute workout.
In any case, in answer to your initial question, MFP is designed for you to eat back your exercise burns. Undereating, especially extreme undereating, is not a good idea. I just don't feel like I have enough data to know how much you're undereating, but since you're not accounting for any of your exercise, I'm reasonably confident that are undereating to some degree.
I was vacuuming and mopping. I have 6 floors because it's a stacked townhouse so there is alot of stairs. My calorie burn with my work out and afterburn was 353(i usually burn 300-500 cals during a high intensity work out), then I just kept moving cause of the kids and then started cleaning. Burned another 300-400. I literally did not stop long for 2 hours, sat to eat lunch for a few minutes then got back up and finished my cleaning. So I have been moving pretty much all day. Did a walk after dinner but it wasn't very fast burned 222 cals doing that on top.0 -
XoXashleighXoX wrote: »So today I ate 1659 calories. With my work out , cleaning the house and going for a 40 minute walk today(including after burn from all these activities, I stop my fit bit once my heart rate is at resting rate) I burned a estimated total of 935. If I minus that from total I ate it gives me total of 724 cals I'm running off of? Is that bad should I be eating more ?
How many calories did your FitBit send to MFP? Is your FitBit synced to MFP? If not, that 935 calories likely includes not just your exercise calorie burns, but your being alive calorie burns, and that is not the number you want to eat back.0 -
Tracking how much energy you have along with what you’re eating can be helpful.
If you begin to lose enthusiasm for moving, you’re likely restricting too much. Also rate of loss is helpful. If you’re losing at more than 2 pounds a week, and your weight isn’t above 300lbs? You’re restricting too much.
If your energy is good and you’re losing at a reasonable rate? You’re likely fine.1 -
Add me to the list of those who think you're counting far too much for the exercise calories. For one thing, you will burn calories just resting. That's 1 MET (metabolic equivalent) which is about 1 calorie per kilo per hour. Light exercise, such as walking and household chores, may be 2 MET. So as you can see there, if the device is saying you burned X hundred calories doing those things, you would have burned half that amount just doing nothing. The incremental calories burned by that exercise may be half as much as they're reporting.
Here's a list for examples:
https://golf.procon.org/met-values-for-800-activities/
If you have a reasonable estimate of your additional calories burned by exercise, above and beyond what you already told MFP you do (e.g. I picked "sedentary" in my options, then I enter my workout estimates myself), you can eat those calories back. Say you can do 1,600 to hit your goals, you burn an extra 400, now you can consume 2,000 and still be on target.6 -
XoXashleighXoX wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »That's probably bad. I don't know for sure how a FitBit works, but I suspect that in the time you are using it, you are double counting your base calories (that is, the calories you would burn if you were just sitting around and not exercising), so it may not be quite as bad as it seems. What does your workout consist of?
I use the workout setting when I do the workouts or go for a walk. Any time I'm consistently moving and my heart rate is up I put it on. It only starts counting the calories I'm burning then..I don't think it includes the basic 393 it says I burned when I put it on first thing in the morning. 🤔
I do the Sydney Cummings work outs on YouTube. She does all kinds of workouts, hiit , Tabatta, strength/weight training,. Today I did a 45 minute full body workout that incorporated some weights. She's an amazing trainer. I lost all my pregnancy weight (45 pounds) two years ago and then got pregnant again last year, had my son this past April so I'm trying to get back to where I was before this last pregnancy(130s). I was 167-170 before I started now I'm down to 150s 3 months in this program.
Incorrect. You have a misunderstanding of what it's doing and making it worse.
Fitbit is estimating calorie burn 24 hrs a day. 2 different methods depending on how you use it.
For daily activity that is your base BMR burn, plus any distance your steps takes you which is a very accurate formula if the distance is correct. (tweaks can help with that)
For those workouts you start, calories is based on HR formula - which is totally inflated at the lower levels of activity like walking and waiting time for HR to lower (which doesn't always have anything to do with burning more hence the fallacy that HR = calorie burn somehow).
It's also inflated formula for the lifting you are doing, and intervals you are doing.
The ONLY time HR-based calorie burn can be a decent estimate is for steady-state aerobic exercise with same HR for 2-4 min at a time and slow changes. And even with that best use scenario, there are known caveats that cause inflated estimates. (for running distance would still be better for example, biking a power meter)
You are doing intervals and anaerobic exercise - totally opposite of best use case, so inflated calorie burn.
You aren't double counting because of the way Fitbit works if it's syncing with MFP - but you are making it use the worse method possible for estimating calories.
You do have the correct idea on NET calories - that's what your math was getting close too.
If a healthy eating level for your body for safety but still to allow burning off some fat was say 1500, but you used up say 500 of that purely to power a workout - you've left the body with 1000 to take care of all the other required stuff it needs to do.
Keep that up you'll have a very unhappy stressed body on your hands that will attempt to adapt and fight your efforts.7 -
Thank you all for clarifying!
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I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.5
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fatoldladyonamission wrote: »I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.
If you look at my post you'll see why it depends.
There are plenty of others that eat every bit of that adjustment and lose at expected or faster, they have to eat more because Fitbit is underestimating.
Others probably have poor food logging accuracy so a balance is hit where it's right on.4 -
fatoldladyonamission wrote: »I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.
With my FitBit One I had no issues eating100% of the calories it sent over. This was not a device with a heart rate monitor, so it was just counting steps and stairs.1 -
fatoldladyonamission wrote: »I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.
Even a tracker's just giving you a statistical estimate, not an actual measurement. The implication is that any given good model/brand will be accurate or close for quite a few people, a ways off for a few people (either high or low), and quite surprisingly far off (still high or low) for a very rare few people. That's just how statistical estimates work.
That would be true, even if logging is perfect, and the exercise one does is in the realms where the devices can be reasonably accurate.
If I only ate the calories my good brand/model fitness tracker says I burn, I'd be in the hospital in a few months, severely underweight and faltering. It thinks I burn *hundreds* of calories fewer than my logging & scale-weight results suggest, based on 6+ years of careful logging.
That doesn't mean "trackers overestimate" (in contraposition to your "they underestimate"). It doesn't even mean "trackers are inherently inaccurate". Mostly, it means I'm not statistically average . . . again, assuming my logging is spot-on, and I'm compliant with proper calorie goals, which I do my best to be.3 -
I have an old fitbit. It's the fitbit 2 so it doesn't sync to MFP. That I know of anyway 🤔0
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OK so I have myself as active on my fitnesspal...because I work 4-5 days a week now. I give myself a two day break. Am i in the wrong category ? Should I be lightly active? I'm unsure what to put myself as....
Thanks again0 -
XoXashleighXoX wrote: »OK so I have myself as active on my fitnesspal...because I work 4-5 days a week now. I give myself a two day break. Am i in the wrong category ? Should I be lightly active? I'm unsure what to put myself as....
Thanks again
You'll notice all those descriptions for activity level have to do with daily life. NOT exercise.
Unlike other sites where you estimate the amount of exercise you hope to get, and then better do it - MFP has you trying to learn a life lesson about weight management.
You do more you can eat more.
You do less you sure better eat less.
So exercise is NOT included up front for goals and part of your eating goal.
If you exercise - you are doing more - and can eat more.
Hence logging it when actually done.
So the descriptions are about working 5 days a week.
But WHAT is your work for 4-5 days a week now?
Sedentary? On your feet part of the time? Most the time? Constant movement and hard work?
Then again sedentary is literally a bump on a log 7 days a week and evenings - most people discover they are NOT that when you count non-work hours getting stuff done.
Oh - the Fitbit doesn't sync to MFP.
Even that old Fitbit syncs to your Fitbit account.
Your Fitbit account, if linked to MFP, syncs to MFP.
Fitbit sends steps as a figure to display, weight, and daily calorie burn with time stamp.
That tells MFP if you are burning less or more than your guess of activity level would cause.
And MFP creates an adjustment to match the Fitbit.4 -
fatoldladyonamission wrote: »I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.
If you look at my post you'll see why it depends.
There are plenty of others that eat every bit of that adjustment and lose at expected or faster, they have to eat more because Fitbit is underestimating.
Others probably have poor food logging accuracy so a balance is hit where it's right on.
I wasn’t suggesting your post was wrong, simply sharing my own experience. That’s why I said I don’t know about all the science. Perhaps I should have just said, be aware it may not in some circumstances be accurate.fatoldladyonamission wrote: »I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.
Even a tracker's just giving you a statistical estimate, not an actual measurement. The implication is that any given good model/brand will be accurate or close for quite a few people, a ways off for a few people (either high or low), and quite surprisingly far off (still high or low) for a very rare few people. That's just how statistical estimates work.
That would be true, even if logging is perfect, and the exercise one does is in the realms where the devices can be reasonably accurate.
If I only ate the calories my good brand/model fitness tracker says I burn, I'd be in the hospital in a few months, severely underweight and faltering. It thinks I burn *hundreds* of calories fewer than my logging & scale-weight results suggest, based on 6+ years of careful logging.
That doesn't mean "trackers overestimate" (in contraposition to your "they underestimate"). It doesn't even mean "trackers are inherently inaccurate". Mostly, it means I'm not statistically average . . . again, assuming my logging is spot-on, and I'm compliant with proper calorie goals, which I do my best to be.
I was speaking about my own personal experience, which leads me to believe they overestimated. I should have added ‘my burn’ to the end of that. I wasn’t suggesting it’s the same for everyone. I was just sharing my experience and what I’ve found works for me.
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fatoldladyonamission wrote: »fatoldladyonamission wrote: »I don’t know about the science here but I’m a Fitbit user and I know that if I eat all the exercise calories my Fitbit syncs to MFP, I don’t lose weight. In fact I usually go with only ever eating a maximum of 50% of those calories back and not every day or it does upset the scales. So honestly I think they over overestimated.
If you look at my post you'll see why it depends.
There are plenty of others that eat every bit of that adjustment and lose at expected or faster, they have to eat more because Fitbit is underestimating.
Others probably have poor food logging accuracy so a balance is hit where it's right on.
I wasn’t suggesting your post was wrong, simply sharing my own experience. That’s why I said I don’t know about all the science. Perhaps I should have just said, be aware it may not in some circumstances be accurate.
I didn't think you were commenting on my post at all actually so no worries - I thought you had missed it.
Because you said you don't know about the science - and I explained some of that in the post if you care to learn.
But without knowing the science - you claimed they overestimate.
Just wanted to share the fact as Ann did it can go both ways, and there are known reasons why.2 -
@heybales I thought I’d explained that I meant they overestimated my burn. That’s why I replied to both of you.0
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fatoldladyonamission wrote: »@heybales I thought I’d explained that I meant they overestimated my burn. That’s why I replied to both of you.
Yes I got that. I replied for another reason.0
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