Burned Calories, METS and Eating Them Back...

karmasBFF · February 2010

I found this online, though I cannot find the source. I am going to do deeper digging because its got some great concepts about why things like the tradmill and the Wii calculate much less. I know since I've gotten my heart monitor, I have been adding a LOT more calories compared to the Wii and I have not lost!

Very interesting!

"I see so many posts here about people that are dieting and can't seem lose weight. 500 calories burned on the treadmill doesn't mean you can eat 500 extra calories that day. I found this online and thought it may be helpful for those that exercise and take that into consideration when calculating calorie allowance.

Mistake #2: Overreporting the "extra" calorie expenditure of exercise

Most people count the calories they spend exercising as "extra" calories. There is a difference between calories burned while exercising and "extra" calories burned exercising. Here is an example: you burn 300 calories on the treadmill instead of your usual activity (watching TV at home); in reality, you have to subtract the calories you would have spent watching TV from these 300 calories to calculate how many additional calories you burned. Let's say that watching TV, you would have burned 80 calories. In this specific case, you have expended 300 calories while exercising, and 220 "extra" calories.

Calorie counters mindlessly add the calories burned exercising as "extra" and in some cases, this practice can significantly influence the calorie calculations. Hence, calorie software counts the part of your usual activities that overlaps with the extra activities twice.

How to estimate the "extra" calories burned exercising?

In order to make the calculations more accurate, I shall first introduce the concept of MET values. MET values are a convenient way to calculate the calorie cost of activities. MET values are multiples of the resting energy expenditure per time. In plain English, a MET = 3 means burning 3 times more calories than resting. A MET = 1 signifies how many calories you burn at rest (your Resting Metabolic Rate or Basal Metabolic Rate). Whatever you do, you burn calories at a rate of at least MET = 1 with the only exception being sleeping which has MET = 0.9. During the day, most activities include sitting and walking which have MET values between 1.2 and 3. Your total daily energy expenditure is calculated by multiplying your Resting Metabolic Rate by the average MET of all your activities. Is your head spinning?

Let's use a real world example. Consider a female person with a Resting Metabolic Rate of 1200 calories a day. One day has 1440 minutes. Our example lady is burning 1200/1440 = 0.84 calories per minute at rest, which signifies a MET = 1. Let's say our example woman just returned from an aerobics class, where she exercised for 30 minutes. General aerobic class training has a MET = 6. Our example lady has just burned 30 (minutes) x 6 (MET) * 0.84 (calories per minute) = 151 calories while exercising. Suppose our lady would have chatted on the internet instead of exercising (MET = 1.5). In this example, the woman substituted chatting on the internet with aerobic exercising. Remember, that every time you do something you substitute one activity for another. In order to get the extra calories, we have to subtract 1.5 (chatting) from 6 (exercising). Now let's calculate the extra calories: 30 (minutes) * (6 - 1.5) (MET value) * 0.84 = 113 calories.

Let's consider what a standard calorie counter would have done. First, it will assume an average calorie burn rate of 1 calorie per minute. Then the counter will find that exercising for 30 minutes will yield 30 (minutes) * 6 (MET) * 1 (calories per minute) = 180 calories. The calorie counter will add these 180 calories to your daily expenditure without considering that a part of these 180 calories is already accounted by your usual activities.

Do you now see the difference between 113 calories and 180 calories? If that woman spends 5 hours a week in that aerobics class, the standard calorie counters will overreport her calorie output by: (180-113) * 10 = 670 calories a week. The woman will be fooled that her metabolic rate has dropped while she just overestimated her calorie expenditure. Enter weight loss plateau, wasted time and efforts. Do you have the time for trial and error calorie estimations? "

TnTHawkins · February 2010

Great post. Thank you.

hmr1117 · February 2010

Interesting concept...I believe MFP does actually account for that...if you add up what your resting rate is and figure out the calories you should eat to maintain your weight MFP takes off a decent amount of calories from there and assumes you will exersize however many times you say you will for the week and in the end the reason it adds the calories back in is because our calories alloted for the day are already including the thought that we will be active in working out...<does that make sense?> My cousin is a nutritionist and she has watched my food journal on here and she said that the calorie intake for me is on the low end so adding the calories that I work out for back in is a good plan because lowering the calories too much in one day can cause your body to hold onto the weight. In any case I do try to stay under my calorie goal but not by much...but I also try to make sure that all of my calories are healthy foods and minimize the snacks and 'empty calories' where possible...

sorry for the ramble!:)

stormieweather · February 2010

I think that's why a lot of people suggest only eating 1/2 of your exercise calories back.

karmasBFF · February 2010

Interesting concept...I believe MFP does actually account for that...if you add up what your resting rate is and figure out the calories you should eat to maintain your weight MFP takes off a decent amount of calories from there and assumes you will exersize however many times you say you will for the week and in the end the reason it adds the calories back in is because our calories alloted for the day are already including the thought that we will be active in working out...<does that make sense?> My cousin is a nutritionist and she has watched my food journal on here and she said that the calorie intake for me is on the low end so adding the calories that I work out for back in is a good plan because lowering the calories too much in one day can cause your body to hold onto the weight. In any case I do try to stay under my calorie goal but not by much...but I also try to make sure that all of my calories are healthy foods and minimize the snacks and 'empty calories' where possible...

sorry for the ramble!:)

If I understand you correctly, if I were to put in that I do not plan to work out, but want to lose 2 lbs a week, the number of calories MFP gives me will be less than if I enter a number times to excercise?

Here is another great link on this information: by the University of South Carolina.

http://prevention.sph.sc.edu/tools/compendium.htm

ccdo · February 2010

I think that's why a lot of people suggest only eating 1/2 of your exercise calories back.

i eat half of my caloires too and very interesting post thank you :flowerforyou:

karmasBFF · February 2010

Ok, so if I want to lose 2lbs a week, my calories stay at 1200 whether I work out 0 times or 7 times at 60 minutes...it still says I will only lose 1.9 lbs per week...how is this possible???

hmr1117 · February 2010

most likly because it is not healthy to eat less than 1200 calories a day...that is a bottom level...which unfortunatly is why losing the last few lbs is difficult for many because if you dont eat enough your body will go into starvation mode but if you eat too much it will pack on everything...finding the happy medium is the complicated part...I would stick with what MFP says and do your normal workouts and eat back at least half of your workout calories and it might take a little longer then the 1 week or so but the weight should still come off.:) Good luck!

ACarp24 · February 2010

Sorry if this seems like a ramble but I'm trying to figure this out.
This doesn't really make a lot of sense to me. You're basal metabolic rate is the number of calories you're body burns in order to keep you alive, the amount needed to keep you're heart pumping and organs working. So it makes sense, at least to me, that if you burn 500 calories exercising, and you're recommended daily caloric intake is already set low enough for you to loose 1-2 lbs a week, then that extra 500 would probably push you're body into fat storage mode if you worked out consistently and didn't eat those calories back. This article is trying to say that because we already burn calories at a resting position that we have to subtract those calories from the calories we burn working out. But you aren't at a resting position, and you're heart is presumably beating faster than normal, and you are burning more calories to make that happen. I've been working out hard for the last week, and eating back most of those calories, and I've lost 1 and a half pounds.

BlueLikeJazz · February 2010

I think it's because they don't count in any calories you may burn from exercise because if you have someone sign up and say that they're going to do 3 hours of high intensity workouts every day and then in actuality they don't work out at all, then the calories that MFP suggests would end up being way over, and may even cause someone to gain, you know what I mean?

Let's say running for 3 hours would burn 1500 calories. And let's say this person wants to lose 1 lb a week. If MFP added the 1500 calories in that would potentially be burned from running, most people's calorie goals would end up being around 3,000, which would cause a person who was actually not running at all to gain weight.

I think they must just ask you in the beginning in order to allow you to set some exercise goals. They don't give you those kickback (extra) calories until you actually burn them and record it each day. They're just going off net calorie consumption.

karmasBFF · February 2010

Sorry if this seems like a ramble but I'm trying to figure this out.
This doesn't really make a lot of sense to me. You're basal metabolic rate is the number of calories you're body burns in order to keep you alive, the amount needed to keep you're heart pumping and organs working. So it makes sense, at least to me, that if you burn 500 calories exercising, and you're recommended daily caloric intake is already set low enough for you to loose 1-2 lbs a week, then that extra 500 would probably push you're body into fat storage mode if you worked out consistently and didn't eat those calories back. This article is trying to say that because we already burn calories at a resting position that we have to subtract those calories from the calories we burn working out. But you aren't at a resting position, and you're heart is presumably beating faster than normal, and you are burning more calories to make that happen. I've been working out hard for the last week, and eating back most of those calories, and I've lost 1 and a half pounds.

I guess the key is to find out if consumed calories is the same as burned calories. I mean, I know they are different, but what we consume it to keep our bodies functioning. What we burn is what? The same calories we eat or the calories that are stored in our lbs of fat?

ACarp24 · February 2010

I think it's because they don't count in any calories you may burn from exercise because if you have someone sign up and say that they're going to do 3 hours of high intensity workouts every day and then in actuality they don't work out at all, then the calories that MFP suggests would end up being way over, and may even cause someone to gain, you know what I mean?

Let's say running for 3 hours would burn 1500 calories. And let's say this person wants to lose 1 lb a week. If MFP added the 1500 calories in that would potentially be burned from running, most people's calorie goals would end up being around 3,000, which would cause a person who was actually not running at all to gain weight.

I think they must just ask you in the beginning in order to allow you to set some exercise goals.

I said I was going to work out 5 days a week for 45 mins and my calories burned goal was 314 calories. thats way less than I burn daily. Go onto you're goals and check for this if you're concerned but if they only figured in 314 calories for that much time spent exercising I just dont think thats it

karmasBFF · February 2010

I think it's because they don't count in any calories you may burn from exercise because if you have someone sign up and say that they're going to do 3 hours of high intensity workouts every day and then in actuality they don't work out at all, then the calories that MFP suggests would end up being way over, and may even cause someone to gain, you know what I mean?

Let's say running for 3 hours would burn 1500 calories. And let's say this person wants to lose 1 lb a week. If MFP added the 1500 calories in that would potentially be burned from running, most people's calorie goals would end up being around 3,000, which would cause a person who was actually not running at all to gain weight.

I think they must just ask you in the beginning in order to allow you to set some exercise goals. They don't give you those kickback (extra) calories until you actually burn them and record it each day. They're just going off net calorie consumption.

This does make sense and I see your point. Thanks for sharing!

I'm still so confused! I dont want to do anything to put my body into starvation mode and halt my efforts but I also dont want to eat back calories that is going to have the same effect!

karmasBFF · February 2010

I think it's because they don't count in any calories you may burn from exercise because if you have someone sign up and say that they're going to do 3 hours of high intensity workouts every day and then in actuality they don't work out at all, then the calories that MFP suggests would end up being way over, and may even cause someone to gain, you know what I mean?

Let's say running for 3 hours would burn 1500 calories. And let's say this person wants to lose 1 lb a week. If MFP added the 1500 calories in that would potentially be burned from running, most people's calorie goals would end up being around 3,000, which would cause a person who was actually not running at all to gain weight.

I think they must just ask you in the beginning in order to allow you to set some exercise goals.

I said I was going to work out 5 days a week for 45 mins and my calories burned goal was 314 calories. thats way less than I burn daily. Go onto you're goals and check for this if you're concerned but if they only figured in 314 calories for that much time spent exercising I just dont think thats it

This leads me back to the article that I initially posted. My HRH always says I burn soooo many more than MFP. But could that be because MFP is using METS and my HRM is not? I enter the same information in my HRM as I did on MFP...so they should be the same, ideally-correct? Well, they are not!

MercuryBlue · February 2010

Ok, so if I want to lose 2lbs a week, my calories stay at 1200 whether I work out 0 times or 7 times at 60 minutes...it still says I will only lose 1.9 lbs per week...how is this possible???

This has to do with how many calories you burn in a day. See, MFP will NEVER recommend you eat under 1200 calories. So, say MFP has calculated, based on your information entered, that you burn 1800 calories per day. You need a deficit of 1000 calories per day to lose 2 pounds per week.

So if you enter 'you want to lose 2 pounds per week', mathematically you'd have to eat 800 calories per day. But MFP automatically rounds that up to 1200. MFP also doesn't factor in added exercise calories here because the idea is that, ideally, you'll be eating those calories.

Because I work a desk job, and my activity level is set accordingly (I track my workout calories burned seperate from my lifestyle calories), Even though I have my goals set to 2 pounds per week, I'll never lose that through diet alone simply because I don't burn enough calories without exercise to see a loss like that.

BlueLikeJazz · February 2010

I think it's because they don't count in any calories you may burn from exercise because if you have someone sign up and say that they're going to do 3 hours of high intensity workouts every day and then in actuality they don't work out at all, then the calories that MFP suggests would end up being way over, and may even cause someone to gain, you know what I mean?

Let's say running for 3 hours would burn 1500 calories. And let's say this person wants to lose 1 lb a week. If MFP added the 1500 calories in that would potentially be burned from running, most people's calorie goals would end up being around 3,000, which would cause a person who was actually not running at all to gain weight.

I think they must just ask you in the beginning in order to allow you to set some exercise goals. They don't give you those kickback (extra) calories until you actually burn them and record it each day. They're just going off net calorie consumption.

This does make sense and I see your point. Thanks for sharing!

I'm still so confused! I dont want to do anything to put my body into starvation mode and halt my efforts but I also dont want to eat back calories that is going to have the same effect!

When I was doing Weight Watchers, I always ate back half my exercise points, as other people here have suggested. I think that's the safest way to ensure you're eating enough but also not eating so much that you're going to halt your efforts. There are lots of threads about eating your exercise calories or how much is enough to eat each day that I was reading this morning that were quite interesting.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/23912-links-in-mfp-you-want-to-read-again-and-again

karmasBFF · February 2010

Ok, so if I want to lose 2lbs a week, my calories stay at 1200 whether I work out 0 times or 7 times at 60 minutes...it still says I will only lose 1.9 lbs per week...how is this possible???

This has to do with how many calories you burn in a day. See, MFP will NEVER recommend you eat under 1200 calories. So, say MFP has calculated, based on your information entered, that you burn 1800 calories per day. You need a deficit of 1000 calories per day to lose 2 pounds per week.

So if you enter 'you want to lose 2 pounds per week', mathematically you'd have to eat 800 calories per day. But MFP automatically rounds that up to 1200. MFP also doesn't factor in added exercise calories here because the idea is that, ideally, you'll be eating those calories.

Because I work a desk job, and my activity level is set accordingly (I track my workout calories burned seperate from my lifestyle calories), Even though I have my goals set to 2 pounds per week, I'll never lose that through diet alone simply because I don't burn enough calories without exercise to see a loss like that.

WOW! Great response! This makes things a little clearer now! However, if I burn 2100 calories doing nothing, and I eat 1200, I still need to "burn" an extra 100 calories to make the 1000 calories per day deficit, correct? So why would I eat these back? Doesnt that defeat the purpose!

I am so glad I posted this! I have seen so many of them and it just seems like everyone has an opinion but no one questions or argues the logic...this actually feels like its going somewhere!

MTGirl · February 2010

I'm not going to enter into the MET/calories burned issue, but I will clarify how MFP works.

MFP calculates your daily calories needed based on your gender, age, weight and activity level chosen when you sign up. You put in how much you are going to work out for your goals on your exercise log. MFP does not take that into account when alloting daily calories. The exercise calories are added in when you actually log the exercise. You should choose your activity level based on what you do excluding exercise. Then add in your exercise for the additional calories

MFP is set up to have you eat all those earned exercise calories. It is a good idea to try it the way it is set up first - at least give it a shot, knowing that there is already a deficit built in. It works for a lot of people, however, some can only eat 1/2 of their exercise calories and some can really not eat any. You do want to make sure you don't put yourself into starvation mode - you will lose fast to begin then stall out completely. It takes some experimenting and changing, but it can be done!

MercuryBlue · February 2010

Sorry if this seems like a ramble but I'm trying to figure this out.
This doesn't really make a lot of sense to me. You're basal metabolic rate is the number of calories you're body burns in order to keep you alive, the amount needed to keep you're heart pumping and organs working. So it makes sense, at least to me, that if you burn 500 calories exercising, and you're recommended daily caloric intake is already set low enough for you to loose 1-2 lbs a week, then that extra 500 would probably push you're body into fat storage mode if you worked out consistently and didn't eat those calories back. This article is trying to say that because we already burn calories at a resting position that we have to subtract those calories from the calories we burn working out. But you aren't at a resting position, and you're heart is presumably beating faster than normal, and you are burning more calories to make that happen. I've been working out hard for the last week, and eating back most of those calories, and I've lost 1 and a half pounds.

Yes, but most of us aren't focusing on our BMR so much as our TDEE (total daily energy expended). This is the amount of calories we burn in a normal day through normal activity (before exercise is factored in). This is also known as 'lifestyle' calories.

My BMR, for example, is 1485. My TDEE is 2042. When we're trying to figure out a deficit for the day, we do so based on our TDEE- or lifestyle calories. So if I sit at a desk all day then go home and wash dishes and cook dinner, then watch tv before going to bed, I'm going to burn 2042. If I slip in a workout, I'm going to burn 600 calories in an hour. However, you also have to consider the calories I would have burned in that hour if I WASN'T working out. That would be about 100, roughly. 600-100=500 is actually the amount of calories I burned through exercise.

The original article makes a good point, but it's really easy to figure out if you know your TDEE and can calculate roughly how many calories per hour you burn while awake. Once you know how many calories per hour you burn on average, you can simply subtract it from the calories burned each hour you exercise to get your 'true' total.

karmasBFF · February 2010

I'm not going to enter into the MET/calories burned issue, but I will clarify how MFP works.

MFP calculates your daily calories needed based on your gender, age, weight and activity level chosen when you sign up. You put in how much you are going to work out for your goals on your exercise log. MFP does not take that into account when alloting daily calories. The exercise calories are added in when you actually log the exercise. You should choose your activity level based on what you do excluding exercise. Then add in your exercise for the additional calories

MFP is set up to have you eat all those earned exercise calories. It is a good idea to try it the way it is set up first - at least give it a shot, knowing that there is already a deficit built in. It works for a lot of people, however, some can only eat 1/2 of their exercise calories and some can really not eat any. You do want to make sure you don't put yourself into starvation mode - you will lose fast to begin then stall out completely. It takes some experimenting and changing, but it can be done!

Thank you for sharing! One question: how do you know it is set up to eat your excercise calories? Knowing this would really put me soooo much closer to feeling comfortable with eating them!

MercuryBlue · February 2010

I think it's because they don't count in any calories you may burn from exercise because if you have someone sign up and say that they're going to do 3 hours of high intensity workouts every day and then in actuality they don't work out at all, then the calories that MFP suggests would end up being way over, and may even cause someone to gain, you know what I mean?

Let's say running for 3 hours would burn 1500 calories. And let's say this person wants to lose 1 lb a week. If MFP added the 1500 calories in that would potentially be burned from running, most people's calorie goals would end up being around 3,000, which would cause a person who was actually not running at all to gain weight.

I think they must just ask you in the beginning in order to allow you to set some exercise goals.

I said I was going to work out 5 days a week for 45 mins and my calories burned goal was 314 calories. thats way less than I burn daily. Go onto you're goals and check for this if you're concerned but if they only figured in 314 calories for that much time spent exercising I just dont think thats it

This leads me back to the article that I initially posted. My HRH always says I burn soooo many more than MFP. But could that be because MFP is using METS and my HRM is not? I enter the same information in my HRM as I did on MFP...so they should be the same, ideally-correct? Well, they are not!

To answer this question, MFP uses values entered by its members. This means someone, somewhere, burned that many calories doing that exercise. It's not really based on anything, other than data entered by someone at some point. For this reason, it's better to go by what your HRM says and not what MFP says.

Burned Calories, METS and Eating Them Back...

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