A different way to set up MFP goals - that WORKS!

rure13

I'm confused, can someone help me out please
BMR: 1553
Maintenance: 1940 calories

so set your MFP to maintain current weight - you say that gives you 1940 calories a day

your BMR is 1553

so do not eat less than 1553 in food - but do not eat more than 1940

ideally aim to eat no more than 1640 cals - this would give you a deficit of 300 cals a day (before exercise) which equates to 2100 cals lost over a week = 2/3 of a pound lost a week

if you exercise do not eat any exercise calories back unless your deficit is more than 1000cals

ignore calories remaning and net calories

just use the green calories remaining figure and make sure that is 300 or more a day left, and make sure your food eaten cals is ideally no more than 1640 but more than 1550 (you can go up to your maintenace cals of 1900 as this means you wont gain but you wont loose either)

hope that helps

jenni

Thanks for the help (:

l_r27

bump for later, thanks

CashierCantin

BUMPERINO

blooomers

Crabapples! So confused here. =(

Bmr- 1641
Maintenance- 2160


I have a super hard time getting 1200 calories in!!!!!! How am i supposed to do this? I am very very new to all of this. So please dumb it down!!!!!!! :blushing:

heybales

Crabapples! So confused here. =(

Bmr- 1641
Maintenance- 2160


I have a super hard time getting 1200 calories in!!!!!! How am i supposed to do this? I am very very new to all of this. So please dumb it down!!!!!!! :blushing:

If you have been eating, or trying to eat to, 1200 calories, and estimated healthy BMR is 1641, then you have gotten your BMR to lower itself to that smaller amount.
Metabolism slowdown.
You can keep pursuing that, and of course you'll lose at some point, I mean the weight loss challenge, your body will revolt.

So 500 off your maintenance calories is just above your BMR, which is good, but mighty close.
But at this point with lowered metabolism, fine.

Start eating more to get up to that 1660 goal calories.

Since metabolism is messed up, probably won't feel like eating much, that's what the body does.

So add 200 calories to your current level. Like 1 decent snack a day.
Do that for a week, then add another 200, and you'll be about there. Spread them out to several meals a day. Make them healthy but perhaps dense.
Like almonds, or almond butter? Or a protein shake with milk, ect.

You should see no weight loss for a couple weeks, maybe even a touch of gain. it'll be discouraging, but once your metabolism is allowed to get to where it needs to be, you'll still be 500 less than your daily activity, so you'll start losing again.

And perhaps no real exercise for a bit, just gentle walking, raising the daily activity, until you are restored.
Then when you start, eat back some of those exercise calories, or else you'll be doing the same thing again.

molissep

this is an excellent post and i want to try it out - buttttt i'm confused. i read through some others replies on how to do this, but i'm still not getting it for some reason...

bmr - 1764
mfp maintenance - 2160

i work out 4-7 days a week between 450 & 600 calories

i understand that i should eat 1764 whether i excercise or not, but when am i supposed to eat back more calories????

any help is super appreciated!

heybales

this is an excellent post and i want to try it out - buttttt i'm confused. i read through some others replies on how to do this, but i'm still not getting it for some reason...

bmr - 1764
mfp maintenance - 2160

i work out 4-7 days a week between 450 & 600 calories

i understand that i should eat 1764 whether i excercise or not, but when am i supposed to eat back more calories????

any help is super appreciated!

actually, their suggestion is set MFP to maintain, not lose.
And then undercut that goal by 300, but NOT below your BMR.

in your case, if that exercise is indeed regular, you could just eat at maintenance and your exercise is taking care of the deficit.
On days you don't, leave 300 in the green.

molissep

this is an excellent post and i want to try it out - buttttt i'm confused. i read through some others replies on how to do this, but i'm still not getting it for some reason...

bmr - 1764
mfp maintenance - 2160

i work out 4-7 days a week between 450 & 600 calories

i understand that i should eat 1764 whether i excercise or not, but when am i supposed to eat back more calories????

any help is super appreciated!

actually, their suggestion is set MFP to maintain, not lose.
And then undercut that goal by 300, but NOT below your BMR.

in your case, if that exercise is indeed regular, you could just eat at maintenance and your exercise is taking care of the deficit.
On days you don't, leave 300 in the green.

thanks for the help, i understand now. i don't know if i can meet 2100 calories on days i work out however - that's a lot of calories!

bcampney

bump

heybales

bmr - 1764
mfp maintenance - 2160

thanks for the help, i understand now. i don't know if i can meet 2100 calories on days i work out however - that's a lot of calories!

If you think the healthy BMR calculation is off, or perhaps the maintenance calories calculation, here is another method to nail it. It could just be your metabolism has been slowed from undereating for so long, you'll have trouble eating more healthy range.

But it could be your BMR estimate by MFP is wrong.
Which means your calculated maintenance calories based on that is wrong, and if the wrong activity level, even more wrong.
And then your exercise calories could be way off if not using a decent HRM estimate.

So suggestion:
Confirm your BMR using another respected formula, which requires bodyfat % and is more accurate.
Get a better estimate of daily activity for the maintenance calories.
Do your math for weight loss to get your daily calories.
Update MFP.
Figure out if exercise calories is way off.

Here is site for getting your body-fat %. May not be super accurate, but the estimate is good enough for use in calculations.
The plus here is, you record these measurements in MFP as additional things to track and see positive progress.

http://www.fat2fitradio.com/tools/cbbf/

Take the results over to here after noting them.

http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/CalRequire.html

Change height to BF in the calculator, and the Katch-McArdle formula is used for BMR.
Do NOT include exercise in the levels and time of activity, because you'll still enter that into MFP and it will credit you, but really thing about your normal average daily activity levels and time outside exercise.
Now you have a better BMR figure (keep that in mind because you should not eat below that ever) and more importantly, maintenance calories.

Now do the math from those maintenance calories just like MFP does on it's estimate.
500 cal/day is 1lb week. Add 250 to that figure depending on being realistic. Even 10% of maintenance is recommended sometimes.
So take that calorie figure from the maintenance calories - and there is your goal calories.
This should NOT be below your BMR figure. You should never eat below what your body requires for basic life, unless you just want to slow your metabolism down and make weight loss harder.
If it is lower, your goal calories can be your BMR, but you would be better served sticking to 10% in that case.

Now you can enter that figure in MFP Goals manually. Don't worry about the figures on the right now, but may be interesting to see how it compares to that formula.

Now go to Enter Weight, and Add additional measurements for what you took for the body fat %.

Now eat back those exercise calories, and use a cheap HRM to get some sort of decent estimate.

Do this all over again in a month. And progress beyond the scale can be seen now too.

Example here. (30 yr old female, 180 lbs, desk job - not me)
Body fat% calculated - 32%
8 hrs resting, 15 very light, 1 light
BMR - 1572
Maintenance - 2162
Goal weight loss weekly - 1lb, 3500 calories, 500/day
Goal calories - 2162-500= 1662 daily (just above BMR, so would have been unrealistic to attempt 2lb/weekly).

Any exercise gets logged, and manually corrected by HRM estimate of calorie burn.
Extra food eaten is snack before and after workouts that are balanced carb/protein, with extra protein afterwords.
Want to feed that muscle, since that is what will help it grow, and burn fat 24hrs a day.

asmithson19

Bump - Thank you!

healthyliving_girl

Thanks for the info!

emmakey712

bumpity bump bump

koumbay

Bump

granni87

bump

StrongGwen

good and very clear info, thanks!

jchocchip

bump I may try this way, I think I started eating too little, and have upped my goal to aim to lose 1lb a week but planned on leaving some exercise calories uneaten. I like this clear explanation.

tigeratty

I totally agree with this approach. I am already doing this on my own. And my stats are remarkably simiilar to the OP's calorie ranges.

I don't even log my exercise on MFP. I just eat some extra calories when I lift weights (I lift heavy). Usually it comes out to an extra snack before I lift and a protein shake after. I don't add any extra on cardio days for now as I am exercising much less intensely following an akle injury. I know I can't lose if I eat too little.

cstannert

Okay I need help figuring this out as I think this may help me get out of the 6 month plateau that I have been in. I was doing good on losing but then added more exercise and the scale slowly starting going up and instead of losing I have gained 5 lbs. in the last year. My weight now is 151 and my BMR is 1371. I am a 34 year old female. I am 5'4". I usually work out 6 days a week for at least an hour sometimes more (Sun, Tu, Thurs is speed walking & Chalean Extreme strength training & the rest of the week is either walking or kickboxing). I usually burn 500-700 per session sometimes more. I'm a stay at home Mom and am fairly active during the day (without including exercise). I eat pretty healthy and balanced a lot of fruits/veggies, gluten free whole grains, proteins. Currently I have my calories set to lose 0.5 lb per week with calories set to 1426. I have been eating to between 900-1150 net calories. I would love to lose between 10-15 lbs. Any help on how to set this up and how much I should be eating?

heybales

Okay I need help figuring this out as I think this may help me get out of the 6 month plateau that I have been in. I was doing good on losing but then added more exercise and the scale slowly starting going up and instead of losing I have gained 5 lbs. in the last year. My weight now is 151 and my BMR is 1371. I am a 34 year old female. I am 5'4". I usually work out 6 days a week for at least an hour sometimes more (Sun, Tu, Thurs is speed walking & Chalean Extreme strength training & the rest of the week is either walking or kickboxing). I usually burn 500-700 per session sometimes more. I'm a stay at home Mom and am fairly active during the day (without including exercise). I eat pretty healthy and balanced a lot of fruits/veggies, gluten free whole grains, proteins. Currently I have my calories set to lose 0.5 lb per week with calories set to 1426. I have been eating to between 900-1150 net calories. I would love to lose between 10-15 lbs. Any help on how to set this up and how much I should be eating?

Reread the recommendation if you want to follow it. The main point is, don't have net calories below your healthy BMR figure, or else your body will just respond by slowing down metabolism to get by with less energy.

So you are robbing it of what it needs by exercising more, it has now slowed down more. You won't win the downward spiral by eating less or working out more.

Eat more. Set your goal 250 cal/day less than your maintenance goals.

Or, if you are sure you will always be working out, just eat at your maintenance calories, and don't enter exercise calories. Let the exercise take care of the deficit.

But don't net below your BMR. If you don't understand what BMR is, look it up.

BTW, I show your BMR as 1446, and you may want to more accurately estimate your activity levels. You may be undercutting your BMR even more than you know.

http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/CalRequire.html