Do you eat your calories burned through exercise?

ScottH_200

Kind of a weird question, however, what is the routine of others regarding calories burned through additional exercise on a given day?

Lets say you burn an additional 500 calories through aerobics and those calories are added back to your daily net calories, do you take the liberty to eat an additional 500 calories that day, or, leave it as is?

Simbaby09

I realised when I eat it i don't loose much ,so i personally choose to ignore it most day but when i can't help it , i do not feel guilty ,i worked for it .

Mokey41

I don't eat back exercise unless it's a huge amount from a long run or long bike ride. If I were to eat back exercise I wouldn't eat back more than 50% because nothing is accurate in measuring that burn and I probably made mistakes in my food logging.

rowanwood

It depends on how you determine your calorie budget. If you use the MFP method and say choose "sedentary" and then exercise, you should eat back. If you choose some form of active, and do double your normal workout, eat back. If you use a TDEE- % method, then its already built in, so you don't.

This is covered ad nauseum on the forums.

pdunville

I think this is a great question because I am struggling with it as well. I have done extra exercise to make up for a bad day, but when I'm having a good day and stay within my calorie limit and then exercised, part of me thinks I should have something to eat after I exercise. I wonder if it's healthy to not eat something after exercising and vice versa.

vampirequeen1959

I try to leave it as a calorie deficit.

Wrxsti23

I eat some back if I am hungry. My goal is 1400 calories per day but sometimes I do a double workout and according to my pretty accurate chest strap heart rate monitor I can burn 800-900 during this time and it would be ridiculous if I didn't eat back ANY of those. If my body is telling me it's hungry then I eat and if not I don't. I don't set a rule to myself that I must eat them back or not. Too much restriction is never good. If I do feel extra hungry or just want to splurge on that Starbucks drink then I don't feel guilty about it.

Docpremie

MFP has a deficit already built into their calculations. You are supposed to eat back your exercise calories, otherwise your deficit is too large. If you're using MFP to calculate your exercise calories, most folks feel their database overestimates exercise calories, so eat back 1/2-2/3 & watch your weight loss. If you're only eating 1200 calories/day, it is especially IMPERATIVE to eat back your exercise calories or net calories are way too low!!!

If you don't like the daily swing in your calories goal with eating back exercise calories, you can switch to the TDEE-% deficit method. It has your exercise already built in, so your daily calorie goal remains stable. I prefer this method, because I know exactly what I should be eating everyday. In the TDEE method you DO NOT eat back exercise calories. In theory, the 2 methods should give similar calorie goal results.

As an aside, I have a FitBit & find it UNDER estimates my calorie burn. I can eat at my daily calorie burn according to my FitBit and still lose weight. The accuracy of the calories burn varies depending on the device used to measure your burn. It becomes a process of trial & error to find what is most accurate; that is exactly why I love the TDEE method.

**By the way, "hunger" is not a good gadget of whether to eat back those burned calories!!!

viglet

I guess it depends on your ultimate goal.

I'm not a doctor or a scientist but from what I have read, if you don't eat back your exercise calories, you are risking losing more muslce than fat. Basically, your body needs energy to burn fat, if there isnt enough energy (calories/nutrition) it will just burn muslce becuase it is easier for it to do so.

So if your ultimate goal is to lose weight and you don't care if it is muslce or fat, then don't them back. But you will be able to see the difference when naked

With that said, I look at my calories on a weekly or even monthly goal instead of daily. Some days I eat them back, some days I dont, but over the month, my average is a healthy number.

AlyssasDiet

I make sure I eat them back (even if I'm not hungry) but that's because I have my net set at 1200 and I don't want to go below that. Yesterday I burned 400 calories from exercise, so if I didn't eat my calories back I'd be at 800 calories for the day (at over 200lbs) sooo yeah lol I milk it. :laugh:

ScottH_200

Thanks for the replies!