DO you eat back your workout calories?

losethatshit

It's confusing because if you eat a portion of the calories burned back you will *likely* still lose weight as long as you stay within your calorie goals. So if you do eat it back it can work but it doesn't work as well as not eating them back. Either way is okay but one is definitely more hardcore than the other and can make a huge difference after a couple months.

TrailRunner61

I eat them when I'm hungry. If I'm not, I don't eat them. My Dr. told me to eat 1200, period, but if I have a heavy workout, I'll get hungrier (usually the next morning), so I eat some. I've been doing this since January and I've lost over 30lbs with plenty of energy and no 'wasting' of muscle.

magerum

I eat them back, but I always make sure I'm around -10% of what all the calculations come in at... For example: My current maintenance w/ exercise is somewhere between 3300 - 3400 calories daily. So I eat between 3000 - 3100 daily just to be safe.

-M

pastryari

MFP already creates a deficit for you when you choose your activity level.

MFP is set up so that it already creates a deficit, meaning you will lose weight even if you don't exercise. When you exercise, you further increase that deficit. Think of your exercise calories like fuel. When you workout , you need energy, you need fuel. Food is fuel.


P.S. Please please use the search function before posting a thread !!

P.S. Please lighten up. Apparently it didn't bother you since you read it and then bothered to post an answer and then whined about them asking. What's the big deal?

It's annoying to see threads about eating back exercise calories EVERY 5 minutes. It clogs the forums and for no reason. I answered because I am a nice and helpful person so I don't know why you would think I need to lighten. Might want to try your own advice since you didn't even bother to answer the OP's question. Merely commented to attack me.

athensguy

I like eating things, and I eat a lot of things.

I also fail to see how someone could become significantly overweight without the ability to eat to the net goal set by this site.

pastryari

If I am trying to gain weight ...I eat back the calories...if I am trying to cut or lose weight...I don't eat back the calories....Defeats the purpose unless you short changed your calorie goal from the start...

That is not true. Please explain how eating back your exercise calories "defeats the purpose"? MFP already has you on a deficit!

First reason...One...The calories you burn are estimates...and unless you are eating only foods that come with ALL the nutritional information..who knows what amount of carlories you actually ate...I am about to head to Bone Fish & Grill....There is no real way for me to accurately put in the amount of calories of everything I eat and drink there...so I could go over or under on my estimate....

Second reason....I am speaking from personal experience I ate the same 6 meals every day for two Months...."my goal was to go for 3 months " but anyways..I hit a plateau...and when I increased my cardio by running in the mornings I saw a lost in weight...but when I went back to the workout I was doing but decreased my calorie intake by 250 to 500 calories which equate to my average 30 to 40 min cardio burn I lost weight faster....

Final reason...if you set a goal to eat a certain amount of calories and you have a goal to cut or lose weight...Why cheat yourself out of the hard work....you will think your self faster if you look back after 3 or 6 months and realized you didnt add 200 calories a day as a reward...

But if you are just maintaining...all bets are off...

Honestly, I could barely understand what you wrote.
It's pretty simple , though. Eat at a deficit &lose weight. (MFP creates this.) Exercise, & you further increase that deficit. You need to re-fuel your body and not go to an unhealthy deficit.

adamsilva

YES you can eat your calories back and still lose as long as your on a cal deficit. if you are on a calorie deficit and exercise without eating your calories your total cal body deficit is to large which will be counter productive to your weight loss and your BODY. e.g dead tired warn out, irritability, muscle loss etc.

I was wondering who eats and doesn't eat there workout calories because I do not see the sense of eating back the calories you work off because isn't that counter productive. I can be wrong I am just wondering...

samntha14

YES!!!

megsmom2

MFP starts you off with a deficit. If you don't eat back your exercise calories it'd like a double deficit....which could be an unhealthily low number. A day here or there, no biggie of course, but you don't want to do that for any extended time....mess up your metabolism and just make you not function well. So....yes.. I certainly do eat most of those calories bag. Its how MFP was designed to work....and it does work!

zyxst

I try to eat half. I don't have an HRM yet and I feel MFP overestimates. Some days it's damned hard to eat back 150-400 cals without either busting my sodium/fat macros or busting my belly. Yesterday, I burned 696 cals according to MFP, and just eating half I was nearly uncomfortable. You don't have to eat back exercise cals no matter what anyone tells you. It's not something I really understand because, to me, it's defeating the purpose of all the walking and weight lifting I do. And before adini749 jumps on this, I feel exercising is burning off calories from excess weight I have and while you feel I need to "feed my body", what's the point of working out if I'm just going to replace what I've burned? Why don't I just eat to maintain my weight instead of trying to drop it?

rc630

...why else would I work out? (just kidding. a little. or not at all.)

mideon_696

i still find it amzing that people dont get the whole "eat back your exercise calories...

especially for larger people eating stuff all...

if you weigh 200lbs + and are eating 1500 cal per day, that is already a HUGE deficit....
so you go workout, burn 500-600 calories across 2 hours or whatever and expect your bodies to just keep on plugging along on the 900 that are left over for body functions. when your normal BMR is probably closer to 2500 per day...

man you guys must feel like ****. ALL the time...

I eat mine back. and then some.

zyxst

i still find it amzing that people dont get the whole "eat back your exercise calories...

especially for larger people eating stuff all...

if you weigh 200lbs + and are eating 1500 cal per day, that is already a HUGE deficit....
so you go workout, burn 500-600 calories across 2 hours or whatever and expect your bodies to just keep on plugging along on the 900 that are left over for body functions. when your normal BMR is probably closer to 2500 per day...

man you guys must feel like ****. ALL the time...

I eat mine back. and then some.

I don't feel like **** all the time. I've had to train myself to learn what hungry means. I'm not always hungry, so why should I force feed myself to the point of puking just because I worked off 500 cals? TBH, I wouldn't eat half my exercise cals back, but I don't want any comments about how I'm starving myself.

So here's one for you - do you eat before your workouts since your 'body needs fuel'? If not, wth is your body using to make that 500 cal burn?

tigersword

i still find it amzing that people dont get the whole "eat back your exercise calories...

especially for larger people eating stuff all...

if you weigh 200lbs + and are eating 1500 cal per day, that is already a HUGE deficit....
so you go workout, burn 500-600 calories across 2 hours or whatever and expect your bodies to just keep on plugging along on the 900 that are left over for body functions. when your normal BMR is probably closer to 2500 per day...

man you guys must feel like ****. ALL the time...

I eat mine back. and then some.

I don't feel like **** all the time. I've had to train myself to learn what hungry means. I'm not always hungry, so why should I force feed myself to the point of puking just because I worked off 500 cals? TBH, I wouldn't eat half my exercise cals back, but I don't want any comments about how I'm starving myself.

So here's one for you - do you eat before your workouts since your 'body needs fuel'? If not, wth is your body using to make that 500 cal burn?

Meal timing has nothing to do with it. Total calories are the point. If you consistently under fuel your body, your body will slow down. It's that simple. Your body adjusts to what you do to it.

Interesting that you say you had to train yourself to learn what hungry means, because hungry is actually a hormonal adaptation that changes based on how you eat. You restrict calories excessively, your body stops sending hunger signals. It doesn't mean you aren't actually hungry, it means your body has adapted to not getting enough food, and has turned down the hunger response as a survival mechanism. It saves calories, as well as prevents distraction, as the body doesn't understand "diet," it understands "food is plentiful" and "food is scarce." When food is scarce, hunger could distract you and you may not find it. It saves calories because hunger signals are hormones, and it take calories and nutrients to create them and transport them, and when there isn't enough fuel coming in to run the body, it shuts off non-essential systems like that in order to conserve fuel.