MFP vs TDEE Eating back exercise calories?

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khall86790
khall86790 Posts: 1,100 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I have been searching the boards trying to find an answer for this but I am just so confused by it all and I need some help please?

MFP says if I eat 1420 calories per day, I will lose 1lb per week.
I then went to the TDEE method online to see what that told me and put in all my "exercise" for the day including the 45 minutes of intensive exercise I do 6 days per week (usually cardio or circuit training). After -20% this told me I should be consuming just under 1600 calories per day to create a deficit.
My workouts typically burn 400 calories a day, sometimes I eat all of these back and sometimes I don't want to so I eat half back or on the rare occasion I don't at all. However, if I then choose to go out at the weekend I have a higher calorie allowance because I check my weekly figures and see I have room to go over on a specific day if I want/need to.

I am confused though because if TDEE is saying 1600 calories and then I DO eat back my exercise calories because MFP is telling me to eat 1420 I will have consumed 1800 calories per day, 200 calories over what the TDEE method tells me to eat to create a 1lb loss per week.

Am I doing something wrong?
I would prefer to log my exercise and calories correctly via MFP as I like the features it tells you in terms of how your diet and exercise is working, targeted goals for 5 weeks time, etc. But I basically am just very confused as to how to create the correct deficit for me!

Replies

  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 9,925 Member
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    You don't eat back your calories when calculating from TDEE.
  • khall86790
    khall86790 Posts: 1,100 Member
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    You don't eat back your calories when calculating from TDEE.

    Yes I am aware of that.
    What I am confused about is MFP's calculations vs TDEE calculations don't level out at the same number for me.
    So MFP tells me 1420 cals per day + eating back exercise calories can be 1800 cals some days but TDEE is telling me 1600.
  • d3mon4ngel
    d3mon4ngel Posts: 242 Member
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    You don't eat back your calories when calculating from TDEE.

    Yes I am aware of that.
    What I am confused about is MFP's calculations vs TDEE calculations don't level out at the same number for me.
    So MFP tells me 1420 cals per day + eating back exercise calories can be 1800 cals some days but TDEE is telling me 1600.

    Take TDEE as an average over the week.

    1600 x 7 = 11200 per week

    Assuming 5 workout days at 400 cals burned
    ( 1800 x 5 ) + ( 1400 x 2 ) = 11800 per week

    Only 600 cals (approx 100 cals per day) difference, which isn't much overall really and can probably be accounted for by calorie burn estimates being slightly off. Hope this helps :flowerforyou:
  • khall86790
    khall86790 Posts: 1,100 Member
    Options
    You don't eat back your calories when calculating from TDEE.

    Yes I am aware of that.
    What I am confused about is MFP's calculations vs TDEE calculations don't level out at the same number for me.
    So MFP tells me 1420 cals per day + eating back exercise calories can be 1800 cals some days but TDEE is telling me 1600.

    Take TDEE as an average over the week.

    1600 x 7 = 11200 per week

    Assuming 5 workout days at 400 cals burned
    ( 1800 x 5 ) + ( 1400 x 2 ) = 11800 per week

    Only 600 cals (approx 100 cals per day) difference, which isn't much overall really and can probably be accounted for by calorie burn estimates being slightly off. Hope this helps :flowerforyou:

    I have checked my calories burned for the workout I do on several different calculators using different methods and it always comes out at around 400 cals at my current weight. So I am pretty confident I've got that as accurate as I can until I get a HRM next week.

    So if I am understanding this right, if I was to eat 1500 calories after eating back my exercise calories, that would be a good NET calorie amount to aim for?
    If I can I would still really like to use MFP to track my calories burned through exercise and calories consumed correctly because before I discovered the TDEE method it was really working for me eating 1200 cals net per day and logging my exercise. I lost 10lbs this way.
  • d3mon4ngel
    d3mon4ngel Posts: 242 Member
    Options
    You don't eat back your calories when calculating from TDEE.

    Yes I am aware of that.
    What I am confused about is MFP's calculations vs TDEE calculations don't level out at the same number for me.
    So MFP tells me 1420 cals per day + eating back exercise calories can be 1800 cals some days but TDEE is telling me 1600.

    Take TDEE as an average over the week.

    1600 x 7 = 11200 per week

    Assuming 5 workout days at 400 cals burned
    ( 1800 x 5 ) + ( 1400 x 2 ) = 11800 per week

    Only 600 cals (approx 100 cals per day) difference, which isn't much overall really and can probably be accounted for by calorie burn estimates being slightly off. Hope this helps :flowerforyou:

    I have checked my calories burned for the workout I do on several different calculators using different methods and it always comes out at around 400 cals at my current weight. So I am pretty confident I've got that as accurate as I can until I get a HRM next week.

    So if I am understanding this right, if I was to eat 1500 calories after eating back my exercise calories, that would be a good NET calorie amount to aim for?
    If I can I would still really like to use MFP to track my calories burned through exercise and calories consumed correctly because before I discovered the TDEE method it was really working for me eating 1200 cals net per day and logging my exercise. I lost 10lbs this way.

    I wouldn't like to say to be honest! All I know is what seems to be working for me.

    If you'd like a comparison, I'm 5'3", currently 151lbs and my net average is about 1600 per day, while eating at my goal weight TDEE of between 1800-1900.

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