Do you eat back your calories from excercise?

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Replies

  • farewell_friend
    farewell_friend Posts: 41 Member
    I absolutely hate eating calories back after I exercise; what's the point of exercise if you eat them back? Well, it's true that even if you eat them back exercise does confer other benefits, but I still don't/won't do it.
  • SonyaCele
    SonyaCele Posts: 2,841 Member
    when i was actively losing weight i did not eat them, but now that i'm at my target weight, i eat and drink them all!
  • sarafischbach9
    sarafischbach9 Posts: 466 Member
    It is probably a good idea to at least eat some of your exercise calories back, especially if you're set as "sedentary" or "lightly active". Some people say that the exercise machines and MFP overestimate your calories burned. Even so I'd at least eat some of it back, because you're still burning calories either way. If you are using a heart rate monitor, those are the most accurate, and you should be eating all of those calories back. If you're using other things, like an activity tracker, those are just estimates, but I'd at least eat most of those back.

    Now if you set yourself as "active" then you probably don't need to log your exercises because you're estimate based on your average activity level would be already in there. That is another idea if you are wary about eating back your calories. Set yourself to active and eat at that level and see what happens.

    For me, though, I set myself as "lightly active" and add in my exercises. Some people find that motivating to get their exercises in to begin with!
  • shrinkingshreya
    shrinkingshreya Posts: 118 Member
    If I'm hungry I eat them back, if not I leave it be. Keep it simple, don't be afraid to eat them back.
  • MireyGal76
    MireyGal76 Posts: 7,334 Member
    For me, I set my exercise level to sedentary. I am a full time working mom, two kids, in a two story home. I walk a lot and do a lot of stairs.

    I try to err on the side of caution when I log my food, and therefore when I exercise, I log all my cals. I use an HRM.

    I eat back almost all of my exercise cals and have since I started on MFP two years ago.
    When I started, I was struggling with those last ten pounds, which I firmly believed I would never lose. Ever.

    I've lost close to twenty. Strictly by keeping at a very mild deficit (I've lost 5 pounds since I switched to maintenance), busting my *kitten* with my workouts, and eating what I want as long as it fits in my total cals for the day (including exercise cals). Yesterday... I burned around 1200 cals, and ate close to 3000.

    If you are weighing your food, and being honest with your effort... there is no reason why, if you are following the MFP method, you can't safely eat at least 50 - 75% of your exercise cals back.

    That's amazing! good work :) I hope I can stick with it like that, this is the longest I have remained logging on MFP, just on one month.

    Just curious, what do you do for exercise that burns off 1200 calories?

    A crazy intense hour long boxing session, walking over my lunch hour, running the 19 flights of stairs at work, twice. And that day... I may have also done some weights when I got home.

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