Question about goal calories

srufus

Hi,
I have a question about how MFP updates the goal calories.
For example, My goal calorie intake per day is 1200 calories. If I exercise and burn 100 calories, MFP changes the goal to 1300.
I am worried that I may eat more and not actually have the 500 calorie deficit that I need to lose weight.
Is there a way I can maintain the goal as 1200 or I am missing something here ?
Please help !

Drawberry

Hi,
I have a question about how MFP updates the goal calories.
For example, My goal calorie intake per day is 1200 calories. If I exercise and burn 100 calories, MFP changes the goal to 1300.
I am worried that I may eat more and not actually have the 500 calorie deficit that I need to lose weight.
Is there a way I can maintain the goal as 1200 or I am missing something here ?
Please help !

I am on the same calorie plan as you.

When you burn off calories, you're body is no longer working on the minimum 1200. The goal adding up to 1300 is taking into account that you've burned off 100 calories, and is adding another 100 calories onto your day so you maintain the minimum of 1200.

You can see my food diary for yesterday here: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/Drawberry?date=2012-05-06 to follow with my explanation.

My daily goal is to maintain a minimum of 1200 calories, I 'earned' an extra 763 calories from exercise, which is then adding that on top of the 1200 because I was no longer working off the 1200-I was working off a mere 437 calories (1200-763=437) for the day. While it may seem like a lot in terms of just numbers, you're trying to maintain the 1200 calorie mark.

Try to think of it in terms of money, if you have $1200, and spend $100 you're going to need to add another $100 to get back to $1200. So you're going to have been in possession of a total of $1300 over the day but that doesn't mean you have $1300 at the end of the day.

srufus

Thanks for the reply.
I get your point, its fine with the calories, I'll just have to keep them around 1200, but what about the nutrients, tracking what has increased in carbs/protein/ fat is difficult. So do you just note down the maximum numbers for each of these categories ?

Drawberry

Thanks for the reply.
I get your point, its fine with the calories, I'll just have to keep them around 1200, but what about the nutrients, tracking what has increased in carbs/protein/ fat is difficult. So do you just note down the maximum numbers for each of these categories ?

Honestly I have a hard time meeting the total goals for other nutrients at the end of the day. Carbs, and Fat mostly. Going back to yesterday's entry I went over my protein by a smidge, salmon is high in proteins which is something I don't normally eat so me going over on protein isn't actually normal.

I still had 127 grams of carbs and 40 grams of fat left over that I simply couldn't meet by the end of the day. Depending on what you burn off from exercise, the 'extra' calories, fat, carbs, and protein you get back may indeed be very difficult to consume so I try to pick foods that I know are filled with good and filling calories, carbs, and healthy fats even if I know I can't possibly eat another 127 grams of carbs before bed.


There was no way I would be able to eat 746 calories, 127 grams of carbs,and 40 grams of fat at 11:30 at night!

Example:
Stuff like white-meat deli slices are higher in protein then dark meat, so stuff like turkey and chicken for example are good choices to help you meet the protein count. The kind of rye bread I get (Beefsteak seeded rye)has 12 grams of carbs that come from rye bread being a healthy whole grain bread. (Rye bread ranks up there with whole wheat bread and is one of the better choices you can make in choosing healthy breads)

So even if you can't meet every single gram of extra carbs,fat, and protein (and for me I even struggle with meeting my calorie goals) you can try to get these things in through healthy and filling foods.

Don't eat, just to eat that's for sure. Eating a bag of Twizzlers just so you can get to your calorie and fat goal certainly isn't the same thing as whole grain breads and protein rich meat :P