Confusion - eating in calories and how much MFP says you'll

Skinny_minny_mo

This topic has been discussed and mentioned many times, but please bear with me in querying something again.

On the days where I eat in my exercise calories, and complete my food diary for the day, the message in the bottom which says

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh *** kg in 5 weeks" is ALWAYS more!

Does that make sense? And how accurate is it?

I'm eating in calories but my net calories are still under or at 1200.

I really dont want to sabotage my efforts :ohwell:

docHelen

i don't pay much attention to that, i think it is just to give you an idea if you are on target that day. loosing weight is a longer term thing

bluefox9er

not accurate at ALL...and neither is MFP's food 'estimation' of your daily calorie requirement..it is at best a VERY VERY rough ball park, close/best guess approximate. people's bodies, metabolic rates,exercise capabilities, heart rates etc are ALL different. take that MFP figure with a huge dollop of salt ( but watch the sodium!).

eg. you could eat a single grape and be over for 'sugars' for the day...go figure.

Buddhaboy

I agree, don't worry about that
It's a rough calculation that really is more for inspiration then it is a accurate calorie count

asilva3111

It's an estimate. Are you eating your exercise calories? You shouldn't do that. Eat your allotted calories for food, but not your exercise calories.

KyleB65

I may not be working the system properly. But, I pretty much ignore the 5 week weight estimate.

I keep my focus on the 2 lbs per week I am supposed to lose by following this "system". To date I have been doing well. Some weeks I barley make a single lb lost and for others I have dropped as much as 5 lbs. Over all I am keeping very close to the 2 lbs/week.

The daily 5 week estimate is to me the same as weighing myself every day. Some days I may be up and some days I may be down. However, by weighing myself the same day & time once per week. I am getting much more consistent readings.

Good luck!

Skinny_minny_mo

not accurate at ALL...and neither is MFP's food 'estimation' of your daily calorie requirement..it is at best a VERY VERY rough ball park, close/best guess approximate. people's bodies, metabolic rates,exercise capabilities, heart rates etc are ALL different. take that MFP figure with a huge dollop of salt ( but watch the sodium!).

eg. you could eat a single grape and be over for 'sugars' for the day...go figure.

I;m beginning to see that.

I upped my exercise from 2 x 20 min sessions to 3 x 30 min sessions and my calorie intake didnt change....

I'll play it by ear or rather by scale.

Thanks!

lmarshel

This topic has been discussed and mentioned many times, but please bear with me in querying something again.

On the days where I eat in my exercise calories, and complete my food diary for the day, the message in the bottom which says

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh *** kg in 5 weeks" is ALWAYS more!

Does that make sense? And how accurate is it?

I'm eating in calories but my net calories are still under or at 1200.

I really dont want to sabotage my efforts :ohwell:

Do you log your exercise on MFP in cardio, so that it takes those exercise calories into account? I do that, and my estimate for 5 weeks is almost always less than what I weigh now. The only exceptions are those days I go more than 250 over my current calorie goal. Then I'm eating more than maintenance, so it makes sense by the numbers. It's just a math calculation.

Skinny_minny_mo

It's an estimate. Are you eating your exercise calories? You shouldn't do that. Eat your allotted calories for food, but not your exercise calories.

asillva, from what I've read in all the forums, one should eat in their calories.

Whats your reasons on why one shouldn't?

Pangea250

Yep, that doesn't make sense. Are you saying that it estimates you'll weigh more than you do now? If your starting calories are 1200, even with eating your exercise calories, it should give you an estimate that is lower than you weigh now. Something must be entered incorrectly somewhere.

lmarshel

not accurate at ALL...and neither is MFP's food 'estimation' of your daily calorie requirement..it is at best a VERY VERY rough ball park, close/best guess approximate. people's bodies, metabolic rates,exercise capabilities, heart rates etc are ALL different. take that MFP figure with a huge dollop of salt ( but watch the sodium!).

eg. you could eat a single grape and be over for 'sugars' for the day...go figure.

I;m beginning to see that.

I upped my exercise from 2 x 20 min sessions to 3 x 30 min sessions and my calorie intake didnt change....

I'll play it by ear or rather by scale.

Thanks!

Your calorie goal does not change based on your "estimated" exercise for the week. You can just ignore those numbers completely. Your calorie goal will only change when you change your weight or your weight loss goal. MFP works off the actual numbers you log, not your estimated exercise.

Skinny_minny_mo

This topic has been discussed and mentioned many times, but please bear with me in querying something again.

On the days where I eat in my exercise calories, and complete my food diary for the day, the message in the bottom which says

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh *** kg in 5 weeks" is ALWAYS more!

Does that make sense? And how accurate is it?

I'm eating in calories but my net calories are still under or at 1200.

I really dont want to sabotage my efforts :ohwell:

Do you log your exercise on MFP in cardio, so that it takes those exercise calories into account? I do that, and my estimate for 5 weeks is almost always less than what I weigh now. The only exceptions are those days I go more than 250 over my current calorie goal. Then I'm eating more than maintenance, so it makes sense by the numbers. It's just a math calculation.

Hi Imarshel,

Yes i do log in my exercise calories

I'm only in my 2nd week so lets see how it goes.

Ta!

Skinny_minny_mo

Yep, that doesn't make sense. Are you saying that it estimates you'll weigh more than you do now? If your starting calories are 1200, even with eating your exercise calories, it should give you an estimate that is lower than you weigh now. Something must be entered incorrectly somewhere.

Hi there,

no its under what i weigh now.

eg below:

Today I ate in my exercise calories and this is what it said

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh 47.4 kg in 5 weeks" (I ate 1249 calories still slightly under the calories it allowed me)

On tuesday when i ate under my calories it said

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh 45.9 kg in 5 weeks "

Thats a 2kg difference!!

Troll

If every day were like my typical day, i would weigh 90.5 lbs in 5 weeks. Funny, because i've been eating like this for almost a year and i weigh 110lbs.

It's not really accurate at all, i'd say.

Pangea250

Your diary is open! So I was able to look at it to see exactly what's going on. When MFP gives you that weight estimate, it means that if you ate *exactly* the same food as the food you ate that day and you ate it for the next 5 weeks, you would weigh X. In the past 5 days or so, while you have remained under your overall calorie goal, you have been eating more and more of your exercise calories each day. So you have been leaving less of a deficit in calories each day. So you estimate has relatively gone up.

Does that explain it for you?

MIMITIME

Just an estimate so don't take it as fact. Like you, until I saw the poster saying you should not eat your exercise calories, everything I read on here over and over is that you SHOULD eat your exercise calories. I guess that' something no one will agree on one way or the other.

lmarshel

Today I ate in my exercise calories and this is what it said

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh 47.4 kg in 5 weeks" (I ate 1249 calories still slightly under the calories it allowed me)

On tuesday when i ate under my calories it said

"If every day were like today... You'd weigh 45.9 kg in 5 weeks "

Thats a 2kg difference!!

Yes, because on Tuesday your diary shows you only ate 870 calories. If you netted 870 calories every single day for the next 5 weeks, you should weigh only 45.9 kg in 5 weeks. Of course, that wouldn't be healthy. You should be eating more cals than that each day.

meerkat70

It's an estimate. Are you eating your exercise calories? You shouldn't do that. Eat your allotted calories for food, but not your exercise calories.

Sigh.

Eat when you are hungry. Eat healthy food if you are hungry. If you are exercising hard, fuel the exercise by eating at least some of the calories you burn back. Otherwise... you will be hungry, underfuelled, and undernourished.

The deficit is already built into the food calories.

bluefox9er

It's an estimate. Are you eating your exercise calories? You shouldn't do that. Eat your allotted calories for food, but not your exercise calories.

a lot of people on here would disagree with you very strongly about that :-)

when I was burning2,000 plus calories a day everyday, there's NO WAY my6 body could produce that sort of burn without adequate fuel. you can't put $1 of gas in a fuel tank and expect your car to take you across the country.

to state that you shouldn't eat your exercise calories without explaining why and why it has work led for you is highly irresponsible , and EXTREMELY misleading as you have absolutely NO IDEA what the OP's nutritional and exercise needs are , let alone how her body reacts to it.

I achieved my weight loss by eating my exercises calories..sometimes i'd eat a few, sometimes half, sometimes NONE...if someone told me never to eat them, I'd laugh at them.

dad106

It's an estimate. Are you eating your exercise calories? You shouldn't do that. Eat your allotted calories for food, but not your exercise calories.

Right.. cause your an expert on her body. Some people need to eat them.. others don't.

Just because you think you know everything is not a good reason for her not to eat them..

Skinny_minny_mo

thanks guys!

take home message: eat well, exercise well and stop worrying about the small stuff!

freckly_vermonter_girl

Reading this post was so fascinating to me. Yesterday I burned a TON of calories doing housecleaning for 4 hours solid at a vigorous pace, and when I got done I was reaaaally hungry and wiped out - even tho I had eated close to if not all of 1200 calories for the day. At 10 p.m. I went and ate a double cheeseburger, small fry, and small berry smoothie at McDonalds. Not the healthiest choice, but I was so hungry & it was the only place still open in podunk VT at 10:30 at night. I felt bad eating ****Donalds, but I was still 500-something calories under my daily caloric intake for the day!

Probably not a great idea to eat CrapDonalds after a huge workout every day, but my focus was on putting some calories into my tired hungry body... That's all.