Why you should eat your exercise calories

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  • BeautyFromPain
    BeautyFromPain Posts: 4,952 Member
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    I'm still researching on this one too. If that is the case, why workout, and just not diet. If anyone with letters behind their name would like to comment, I would like to read it. Some credentials would be nice.

    Soo many reasons to workout...
    1. speeds up metabolism
    2. it's fun?
    3. it helps reduce stress
    4. would you rather be skinny fat or fit?
    5. would you rather be able to run away if someone is chasing you with a baseball bat?
    6. would you like more energy
    there are so many more.

    ALSO, sunshine may not have credentials YET but she is working on them... just letting you know, she does know a lot more about nutrition than a lot of people on this website.
  • samandlucysmum
    samandlucysmum Posts: 320
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    I find that after doing a long walk, that I am really hungry for the rest of the day, I have tried not using my calories earnt, but I just end up picking up the nearest food item, usually the biscuit barrell! I think the best thing for me would be to prepare something healthy to eat when I get back, to stop the cravings.
  • CMmrsfloyd
    CMmrsfloyd Posts: 2,383 Member
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    No!

    If you put your activity level into MFP, it calculates based upon that. So, it's already accounted for you going to the gym 3x a week or w/e you put. Now, you start throwing that into MFP, and i counts it double.

    i.e. My maintenance while lifting weights is ~2450 calories. Again, that's already counting lifting weights. Now, if I put 45 minutes of weight lifting, and it gives me 250 calories back--and I eat that, then I've reduced my deficit.

    Prolonged extreme deficits are bad, 1 day of 900 here and there isn't bad. General rule, you can sustain a deficit of 31 kcal/lb of fat.
    if you actually include your exercise in your activity level, thats true. but most people dont because thats not really how the site was designed. it really wants your activity level EXCLUDING exercise, so that it can calculate your deficit and allow people to choose to exercise or not - and to eat more if they do

    I agree - when I joined MFP I set my activity level to my *normal daily activities* and it was not at all normal for me to exercise. When I started exercising, I took the credit for those exercise calories b/c I knew for a fact it was not included in the activity level I set here (set to sedentary). I hesitate to just bump up the activity level and stop accounting for individual workout sessions b/c that seems extremely inexact, especially if you're not exercising off about the same calories every day. I prefer leaving my activity level low and then accounting for the amount of exercise I do individually, it feels more precise and works extremely well for me personally. Plus as pp just said, that's how this particular site is really designed, to add in specific exercise after you have actually done it. Once I get to a maintenance phase, I may experiment with upping my activity level and not logging every single exercise, but for now I like the feeling of precision I get from accounting for every little thing, especially since I'm in a 1/2 lb per week stage where being off by a couple hundred here and there could cause me to stop losing.
  • Azdak
    Azdak Posts: 8,281 Member
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    everyone is different. I didnt lose any weight until i stopped eating my exercise calories back.

    That could just be arithmetic, not metabolism. IMO, about 90% of the "eat or not eat" "debate" is nothing more than debating math skills.
  • CMmrsfloyd
    CMmrsfloyd Posts: 2,383 Member
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    everyone is different. I didnt lose any weight until i stopped eating my exercise calories back.

    That could just be arithmetic, not metabolism. IMO, about 90% of the "eat or not eat" "debate" is nothing more than debating math skills.

    That is so true. MFP's numbers are just an estimate, there are several different ways to get these estimates and they don't all work perfectly for everyone. Activity levels, exercise calorie estimations, lean body mass vs. bodyfat, etc, can all make the math very complicated and harder and harder to get 'right' for an individual person. There are definitely people on this site that find they have to do things very differently than what MFP suggests in order to get results. MFP cannot account for everything even though it tries to make us do so. LOL
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,401 MFP Moderator
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    My nutritionist and trainer have both kept me on a higher deficit program and have told me to avoid heavy weights until after I am down to about 22%. At 22% I stabilize the weight training to cardio ratio and up my calories. At 20% I do more weight training than cardio.
    as long as that works for you. The only downside to that method is you are trying to play catchup on increasing your metabolism and re gaining the lbm you lost.
  • LorinaLynn
    LorinaLynn Posts: 13,247 Member
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    All of the debates can be solved with one thing: Trial and error. If it's what you're doing is working for you, keep doing it. If it's not don't be afraid to try something different. And don't get hung up on the scale.

    I mentioned earlier in this thread that last time I lost weight, I was a size 8 at 130#, and this time at 130#, I'm a size 4. Last time, I was eating between 700-1000 calories a day. This time, between 1800-2000 calories a day. I don't have any photos from the last time, but I do have the size 8 jeans, and they're really big on me now: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/449570-mfp-mythbusters-losing-weight-fast-exercise-calories-girl
  • luvmybaby333
    luvmybaby333 Posts: 241
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    this is all really interesting, and could be my problem. I've been doing an hour exercise a day and only eating 1200 kcals a day on average and seen no progress; i even came off the pill in case that was having an effect.

    I'm still not entirely sure how many kcals i should aim for, sorry i'm a bit of a thicko with technical stuff like this. So we're saying eat BACK what you've exercised, on top of what? The recommended amount i should be eating or...? (5 ft1 and 132lbs)

    I would say that this is your problem exactly. Nobody should be dropping under 1200 calories per day. If you are only eating 1200 calories, and then you are exercising on top of it, then you are effectively eating less than that because you've burned some off. So if you've exercised for an hour and burned 400 calories (estimating here), then it's like your body is only taking in 800 calories per day. That is probably putting you into starvation mode, which is causing your body to want to retain fat stores.
  • amandaruiz2011
    amandaruiz2011 Posts: 43
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