BrainyBurro's October 2013 Challenge

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  • Chevy_Quest
    Chevy_Quest Posts: 2,012 Member
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    Great Job Brainy - By the way - I "got" your post yesterday. You wrote something very logical and true. This is a pet peeve of mine too by the way. Keep up the good fight!
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    here's a screenshot of the spreadsheet i use in conjunction with MFP. i trimmed some calculations out of it that are only relevant to me, but here it is...

    Spreadsheet_zps0c6a8290.jpg

    as you can see, i keep a running sum in columns A, B, and D. in column C, the running sum is divided by 3500. columns F and G are averaged. when a day has been completed, i mark the entries in BOLD. the UNBOLDED entries are just placeholders. it's pretty simply to setup and keep updated. just a few seconds each day. also, in this spreadsheet, i use my own calculations for BMR which are a little bit higher than MFP. i have my sedentary BMR calculated at 2720. MFP has it at 2590. at the end of each month, i recalculate it based on my new weight. i keep the same estimates for cardio workouts and BMR for the full month. the small variances that occur as weight is lost don't impact my monthly tracking, so i don't recalculate "in month". i do recalculate my cardio burns anew at the start of each month though.
  • Chevy_Quest
    Chevy_Quest Posts: 2,012 Member
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    Brainy this is really helpful. This gives me some great ideas. Thanks for taking the screenshot of the spreadsheet!
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 22

    Oct22_zps5869f2ba.jpg

    cardio: 3.3 mile walk (461 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 3051 calories
    today's deficit: 1267 calories
    cumulative deficit: 12,200 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's large slice (canadian bacon, double order of banana peppers, double order of pineapple)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 23

    Oct23_zpsb6deed01.jpg

    cardio: 14.6 mile walk (2042 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 4632 calories
    today's deficit: 2997 calories
    cumulative deficit: 15,197 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's large slice (canadian bacon, double order of banana peppers, double order of pineapple)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 24

    Oct24_zpse1a4b867.jpg

    cardio: none
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 2590 calories
    today's deficit: -51 calories
    cumulative deficit: 15,146 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's large slice (canadian bacon, double order of banana peppers, double order of pineapple)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 25

    Oct25_zpsd0792504.jpg

    cardio: 8.5 mile walk (1188 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 3778 calories
    today's deficit: 1728 calories
    cumulative deficit: 16,874 calories

    today's pizza... 8 x Papa John's medium slice (mushrooms, green peppers, pepperoni)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 26

    Oct26_zps963cbdc9.jpg

    cardio: 6.6 mile walk (923 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 3513 calories
    today's deficit: 261 calories
    cumulative deficit: 17,135 calories

    today's pizza... 8 x Papa John's medium slice (mushrooms, italian sausage, pepperoni)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 27

    Oct27_zpse2189dd4.jpg

    cardio: 11.1 mile walk (1552 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 4142 calories
    today's deficit: 1032 calories
    cumulative deficit: 18,167 calories

    today's pizza... 4 x Papa John's medium slice (pineapple, italian sausage, banana peppers)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 28

    Oct28_zps906db50a.jpg

    cardio: 6.6 mile walk (923 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 3513 calories
    today's deficit: 873 calories
    cumulative deficit: 19,040 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's medium slice (pineapple, italian sausage, banana peppers)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 29

    Oct29_zpsc5fe1879.jpg

    cardio: 5.5 mile walk (769 calories)
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 3359 calories
    today's deficit: 372 calories
    cumulative deficit: 19,412 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's medium slice (pineapple, italian sausage, banana peppers)
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    i've definitely been snacking waaaaaaaay too much on Halloween candy. i won't hit my 10lb goal... instead, i'll finish in the 6lb-7lb range for the month. i have mixed feelings about this. on the one hand, i would have liked to have hit the 10lb mark since it would made for a more impressive title to the thread if i decide to post the results in Success Stories. on the other hand, just think of all the clean-eating/paleo/primal/low-carb/low-sugar folks who will have meltdowns when they see that i lost weight not only eating pizza every day, but also a metric ton of candy in place of regular foods! :wink:

    still, i can't help but point the finger of blame at Big Halloween Candy. there's clearly some sort of conspiracy afoot because a whole aisle at the local Walmart is dedicated to bags and bags of delicious candy FOR A WHOLE MONTH. i also blame Big 48 Hour Flu. i lost about 4 days worth of cardio in a row this month due to that conspiracy. finally, i blame society. if there's one thing i've learned in the era of Big Media, it's that society is ALWAYS to blame for everything! :tongue:

    tinhat.jpg

    one another note, i have done very little strength training this month. i have been pressed for time and it always got put off until the end of the day and i have discovered that i have very little motivation to do that work at 10PM or 11PM at night. i think i need to start budgeting an earlier start time for it in November.:embarassed:
  • Chevy_Quest
    Chevy_Quest Posts: 2,012 Member
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    Hey Brainy.. good post...I got "liberated" by eating more pizza than I have in years... but I also liberated a lot more candy too! I didn't lose this month, but between Cindy and You I am looking at things from a month view.

    This challenge has been a success in my eyes - So Thanks! :drinker:
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    as i have been snacking on halloween candies, i have simply been keeping the empty wrappers on the counter until i can log them. since i need to get ALL of them logged by the end of the month, but not necessarily all on the day they were eaten, the final two days of this month in my diary are going to be UGLY... like really ugly.

    i'm not bothered by that because food is just fuel and the only thing worse than eating 16 Reese's Peanut Butter Cups is NOT eating 16 Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, but it's going to look ugly to outsiders seeing 16 or 17 of those logged on a single day. :embarassed:

    dont-judge-me.jpg
  • Cindyinpg
    Cindyinpg Posts: 3,902 Member
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    i've definitely been snacking waaaaaaaay too much on Halloween candy. i won't hit my 10lb goal... instead, i'll finish in the 6lb-7lb range for the month. i have mixed feelings about this. on the one hand, i would have liked to have hit the 10lb mark since it would made for a more impressive title to the thread if i decide to post the results in Success Stories. on the other hand, just think of all the clean-eating/paleo/primal/low-carb/low-sugar folks who will have meltdowns when they see that i lost weight not only eating pizza every day, but also a metric ton of candy in place of regular foods! :wink:

    still, i can't help but point the finger of blame at Big Halloween Candy. there's clearly some sort of conspiracy afoot because a whole aisle at the local Walmart is dedicated to bags and bags of delicious candy FOR A WHOLE MONTH. i also blame Big 48 Hour Flu. i lost about 4 days worth of cardio in a row this month due to that conspiracy. finally, i blame society. if there's one thing i've learned in the era of Big Media, it's that society is ALWAYS to blame for everything! :tongue:

    tinhat.jpg

    one another note, i have done very little strength training this month. i have been pressed for time and it always got put off until the end of the day and i have discovered that i have very little motivation to do that work at 10PM or 11PM at night. i think i need to start budgeting an earlier start time for it in November.:embarassed:
    Personally, I think it will make for even a more meaningful success story that you included a holiday indulgence. If I see one more thread about people afraid to celebrate Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas because of food. :explode: People are actually saying they would rather miss out on seeing friends and family than be subjected to the temptation of 'junk' food, even for a single day. So sad and unneccessary!
  • Chevy_Quest
    Chevy_Quest Posts: 2,012 Member
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    i've definitely been snacking waaaaaaaay too much on Halloween candy.
    <<snipped>>
    Personally, I think it will make for even a more meaningful success story that you included a holiday indulgence. If I see one more thread about people afraid to celebrate Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas because of food. :explode: People are actually saying they would rather miss out on seeing friends and family than be subjected to the temptation of 'junk' food, even for a single day. So sad and unneccessary!

    +1 Could not have said it any better .. sadly
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 30

    Oct30_zps27f1f3f2.jpg

    cardio: none
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 2590 calories
    today's deficit: -1360 calories
    cumulative deficit: 17,680 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's medium slice (pineapple, italian sausage, banana peppers)

    blech! ...i should have done a long walk, but just didn't feel like doing it.
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    Day 31

    Oct31_zps09dfc65e.jpg

    cardio: none
    strength: none
    TDEE using MFP #'s: 2590 calories
    today's deficit: -6743 calories
    cumulative deficit: 10,937 calories

    today's pizza... Papa John's medium slice (pineapple, italian sausage, banana peppers)

    d'oh! i gave a whole lot of calories back on Halloween. as mentioned previously, a number of these calories were eaten (but not logged) in the past couple of days, but a lot of the pop tarts were eaten on this day. the final day of the month always looks a little bit like this for me (although not usually to this extreme) as i make an effort to squeeze in everything that might not have been previously logged onto the final day to make sure that everything eaten during the month actually gets logged during the month. i don't really worry about my daily numbers too much. i do pay attention to my 3-day and 7-day "averages" for macros, but mostly i worry about my monthly numbers. if you look at my spreadsheet (posted previously), you'll see why that is... i have it setup in such a way that i can see my projected monthly results as i go along. this is the long view that i prefer to take because fretting over daily numbers would drive me crazy. for this reason, having a day like this one is not a big deal to me. all of these calories that i gave back will just take me a few days to recover. that's all it means. i refuse to worry about individual "bad" days or even a few consecutive "bad" days... what matters is having more "good" days than "bad" and making sure that the overall trend is to lose weight while meeting my macros.
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
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    here are the results of this challenge:

    total calories in: ~91,237
    total calories out: ~103,264
    total miles walked (cardio): 164.3 miles
    average daily calorie intake: ~2943
    average daily TDEE: ~3331
    average daily deficit: ~388
    weight loss: ~3.5lbs
    average daily fats intake: 91g ( =0.35g/lb of bodyweight)
    average daily protein intake: 134g (=0.8g/lb of LBM)

    somewhere along the way, my daily cumulative deficit number got off track and it's not worth going back to find out where that happened. my final cumulative deficit for October should have been 12,027 (according to my spreadsheet).

    my daily fats average was higher than i wanted, but i exactly hit the ETP recommendations for my bodyweight. my daily protein average also exactly hit my ETP protein recommendations (at the time) for my estimated LBM. i was shooting for a lower fats number just to save those extra calories (9 calories per gram of fat), but i'm ok with hitting the actual ETP suggestion (0.35g/lb of bodyweight) instead of what i was shooting for (0.20g/lb of bodyweight).

    if i had not eaten all of those extra calories (damn you delicious pop tarts and bagels!!!) on the last couple of days of the month and had put in another 36 miles or so of walking (to reach my goal of 200 miles for the month), my weight loss would have come in right around ~7lbs for the month. that would have been pretty good considering the amount of Halloween candy also eaten during the month.

    i'll go ahead and repeat this challenge again in an upcoming month, only this time without all of the Halloween candy temptation. :happy: