Do I have to eat back my exercise calories?

spaingirl2011

Hi everyone - I know this topic gets discussed quite frequently, but I would really like to hear a definitive answer on the subject. My calorie goal is 1200, and on average I burn at about 450 calories/day from running. I know that according to MFP, then I should add 450 for a total of 1650. I totally understand that you want to avoid your body going into starvation mode, but I am eating a healthy 1200/day spaced out so that I am eating 5x a day. So far I have NOT been eating back my exercise calories and lost about 1.5 lbs a week. I ate back my exercise calories this weekend and now I am up 1.5 lbs on the scale.

The reason I am so skeptical of eating back all the calories burned is that the Biggest Loser contestants probably burn at least 2000 calories a day, and I know they don't eat all those back. What formula are they using for calorie intake to avoid going into starvation mode while creating as large a deficit as possible?

Will someone confirm that as long as I am eating a healthy 1200 calories, that my body will not go into starvation mode?

My stats:
Age - 25
Height - 5'6
SW: 170
CW: 166
GW: 145

Sorry to hear that you've gotten responses from bitter people with too much time on their hands.

Here's the long and the short of it. No one can confirm for you if 1200 will work because every body is different and may not follow the computer generated formula that was created for you. If you're losing, generally feeling satisfied, not overly tired or feeling undernourished, then I'd say stick with what works for YOU. Don't, however, be afriad to play around with your exercise cals or net amount of cals. I spent last week with a net between 600-900 and I gained a pound (and I thought I was eating well!). Listen to your body, do what works for you and remember that every body is unique in spite of computer generated formulas.

Good luck, sweetie!

bunchesonothing

Hah, I'm glad I'm not the only one that found this site unusually tame in the snark department.

People will probably object, but I think a lot of the people on here don't have quite the internet history to know better.

What warrior dash did you do? I just did Whistler this weekend! WOOP!

(off topic now I guess?) let s see how creative we can get derailing this thread!

I did the one in Illinois.

RoosterB

So where does all the water go?

cabul3

my target is 1390 and i eat back HALF my exercise calories. not all, because i want some of them to contribute to my loss!

Dragonwolf

omg whateverrrrrrrr. The thread topic is very clear, and if people don't want to read through it YET AGAIN because it's soooooooo overdiscussed, then don't click on it. Instead - "Oh goody, here's my chance to act like a jerk and point out that this girl is repeating a commonly discussed topic, thus making me the most clever member of MFP in the world!"

I don't get out much in the forum world, thank god, but I assumed this forum was designed for people to support eachother.

You're right, the thread topic is clear....and it's been discussed in length in the stickies. Several of the initial links that were posted point you to lists of links, as do the stickies that say "READ THIS" on the top of this forum category.

Most people, even in real life, get annoyed when someone asks the same question over and over and over and over. This is the Internet, so that annoyance happens even sooner. The whole "if you don't like it, don't read it" also goes both ways. If you think someone is intentionally being rude, don't respond to them (or at least not to their rude points).

I'm a frequent member of a popular Q&A network of sites, they have a great little primer on how to ask a good question, it's worth the quick read and will likely save you a lot of headache in other places. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/how-to-ask

taso42_DELETED

I'm a frequent member of a popular Q&A network of sites, they have a great little primer on how to ask a good question, it's worth the quick read and will likely save you a lot of headache in other places. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/how-to-ask

i wish... i don't think that level of savvy exists here unfortunately.

strbryt

omg whateverrrrrrrr. The thread topic is very clear, and if people don't want to read through it YET AGAIN because it's soooooooo overdiscussed, then don't click on it. Instead - "Oh goody, here's my chance to act like a jerk and point out that this girl is repeating a commonly discussed topic, thus making me the most clever member of MFP in the world!"

I don't get out much in the forum world, thank god, but I assumed this forum was designed for people to support eachother.

It is supposed to be. People let their egos get inthe way of that sometimes and forget that they used to be fat or still are but making progress. I appologize for their rudness to you. It is sas that you come to a place to feel like you belong and someone understands where you are coming from but instead they have attitudes cause you can't see them in person and somehow they are much better than you cause they have lost a few lbs.

In my experience I have found that I do not need to eat all of mine back BUT sometimes I do ned to eat some of all of them back depending on how hard I have worked out that day or if I am still hungry. Listen to your body and you will do just fine. Take care and good luck. Also please know that not everyone on here is an *kitten*.

solpwr

My apologies for ruining anyone's day by replicating a thread. My point is, there has to be a threshhold at which you stop eating back calories burned in order to maximize weightloss. Hopefully you burned some extra calories today by typing up a needlessly rude response.

Why does there have to be a threshold? What is your logic for that? It is all about the deficit created by burning more fuel than you consume. If you master controlling the deficit, you WIN!
What's frustrating you? Not losing? Taking too long? Come to the light. Consume the correct amount of fuel to sustain your body and create the results you are looking for.

Think about competitive cyclists at the pro level. They have the struggle of not be able to eat enough food every day. During the Tour de France those guys burn 4,000-6,000 calories a day for 23 days, about what they eat per day. And interestingly, most of them lose a pound or two during the race. If they don't eat enough for too long, one day they show up to race, and they've got nothing, no energy. Out of the race.

You need to manage your deficit correctly. Do your own math. One pound = 3,500 calories. If you want to lose a pound per week, you need a 3,500 deficit, 500 per day. If you don't eat enough, your body's systems compensate and slow down you metabolic rate. That is counterproductive. You want that rate higher, not lower.

MFP gives you a NET calorie calculation. The goal is based upon that, not your intake because they are not the same number. One is NET, the other is intake. The only time those two number are the same, is if you never exercise. That is clearly an unhealthy lifestyle. That's why its called "My FITNESS Pal" and not "My DIET Pal".

In my case, I never eat below 1,700 calories per day. Usually my intake is around 2,200 per day. My NET calorie goal however is 1,300 NET calories.

But I exercise a lot. I burn on an average of 6,000 calories per week riding my bikes or playing ultimate frisbee. But follow the math in my case.

I recommend using a weekly perspective, that's a good way to put it all into context. In a week my NET calorie goal is 9,100 calories. I exercise 6,000 per week (sometimes 2,000 per day 3 x per week, or 1,000 per day 6 x per week). That allows me to eat 15,100 calories in a week's time. That works out to an average of 2,157 calories per day, and I meet my goal of 1,300 NET calories per day.

The beauty of the MFP tool is that it dynamically accounts for the amount of exercise you accomplish.

What if you exercise 4,000 per week? It helps you see how you should adjust your intake to account for that, or if your intake remains the same, it gives you a basis to understand why you are losing more weight than was originally predicted.

Conversely, if you are only exercising 1,000 calories per week and still eating 1,900 calories per day, why you are not losing as expected? The MFP tool gives you that feedback, and you can make adjustments.