**READ THIS** Figuring out your calorie goals

perfect10isha

Thanks for posting this. I had been losing weight consistently then plateaued and I'm sure its because my cals were too low. MFP had me around 1250 cals, but my BMR is 1441 and my TDEE is 1709. I'll be upping my cals to approximately 1600 or so ASAP.. I only have a few pounds to go before I reach my GW of 140 (CW 144) but I had thought because I had stopped working out I stopped losing, but I see now that I've just been eating too less.

em9371

Ive been reading through this and I'm quite confused.. I understand the mechanisms, but.. If were eating back the calories that we work off because we have a certain calorie count our body needs.. how are we losing weight? Is it basically saying if our BMR says to eat 1200, and we excercise 800, eat it back, get back to 1200.. we're going to lose weight?

Bmr is what your body needs just to keep you alive. You lose weight by creating a deficit from your tdee, NOT bmr. If you eat under bmr eventually loss will stop and you will end up skinny fat.

em9371

Thanks for posting this. I had been losing weight consistently then plateaued and I'm sure its because my cals were too low. MFP had me around 1250 cals, but my BMR is 1441 and my TDEE is 1709. I'll be upping my cals to approximately 1600 or so ASAP.. I only have a few pounds to go before I reach my GW of 140 (CW 144) but I had thought because I had stopped working out I stopped losing, but I see now that I've just been eating too less.

See my reply to poster on pg2, your numbers look pretty similar. tdee is unlikely to be 1709.
The number in the chart includes a deficit, to get your actual tdee you need to add 20% to that.

ackkk

Thanks for the good info

ImRadical4Jesus

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lee1205

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Ramitta

bump for reference
thanks for posting

em9371

Ok, I get confused by all this stuff. I have been using MFP for three weeks now and so far so good. I have been using their math for losing weight. According to MFP I should eat 2010 calaries a day to loose 2lbs a week. I check my BMR and it says 2703 calories. I guess my question is where did MFP get its math from and is it right for most?

SW:321
CW:309
GW:230 or less

height:5'10"

Mfp only includes daily activity, so would expect you to eat back exercise on top of the 2010.
Working from bmr / tdee will give you a range that you should lose in with exercise already figured in.
They work out pretty much the same overall (see my example on pg 2), just a different way of getting there.

Ladeda1

Bump to read later

dwiebe85

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Somerj

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em9371

This has always confused me. My BMR is 1552 so I should have this as my daily goal and work out to decrease this? So if I went for a bike ride somedays I would knock 800 off that easy. Do I have to eat the extra 800 cals...else I am going to get ill from eating way over my norm..x

Yes eat them, as you should not net below BMR. doing what you suggest would be like eating 752 (1552-800) and not exercising, which is missing the point of eating at least BMR.

If you regularly burn 800 cals say 5 days/week your average daily TDEE would be 1552*1.2 + 571 (800*5/7) = 2433. the calc is a little different but I am showing how regular acivity *1.2 and exercise would fit in.

So do lose weight you should eat between 10 and 20% below TDEE which would be 1946 (2433*.8) to 2190, but would not eat back exercise cals. So if you eat 1950 and burn 800, you would net below your BMR that day, but the average for the week you would be at your above BMR as on days you don't workout you would be eating above BMR by 400 to 540 but on workout days eating under BMR by . 250-400 cals.

Essentially your TDEE includes exercise cals and if you are active the multiplier would be 1.55 on your BMR to give you 2405, close to the 2433 I calculated above using sedentary and exercise cals.

@erickirb - I get the math and how you are calculating it. What is tripping me up is my exercise is very varied and I'm not sure how I would account for it. As of now I go to CrossFit twice a week and am training for a sprint tri with longer bike rides on the weekend. Any advice would be helpful!

From my calculations:
KM BMR - 1530
TDEE Sedentary - (1530*1.2)=1836
TDEE Active - (1530*1.55)=2372

Here is where I get confused, I am very active but varies throughout the week from a light swim (200cal or so) to 3hrs on a bike (1200+calories). Would it be better for me to use the Sedentary TDEE to make my NET calorie goal the make sure I eat enough to compensate for the activity?

I think the whole eating back the calories is completely counter-intuitive and it has been tripping me up as to how I should set my NET calorie goal without eating below my BMR.

Thanks in advance for the help.

With that amount of exercise there is no way you are sedentary whether you use mfp or bmr/tdee. I would go with the activity level that best suits your average workouts, and maybe eat a bit extra on the bike ride days to make sure you don't drop too much below bmr.
If you use bmr / tdee, don't worry about net cals as long as you don't go below bmr.You will be higher some days and lower others depending on the amount of exercise, but that's not a bad thing. I eat around 2000 most days, so my rest days are higher cal than my gym days and I've lost 40lbs and 10% bf so it doesn't affect loss.

SoySalva

Saved for future reference

momto1g1b

thank you for the info, it's been very helpful!

SoySalva

Ok read the info and please somebody tell me if I got this right!

5ft 3in
152.2 lbs
BMR 1322
TDEE 2046 (moderate)

Is 2046 what I'm suppose to eat daily or should I subtract 20% from this number?

I will appreciate greatly any reply:flowerforyou:

LCrowley83

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skusky01

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charlotte3176

Great info!!

Kimmy2676

Thanks for reposting.

nas30

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