Calorie Intake with exercise

luvforwill

Hi guys,

I am fairly new at this and need some clarification:

My calculated caloric intake is 1330 calories. I run mon/wed/ fri and do Zumba tues/wed when I am not out of town. When I am out of town I am usually fire hose testing which is all manual labor. I have read on some posts that when you exercise you need to eat back your exercise calories and up your caloric intake. My questions are these:

1. Why do I eat my exercise calories? Isn't that basic mechanics of weight loss, more out than in? I understand that you body needs sufficient amount of energy to maintain physical activity, but if you eat everything you burn it seems to me you will maintain.
2. How do I know how much more calories to eat based upon my exercise routine?

That is it. Thank you guys in advance for your help.

nikkizamano

i am fairly new to this as well. I have the same question as you!! Hopefully someone will have the answer for us!

holdingon2faith793

Im sure someone else will answer better but, MFP already has you at a calorie deficit, meaning if you don't eat them back you will send your body into starvation mode..I go by my TDEE - 200 calories so that when I over eat Im still good..

elleloch

You won't gain or maintain if you eat all your exercise calories.

Let's just say for example that you plug in all your information to MFP to lose 1 pound a week, and it tells you your daily goal is 1450 calories.

Then you go to the gym and smash everything, burning 600 calories.

You plug that workout into MFP and it tells you that you are netting 850 calories. So you have 600 calories left over.

The 1450 goal is already the deficit you need to hit for healthy weight loss. You can net a little bit lower than that if you want but try not to net below 1200, because that's just friggen miserable and you will be grouchy and hungry and ugh.

You should eat food, it is fuel. I always compare it to gassing up your car. If you're planning to travel 350 miles, you fill up your gas tank full. You don't set out on your way and try to get to your destination 350 miles away when you only have enough gas for 200 miles. That makes the journey a hell of a lot more frustrating, eh?

Gatlen

Heres a quick article from a site.. dont remember which but i had it saved to my hard drive...

You’ve just finished one of your best workouts. Do you know what—and when—you need to eat in order to maximize your results? We’ve got the answers right here.

With our earlier article focusing entirely on what to eat before exercising, we’d be remiss to not explain what you should be eating after your workout. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do today.

We’ve traveled across the internet and called upon many of the same experts who explained what, when, and why to eat before a workout. We’ve broken things down into a few different sections: first, a quick run-down of the science behind eating for recovery, then a word about fluids.

Finally, we get into the timing of your post workout eating, the types of foods that work the best, and some of the guiding principles to keep in mind. Let’s go!

WHAT’S THE POINT OF EATING AFTER EXERCISE?

It’s all about two things: recovery and storage. You need to recover the losses you undertook during the exercise, and your body is simply better at storing that recovery fuel right after your workout. Sure, you can eat later—but the benefits won’t be as good.

The sports medicine pros at ESPN explain it: “athletes need carbohydrate and fluid to replace glycogen and water losses during the exercise. The muscles store more glycogen immediately after exercise than they do later.” Simple, no?

We’ll talk about what to eat shortly, but generally you want to stick to carbs and protein. Why, exactly? Well says about.com —protein “provides the amino acids necessary to rebuild muscle tissue that is damaged during intense, prolonged exercise. It can also increase the absorption of water from the intestines and improve muscle hydration. The amino acids in protein can also stimulate the immune system, making you more resistant to colds and other infections.”

While you might find some advice that suggests carbs will serve you fine on their own, we noticed “one study found that athletes who refueled with carbohydrate and protein had 100 percent greater muscle glycogen stores than those who only ate carbohydrate. Insulin was also highest in those who consumed a carbohydrate and protein drink.” The magic ratio seems to be 4:1—for every four grams of carbs, you should have one gram of protein.

There was one more piece of advice that we found interesting. Apparently, eating post-workout is most important for those who workout nearly every day—and if you’re following a lot of the routines on the site right now, that’s you.

But if you’re the kind of person who only “works out 2 -3 times per week, you need not worry as much about post-exercise foods because your body will have enough time between workouts to recover,” says Columbia University. Notice that if you’re a lighter exerciser you need not worry as much—but if you want to follow the advice anyway—do it!

Gatlen

Oh yeah and the other big thing. Research muscle catabolic state.

"A catabolic state is a condition that is mainly caused by excessive training coupled with a lack of adequate nutrition, especially protein. It results in numerous undesirable side effects in the body, such as extreme fatigue, joint and muscle pain, and sleeplessness."

"Our body has the ability to breakdown our muscle tissue for use as an energy source during heavy exercise. This is part of a bodily process called gluconeogenesis which means producing or generating glucose from non-carbohydrate sources. The part of this reaction that is important to us as bodybuilders is known as the glucose – alanine cycle, in which the BCAA's are stripped from the muscle tissue and parts of them being converted to the amino acid alanine, which is then transported to the liver and converted into glucose. If we consume supplemental BCAA's the body does not have to breakdown our muscle tissue to gain extra energy. Studies have concluded that the use of BCAA's (up to 4g) during and after training can result in a significant reduction of muscle breakdown during training. Catabolism of muscle can cause shrinkage of our muscles and muscle soreness and may also lead us to injury.:

bcorbin34

Any weight loss program will tell you eat what you burn, as you have already lowered your intake of calories. If your body thinks it is starving it goes after muscle and stores the fat. So you want to make sure you eat enough to keep your body going. Also one think people seem to think is that fat weighs less then muscle, a pound is a pound so do mesurements as well as the scale, becuase if your working out a lot it sometime shows more in our measurements before the scale.

Not saying you have to eat all that you earn, I know I can't if I workout too much in one day, but you should try and eat most of it. Good luck

cwolfman13

MFP builds your calorie deficit into your diet...your calorie GOAL is already a huge deficit from maintenance. This is why it's really critical to read the stickies and what not...they're basically the instruction manual for properly utilizing this tool.

MFP is a NEAT method calculator...what this means is that you don't assume exercise activity in your activity level...just your day to day hum drum. You then account for exercise after the fact by logging and eating those calories back. This is a lifesaver for individuals who are new and/or inconsistent in their fitness regimen...if they make their workout, they get to eat more...if not, no biggie..they just eat to that goal and still lose weight.

Other calcualtors factor in an estimate of exercise in your activity level...thus, it would be accounted for upfront...thus, eating them back would be counterproductive.

You just need to actually read up on the tool you're using.

Rogsman

Your 1330 calories is where you want to be at with any exercise adjustments. So if you do zero exercise for a day, you only eat 1330. If you do 600 calories worth of exercise, you now eat 1930. Just make sure you have a plan to spread those calories throughout the day vice in one sitting. You also need a high accuracy of calorie count, or it don't work and you'll either run out of steam or not lose weight.

Best way to obtain calories burned by cardio: Heart Rate Monitor. I use a Polar FT4 which takes into account my stats. This HRM is also very cheap (Amazon). The calories it calculates is very close to the calories counted on machines I use - so I believe it's accuracy is very good.

TeaBea

Hi guys,

I am fairly new at this and need some clarification:

My calculated caloric intake is 1330 calories. I run mon/wed/ fri and do Zumba tues/wed when I am not out of town. When I am out of town I am usually fire hose testing which is all manual labor. I have read on some posts that when you exercise you need to eat back your exercise calories and up your caloric intake. My questions are these:

1. Why do I eat my exercise calories? Isn't that basic mechanics of weight loss, more out than in? I understand that you body needs sufficient amount of energy to maintain physical activity, but if you eat everything you burn it seems to me you will maintain.
2. How do I know how much more calories to eat based upon my exercise routine?

That is it. Thank you guys in advance for your help.

1. MFP gave you a deficit BEFORE exercise (that way people who can't/won't exercise still lose weight). So you eat back calories to prevent a really large deficit. Large deficits can lead to muscle loss. If you want to maximize fat loss, then eat some calories back.

2. MFP gives calorie burn estimates under the Cardiovascular section. I'm not sire if Zumba is in there, if not choose Aerobics - dance.

Here's the problem .... MFP can only estimate calorie burns, machines can only estimate calorie burns, and heart rate monitors can only estimate calorie burns. MFP is overstated for many people ..... HRMs do a pretty good job (for cardio) for many people. Calorie burns are dependent upon many factors (some of which are): height, weight, age, gender, and exertion level. Many people who use MFP estimates will over ride the values given .... say start with 60% of MFP's numbers. If you are not losing weight after awhile, then cut back on that percent. If you feel tired (often) .... then that number could be too low.

ruthrowlett1

Great information - Thanks!

conniehutchins

Honestly I don't get the math on the net calorie thing either and I've read it several times. I am a women needing to loose about roughly 30 pounds. (at least when I started) I know its unhealthy to eat less than 1200 calories. So I want to loose 1.5 to 2 pounds a week. I've plugged that into my goals and I excercise enough to burn up over 2200 calories so I can have the 1000 calorie deficit a day for a two pound loss and eat 1200 to 1400 calories. I use Myfitness pal to record my food and it syncs with my fitbit account where I track calories burned and the deficit. While 1000 calorie deficit is my goal, I proobably average closer to 800 as I take Sundays off and I never eat less than 1200 calories per day. I've been tracking for 5 weeks on fitbit.com and myfitnesspal and have lost a total 7.5 pounds which is right inline with what I've recorded.

So I go with whatever, fitbit tells me I have left to eat, instead of myfitnesspal, as long as my total intake is not less than 1200.

caly_man

when your deficit is too big, the body wont lose well
when your deficit is too small, the body won't lose much

use online calorie calculators as a starting point, what you want to figure out is how to eat enough calories a day to lose about 1 lbs per week.

that might very well mean not eating all your exercise calories back, maybe just half of them.

You are just going to have to trial and error your daily calorie intake for several weeks.

the best thing you can do for your eating plan is to use a food scale to weigh out food portions, i believe that is the best ingredient for weight loss, well that and being consistent

luvforwill

Thanks guys, the information was VERY helpful. I love to eat, so meeting my goal of calories is NO problem! I just wanted to make sure that I was not being counter production. My brother (who is into body building) has me watching my macros too. I know that is more for body building buuuttttt......by doing this it has really made me aware of what exactly I am eating. This is helpful too! But I appreciate all your advise

Amanda

Mr_Knight

1. Why do I eat my exercise calories? Isn't that basic mechanics of weight loss, more out than in? I understand that you body needs sufficient amount of energy to maintain physical activity, but if you eat everything you burn it seems to me you will maintain.
2. How do I know how much more calories to eat based upon my exercise routine?

The idea is that your calorie deficit is based on your "normal" daily routine, so any exercise means both extra calories burned and extra calories eaten. Personally, due to the difficulty in getting accurate calorie burn estimates, I think most people would be better of NOT eating back their exercise calories to start with. Then if they start to feel tired or draggy, it's an indication they are under-eating for the activity level, and they can add back 100 calories at a time until they feel "right" again.

2. Well there's the rub. For certain activities - cycling, running, swimming - the estimates are pretty good if the person tracks how far they actually went. For many other activities, the estimates are...challenging. Hence my suggestion above - the only way to really figure it out is trial and error. Workouts like Zumba, Body Shred etc are notoriously over-estimating calorie burn, so beware.

wendyg311

Oooooo...this was a good one. I'm new too and this was HUGE! Thank you everyone

geekyjock76

A simple explanation of eating exercise calories. First, understand what TDEE is:

Total Daily Energy Expenditure is the amount of energy in the form of calories your body burns to maintain weight based on activity. Your body burns energy through four primary functions:
1)Resting Metabolic Rate - minimal caloric intake required for basic physiological function while at rest and awake.
2)Thermic Effect of Food - amount of calories needed to process food consumed (approximately 10% of TDEE).
3)Non-exercise Activity Thermogenesis - calories burned doing mundane, everyday activities not considered exercise.
4)Exercise Activity Thermogenesis - calories burned during exercise.

MFP's formula, although based on using a TDEE method, does not include exercise activity.

Example:
My TDEE is about 2800 calories. Of which:
My RMR is about 1900 calories.
My TEF is about 280 calories.
My NEAT is about 280 calories.
My EAT is about 340 calories.

Consider that MFP does not include EAT in its equation. Thus, as an exerciser, I start out with a deficit of -340 calories before I even chose a weekly fat loss goal. Thus, MFP only takes into account 2460 calories of the 2800 to maintain my weight. I must then keep in mind this -340 calorie default deficit when considering how much to eat.

If I were to choose a 0.5 lb per week fat loss goal, it establishes a -250 calorie deficit. But since MFP does not include EAT, I need to take into account those -340 calories (340+250=590 calorie total deficit). Thus, by not eating my exercise calories, I am then actually adhering to a 590 calorie daily deficit which is a 1.2 lb weekly fat loss goal instead of the desired 0.5 lb fat loss goal.

slim4health56

... watching my macros too...

Amanda

Good advice for everyone.

Too, there's the losing weight issue AND learning how to eat a healthy diet so you keep it off when you're at your ideal weight. Welcome!

haymancm

If the scale is not moving by eating back all your calories or some of them, eat less of your workout calories. Either you are overestimating your burned calories or food eaten. To lose weight, sometimes you need to create a bigger deficit than what MFP has calculated....just keep this in mind.