Activity Level Question

JamesHoward33

Hoping someone can help me with this. I currently have my activity level set to low, as my daily job has me sitting for most of the time. However, I go to the gym every morning at 5:30 for an hour and a half. 30min fast walking on the treadmill, and an hour workout. My goal is to lose fat, not necessarily weight. I am ok with gaining weight as long as it is muscle, and I am losing the fat.

My question is, do I keep my activity level at low, based on my day to day work life, or should this be bumped up since I am in the gym 6 days a week?

Lietchi

Your activity level on MFP is intended to reflect your non-exercise activity (job, hobbies, housework, commute,...). Exercise is separate and should be logged separately in your diary, which in turn will increase your calorie intake.

PS: it's a quirk on MFP, but you need to log strength training under Cardio to get calories for it.

JamesHoward33

Lietchi wrote: »

Your activity level on MFP is intended to reflect your non-exercise activity (job, hobbies, housework, commute,...). Exercise is separate and should be logged separately in your diary, which in turn will increase your calorie intake.

PS: it's a quirk on MFP, but you need to log strength training under Cardio to get calories for it.

I actually sync my Garmin and my workout calories sync fine. Just didn't know if I needed to adjust the activity level so the calories allowed number was correct.

Lietchi

JamesHoward33 wrote: »

Lietchi wrote: »

Your activity level on MFP is intended to reflect your non-exercise activity (job, hobbies, housework, commute,...). Exercise is separate and should be logged separately in your diary, which in turn will increase your calorie intake.

PS: it's a quirk on MFP, but you need to log strength training under Cardio to get calories for it.

I actually sync my Garmin and my workout calories sync fine. Just didn't know if I needed to adjust the activity level so the calories allowed number was correct.

If you sync your Garmin, then it actually doesn't matter at all what activity level you choose, your adjustment will fix it so you get the correct calorie goal.
The only thing you want to consider then is:
- if you prefer seeing positive adjustments added throughout the day, choose a lower activity level
- if you prefer a higher calorie goal from the start, but with potentially a negative adjustment if you haven't been active (yet) choose a higher activity level. Watch out though: in this case, make sure you activate negative calorie adjustments (only possible on desktop, if I remember correctly).

JamesHoward33

I don't think I am understanding still. Here is my thinking. I am getting about 700 exercise calories right now.

On a low activity level setting on MFP I get an allotment of 2100 calories. Add my exercise calories and I get 2,800.

If I set my activity level as high, I get about 2,700 calories from MFP making my total after exercise to 3,400.

So the activity level setting matters a difference of around 600 calories.

I just want to make sure I am eating the correct amount. Not a fluffed amount or under budgeted amount.

Lietchi

If you set your activity level setting higher and have your device synced, you'll get a smaller calorie adjustment, arriving at the same total calorie goal. MFP takes your total calories burned as per Garmin and then adjusts based on your selected weight goal (loss, gain or maintain).

JamesHoward33

Lietchi wrote: »

If you set your activity level setting higher and have your device synced, you'll get a smaller calorie adjustment, arriving at the same total calorie goal. MFP takes your total calories burned as per Garmin and then adjusts based on your selected weight goal (loss, gain or maintain).

Did not know that. Thank you.

cwolfman13

JamesHoward33 wrote: »

I don't think I am understanding still. Here is my thinking. I am getting about 700 exercise calories right now.

On a low activity level setting on MFP I get an allotment of 2100 calories. Add my exercise calories and I get 2,800.

If I set my activity level as high, I get about 2,700 calories from MFP making my total after exercise to 3,400.

So the activity level setting matters a difference of around 600 calories.

I just want to make sure I am eating the correct amount. Not a fluffed amount or under budgeted amount.

The number you get with exercise isn't the actual exercise itself...it's an adjustment between your activity level as input into MFP to your actual activity level per your device. If you increased your activity level in MFP, you would just get a smaller or possibly no adjustment. The adjustment is for all of your activity, not just exercise...a 700 calorie adjustment would indicate that your overall activity level is higher than you think, even without the exercise portion.

AnnPT77

I want to underscore the bolded, because it's subtle, but important in a case like yours.

Lietchi wrote: »

JamesHoward33 wrote: »

Lietchi wrote: »

Your activity level on MFP is intended to reflect your non-exercise activity (job, hobbies, housework, commute,...). Exercise is separate and should be logged separately in your diary, which in turn will increase your calorie intake.

PS: it's a quirk on MFP, but you need to log strength training under Cardio to get calories for it.

I actually sync my Garmin and my workout calories sync fine. Just didn't know if I needed to adjust the activity level so the calories allowed number was correct.

If you sync your Garmin, then it actually doesn't matter at all what activity level you choose, your adjustment will fix it so you get the correct calorie goal.
The only thing you want to consider then is:
- if you prefer seeing positive adjustments added throughout the day, choose a lower activity level
- if you prefer a higher calorie goal from the start, but with potentially a negative adjustment if you haven't been active (yet) choose a higher activity level. Watch out though: in this case, make sure you activate negative calorie adjustments (only possible on desktop, if I remember correctly).

Also, any of this - MFP, your Garmin, other so-called calculators, even your careful logging - is just estimates and approximations. They absolutely can be close enough to be workable, but it's important to reality test. Use your MFP+Garmin goal for at least 4-6 weeks, then compare your bodyweight results to your goal. If it's close, you're golden. If it's not close, adjust your calorie intake.

The nature of statistical estimates like this is that they're the average for similar people. Most people are close to average (especially since this data has a pretty small standard deviation, i.e., tall narrow bell curve). A few people may be meaningfully higher or lower in calorie needs, and a rare few may be surprisingly far off in either direction. The reasons may not be obvious, but it can happen. Your 4-6 week experiment will give you the experiential data to understand whether you're close to average, or (less likely) far enough off to need to adjust.

PAV8888

covered above via cooperative effort!

negative calories important issue. final adjustment is only valid at midnight due to quirks on how the calories are added up during the day.

And in the end all is estimates. validation is per own results as reflected over sufficient time.

mtaratoot

As another example of how sometimes activity calories don't show up:

I wear a Garmin. If I just go about my daily activities, I get calorie "credit" for steps. If I go for a long walk, my calorie budget goes up. if I turn on the activity log feature of my device and tell it that I am going for a walk, I get calorie "credits" for that as well. However; if I turn on the activity feature and log a "walk," and then I add steps before that (or have already logged steps), I don't get any calorie "credit" until I've taken enough steps over and above what it estimated for the walk. Today, for example, I took a LONG walk through town - nearly eight miles. It gave me a calorie credit of 729 calories. My device also counted 16844 steps on that activity (I'm refining my steps per mile estimate, so I write this stuff down for now). That's a calorie for every 23 steps or so. Well....

In addition to that logged "activity" walk, I've logged over a half mile of additional "steps" or 1171 steps. Just now it finally credited me two additional calories which would appear to be one calorie per 585 steps. Clearly there's a disconnect. It's not really - it's just how my Garmin and MFP interact to make sure I get the best estimate possible, and in my experience, it works reasonably well for me.