diet and exercise question from a newbie

erica6732

i am new at this counting calories thing. do you have to eat back your exercise calories? and let me get this straight - the more you exercise, the more you can eat throughout the day? so if i exercise twice daily i can eat more and still lose weight as long as i stay near my calorie range?

FitFabFlirty92

Everybody has different opinions on this. Some people eat back all their exercise calories, others eat back some but not all, and still others refuse to eat any of it back. I've found I lose weight more steadily when I eat back at least some of my exercise calories. So the short answer to your question is yes, the more you move, the more you should eat to fuel the extra work your body is doing. If you're uncomfortable with it, try eating only some of the calories back and see what that does for you.

meggonkgonk

MFP intends for you to eat your exercise calories back. Yes.

Sherbog

I know it sounds crazy but yes I eat back my calories. At the very minimum I eat back half. When I was first starting like you are I measured or weighed all my food for accuracy. It is amazing how my eyes misjudged portion size.

Best of luck to you.

StephDuffney

I try not to. I do use them as a buffer some days if i go over my normal calories. I normal cant hit my daily calories . However since I have been working out there are day i could eat a small cow and still be starving.

dlpoisson

I eat about 2000 calories a day, which is more than what MFP wants me to eat, but that is what I need to eat. I don't make it a point to eat back my exercise caloires burned. I measure my exercise calories with my Body Media Armband which measures much lower than what MFP says. I try to make it easy for myself, by eating clean most of the time, don't starve myself and exercise 5-6 times a week.

MaryKaye1959

I think for most of us who exercise moderately, it's a slippery slope to eat back exercise calories. If you are exercising heavily, yes, you definitely want to assure that you have sufficient fuel. I workout with a trainer 3 times a week, workout on the treadmill at home 2-3 times a week. My trainer has a background in nutrition and she told me to focus on total daily food intake and not to eat back my exercise calories. Maybe I don't have the right level of self control to do that, but after years of "dieting" (and I LOVE to eat), I don't think I'd worry about it unless you don't find yourself with enough energy to exercise. Just one opinion.

katkins3

Yes, I use a HRM to track my calories burned during Jazzercise or bicycling and eat most of them back. My base is 1200, plus the 350 to 450 calories I get from exercise. I don't track calories from noncardio exercises, such as weight training and Tai Chi, but some people do.
Good luck to you as you find what works best for you.

chooriyah

I eat back most of them (the only reason I don't is if I'm not 100% certain on calories (like I've been to a restaurant and have had to guestimate portion sizes etc) or also sometimes MFP seems to give high calorie burns for exercises (I don't have a heart rate monitor yet).

The problem for me with not eating them back is that I get too tired to exercise the next day if I run too much of a 'deficit' below the deficit that is already worked in by following the MFP recommended number of calories. Getting burnt out leads to eating more and not exercising - really not the way forward.

chooriyah

Plus a major bonus is that it encourages me to exercise if it means I can have an alcoholic drink in the evening or pizza. Nom.