Confused with BMR and eating back calories from exercise!!
SelinaOlivia11
Posts: 12 Member
Hey everyone 
I joined MFP a couple of days ago. I am 18 years old, 168 cm and 57 kg. My goal is to lose some weight (4-5 kg) and gain some muscles. However, I am confused about how much I should eat per day. I exercise 6 days a week for approximately 2 hours (cardio for 30 to 60 minutes everyday mainly jogging and riding my bike, 2 -3 strength training/full body workout sessions for 45 minutes, and courses - bodycombat and bodyattack each course 2 x per week) . My BMR is 1420 kcal. According to MFP I should eat 1350 kcal each day in order to lose some weight. However, the next day I feel tired and hungry although I still eat 1350 kcal.
Could anyone explain to me how many calories I need to eat in order to lose some weight the healthy way without eating too many or too few calories?
I joined MFP a couple of days ago. I am 18 years old, 168 cm and 57 kg. My goal is to lose some weight (4-5 kg) and gain some muscles. However, I am confused about how much I should eat per day. I exercise 6 days a week for approximately 2 hours (cardio for 30 to 60 minutes everyday mainly jogging and riding my bike, 2 -3 strength training/full body workout sessions for 45 minutes, and courses - bodycombat and bodyattack each course 2 x per week) . My BMR is 1420 kcal. According to MFP I should eat 1350 kcal each day in order to lose some weight. However, the next day I feel tired and hungry although I still eat 1350 kcal.
Could anyone explain to me how many calories I need to eat in order to lose some weight the healthy way without eating too many or too few calories?
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Replies
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1350 when you're doing that much exercise is way below your BMR, no wonder you're hungry and tired. You need to fuel those workouts!
Read the "sticky" posts by ANewLucia in this discussion thread on calculating your BMR and TDEE - they use scoobysworkshop.com on here. Once you have them, you then work out the calorie "cut" level you want to do.
For example, on scooby, for me, BMR is 1454. My TDEE is 2254, based on a moderate activity level (3-5hrs per week of exercise). My 15% calorie cut level is 1915.
On your rest days, you should eat up to your cut level, so for me I eat 1915. If you're less hungry, or want to eat less, that's fine - just don't go below your BMR, because that's when your metabolism starts shutting down if you regularly do that (the odd day, fair enough, if you're ill for example you may not want to eat so much). The same goes for net calories after exercise. You want to be netting your BMR at least when you work out. I usually net somewhere between BMR and my full allowance on workout days.
I've kinda tweaked it for what works for me - I tried a couple of other calculation sites and found that some of their calculations were slightly different, so I take the average of all three for what I do on MFP.
Hope that makes sense! this is the best way I've found of losing weight so far, the weight doesn't come off quickly, but it generally doesn't go back on either once it's off.
Once you lose a few pounds, or if you adjust your activity level, remember to re-calculate your BMR and TDEE as they will change as you get lighter.0 -
Thanks a lot It was really helpful! 0