Eating your Exercise Calories?

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MPD6944
MPD6944 Posts: 75 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Do you eat your exercise calories? If so do you still lose weight? I've been sort of eating mine but not all and have not lost weight. Just wondering if I should just stick to my calories or if I should eat all of my exercise calories - which way to go??
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  • Eoghann
    Eoghann Posts: 130 Member
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    So long as you're taking in less calories than you're burning you will lose weight.

    So yes eat back at least some of your exercise calories.
  • MPD6944
    MPD6944 Posts: 75 Member
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    So does that mean if I am eating 1200 calories a day I need to burn more than that a day?
  • Eoghann
    Eoghann Posts: 130 Member
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    Even if you were completely sedentary you would be burning more than 1,200 calories a day.

    MFP does all the calculations for you, just make sure the calories remaining figure doesn't get to 0.
  • diannethegeek
    diannethegeek Posts: 14,776 Member
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    So does that mean if I am eating 1200 calories a day I need to burn more than that a day?

    No. You have to take into account all of the calories your body burns every day just keeping you alive, as well as the calories you burn doing everyday things like brushing your teeth.

    MFP is designed for you to eat back the extra calories you burn through workouts, assuming that your profile is set up accurate and you have an accurate estimate of how much you eat and how much you burn. If you're relying on MFP or gym machine estimates for your calories burned through exercise then you may want to eat 50-75% of those calories.

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/818082-exercise-calories-again-wtf
  • TeaBea
    TeaBea Posts: 14,517 Member
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    So does that mean if I am eating 1200 calories a day I need to burn more than that a day?

    Your body is using calories 24/7. Your heart, lungs, kidneys, etc. all use calories.....the vast majority of women use more than 1200 calories in a 24 hour period doing nothing (BMR).

    MFP gave you a calorie deficit BEFORE exercise. That way people who can't/won't exercise still lose weight. The trick to eating calories back is to find a good estimate for your workouts....and to not "double-dip" so to speak. Even sedentary people get "extra" credit for some activity.
  • APLAWING
    APLAWING Posts: 36
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    I don't eat my excercise cals because I am not sure how accurate the calories burned are to start with! I usually do 35 min cardio on the elliptical 5x a week & the machine says I burn 350-375, MFP says close to 600(which I'm certain is wrong)... So I just log what the machine says because it measures my heart rate. I don't eat them though, just in case it's off.
  • xShreddx
    xShreddx Posts: 127 Member
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    Good question and I've wondered the same thing. For the past few days, I've netted about 7-800 calories under target. I hope I'm not "starving" my body so it in turn banks fat. Any further direction would help!
  • hobbeskastiel
    hobbeskastiel Posts: 221 Member
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    I never consider my exercise calories as more food I can eat. I consider it more calories I burned. Faster weight loss. If I were fit and didn't need to lose weight then I would eat the extra calories to keep myself at a specific weight. After all, when I reach my goal I have no plans to stop working out.
  • MPD6944
    MPD6944 Posts: 75 Member
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    Thanks everyone, I think I am getting it....I work with a trainer for 30 min. 2x a week and a barbell class at the gym 1x a week and also have been doing cardio (treadmill or elliptical - 30 min. 4x a week). You would think with me only eating around 1200 calories a day (ok one day I went up to 1400 calories) the weight would just be falling off of me...but oh no, it still fluctuates up and down and I swear my trainer thinks I am lying about how much I am eating but I am not. So frustrated!
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
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    I never consider my exercise calories as more food I can eat. I consider it more calories I burned. Faster weight loss. If I were fit and didn't need to lose weight then I would eat the extra calories to keep myself at a specific weight. After all, when I reach my goal I have no plans to stop working out.

    Just looking at your profile, you can get away with not eating back exercise cals due to your weight loss goals.

    That would be pretty horrible advice for those within a much smaller window (less than 100ish) to lose. Those extra calories are needed for nutrition, fuel, etc...

    OP only has 11lbs to go. To say "that's faster weight loss" to someone in that situation can be pretty irresponsible. What you could lose in a week at this point might take the OP 2 months.
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
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    Thanks everyone, I think I am getting it....I work with a trainer for 30 min. 2x a week and a barbell class at the gym 1x a week and also have been doing cardio (treadmill or elliptical - 30 min. 4x a week). You would think with me only eating around 1200 calories a day (ok one day I went up to 1400 calories) the weight would just be falling off of me...but oh no, it still fluctuates up and down and I swear my trainer thinks I am lying about how much I am eating but I am not. So frustrated!

    I'd recommend opening your diary now.....

    With what you laid out, you should be losing because you're not eating much.......at all at 1200 gross.
  • bluebull123
    bluebull123 Posts: 27 Member
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    You may not be eating enough calories with that amount of activity. Try upping it to 1400 calories a day (changing your setting from sedentary to light activity) and see what that does for you.
  • MPD6944
    MPD6944 Posts: 75 Member
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    Thanks I will edit my setting to light activity and see what happens :)

    Ok I changed it to light but the calories per day still say 1200 -- anything else??
  • earlnabby
    earlnabby Posts: 8,171 Member
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    I'm kind of in between. I coordinate MFP with my Fitbit and I sometimes get extra calories on days where I run more errands or whatever and the Fitbit says I burned more than normal. Those I do not eat back. The days I work out, I do eat back some. I have some flexibility because I am only eating at a deficit to lose 1 lb a week so a few extra calories burned will still fuel my body enough. I let my hunger be my guide as to how many I eat back on those days.
  • lenarashminraj
    lenarashminraj Posts: 53 Member
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    MFP may overestimate your calories burned for some activities, best way is to manually enter the 'calorie burn' showed in cardio machine.

    The calories goal MFP gives you in food diary is what you should eat if you dont work out. Once you enter the calorie you burned, it automatically updates the calorie goal, and MFP expects that you will consume it, atleast half of it. Only thing is make sure you wont see the calorie remaining as 'o' or negative numbers. If you're full you dont HAVE to eat, but if you are hungry in the evening, dont starve your body after a good workout.

    i was following a 1200cal meal plan which MFP suggested with an average calorie burn of 400-450cal.. i reduced 10lbs in 5 weeks... but when i stopped my exercise for 1 month i gained back all the weight i burned. what i understood is i was starving my body, so it is easy to gain back the weight i lost.. then i posted a query about in forum and got very good replies from MFP friends. as they suggested i changed my settings and now i follow 1400calorie plan. because of ligament inflamation im not able to exercise as earlier, but still i loose weight and im happy with it. there are some cheat days too:wink:

    Your body needs fuel for metabolism, i will suggest you to change the settings and keep your calorie intake as 1400. :flowerforyou:
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
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    Thanks I will edit my setting to light activity and see what happens :)

    Ok I changed it to light but the calories per day still say 1200 -- anything else??

    You only have a few lbs left. I'm guessing you have it set at 2lbs per week? If so, that's really aggressive with what you have left. Try changing it to 1 - .5 lbs per week.

    What is your ht and wt?
  • 60sPanda
    60sPanda Posts: 303 Member
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    I absolutely eat ALL of my additional exercise calories (swimming, kung fu, any walking over 10,000 steps). One week I experimented by not eating them and gained weight, went back to eating them all and lost. But everyone is slightly different, so you just need to experiment.

    I figured out that I was eating an average of 1800 calories a day (including exercise calories earnt) - I am female, 5ft 5, started at 184 pounds and finished at 140 pounds.
  • Annesoucy1957
    Annesoucy1957 Posts: 125
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    I dont eat them back, I am not hungry and wont eat if that is the case. I know. I could swallow a tbs of peanut butter or something but still wont do it. Eating when not hungry was a big part of me gaining weight in the first place and something I want to leave behind.

    My weight loss is constant, I sleep well, I have energy and meet my macro
  • MPD6944
    MPD6944 Posts: 75 Member
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    Ok, I changed it to 1 lb. a week and it now has given me 1270 calories per day, I might try that as long as I'm working out as hard as I have been lately.


    Ht. 5'2", Wt. 146
  • JoeDenison
    JoeDenison Posts: 18 Member
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    Do you eat your exercise calories? If so do you still lose weight? I've been sort of eating mine but not all and have not lost weight. Just wondering if I should just stick to my calories or if I should eat all of my exercise calories - which way to go??

    I set my MFP activity level to "sedentary", then manually record my HIIT workouts (both strength and cardio days), and let fitbit fill in the rest of the calories. This gives me more accurate BMR and TDEE values reported by MFP. I used to eat my exercise calories, but results didn't last long, plateaued.

    Currently I'm not eating my exercise calories: adhering to a strict 1,000 calorie deficit from my TDEE (ignoring exercise -- the extra calorie expenditure from exercise just helps me along further/faster). That's about 1,300 calories a day for me. Losing about 2+lbs weekly with this, plenty of energy.

    Check my diary for types of foods and macro nutrient values (I try to make sure the info is accurate).

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