Calorie Burn Question

Spreadborough

Hi,

I'm relatively new here, and trying to work out some of the changes I need to make. I've got a question about calorie burn that I've been wondering. I know there is the suggestion on MFP to "eat back" your exercise calories, and I've read several posts regarding this and the differing views.

One thing I was curious about in the statistics though is the calorie burn rate for the exercise vs. my normal calorie burn rate for just being here. What I mean is, I burn around 2400 calories a day by existing, which is about 100 calories an hour. If I walk for an hour, 4 miles per hour, that comes to about 500 calories burned from the exercise. MFP adds that as 500 extra calories available for the day. Would it really be 400 though, after deducting the 100 calories I would have burned by sitting on my *kitten*?

What do you think. I'm not really trying to debate the pros and cons of eating back calories, but trying to determine if you do decide to eat back some / all of the calories, would you be lessening your desired calorie deduction amount and therefore lessening your weight loss if you used the exercise burn, or does it already take into account your base calorie burn (I forget the technical term)?

I've decided to not eat back all burned calories, but on days I burn a lot, I'll eat back some, and go above my set 1600 calories, and try to have a net of 1200 or so, but wondered about whether the base calories are being deducted from the burn from exercise.

Please let me know what you think. Thanks.

melliebee

I don't eat back all my exercise calories. While it makes sense in theory, I have realized that it is almost impossible to be completely accurate in counting calories. I always leave some for wiggle room, and I will NEVER eat when I am no hungry. Ugh, when people say to eat back your calories even if you are full it irritates me.

rickpearce

I'm concerned about this too mostly because I'm pretty sure the calories of the food I enter are correct but how do I really know if the calories burned calculation MFP gives me are correct? If MFP tells me I burned 1000 calories and then I eat those, what if they were wrong and I've only burned 400-500? Then I'm gone way over...

I've kind of been thinking of just cutting MFP's calculation in half and then eating maybe 50% of my exercise calories back. This way at least I could feel somewhat safe that I am not doing myself any damage.

Spreadborough

Maybe I am analyzing it too much, I tend to do that. I am really curious though if I burn 500 calories exercising (using accurate data such as Heart Rate Monitor) in an hour, but my base / resting calorie burn is 100 calories an hour, did I burn 500 calories more than not exercising, or is it 400 calories burned (net)? This would be even more important to me when I take a long walk with someone else (spouse), that walks at a considerably slower pace, where I would burn about 300 calories in an hour.

ljw556

I think when it says that you have burnt an extra 500 calories it means 500 and not 400, because your body used the 500 to move you and the other normal 100 for breathing etc. Eating back my exercise calories really seems to work for me - I seem to be regularly losing 4lb per week. I'm supposed to eat 2100 calories per day - I often burn about 1000 calories per day and eat between 2800-3000 per day and still lose 4lb per week. Don't be scared to eat your exercise calories. The whole design of the diet is that you are supposed to eat them back otherwise you will be creating a deficit of more than the 1000 calories per day (2lb loss per week). I think if you eat at least 1/2 of them back you should be able to keep your metabolism in good order but you can't run a car without gas

edit: I think this shows that MFP works the calories burnt accurately and if anything it seems to underestimate the calories I burn.

nrcorporan3

Well I've only been doing this ten days but I don't eat the "extra" unless hungry because if im under daily goal by lets say 100 then next day I go over 100 then it evens out. Not that I would purposely go over the amount under from day before but I see them as rollover minutes if I go over one day it won't affect me as much.Am I doing the right thing here? Only time I ate something after I ended my day was when I got a message saying I was way under in red letters so that kinda scared me nd I drank a glass of milk LOL...has anyone ever seen that message also? If so what do ya' ll do?