Question about maintenance calories/fat loss

reaganz
reaganz Posts: 3
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi all, my first post on the forums. I love myfitnesspal and have been using it daily for the last few months. Just have a question about my calories before workouts and exercise calories. I think I had my settings set too low which was giving me 1260 cal daily. I workout pretty intense 5 days a week as I am training for the tough mudder right now. I burn approx 500-700 calories with my workouts. Sat I actually burned almost 900 with an intense interval treadmill/circuit workout. With my activity being so high most days, should my setting be set to higher calories to start? I have been trying to stay without that 1300 range even with exercise but I think I am way too low and going into starvation mode which is hindering my fat loss. How do I figure out my maintenance calories per day and do I set my initial calories at a deficit to that? Then if I exercise and burn 500 calories do I need to eat 500 more cal that day? For example say my maintenance is 2000 and I set my cal at 1500 so a 500 deficit if it was a rest day I stick to around 1500 but if I workout and burn say 500 cal I should be eating 2000 that day? Sorry I guess I am a bit confused if I should be eating the calories I burned that day if I set my starting cal at a deficit already. I eat 5-6x a day about every 2.5-3 hours. How do I find out how many carbs. protein. fat ratio to lose fat? I focus on eating complex carbs so oatmeal, sweet potatoes, whole grains like brown rice and fruit. Protein is eggs, chicken, fish, greek yogurt and I do 1 protein shake mixed water post workout. Thanks so much in advance for your help.

Replies

  • cjh022
    cjh022 Posts: 88 Member
    Read the In Place of a Roadmap thread on here, it will explain everything you need to know and is aweaome IMO! Short explanation is calculate your TDEE online based on your level of activity (which would be ~maintenance calories) and eat less than that. Most use a 10-20% deficit depending on how much you are trying to lose. Using this method you would not eat exercise calories back as they should already be accounted for in the calculation. Again thats the short version use the search feature amd read the road map thread, it will give info about how to set your macros and so much more, it is so full of useful information! Good luck :smile:
  • MatressGiant
    MatressGiant Posts: 4
    Alright, I'm going to try to dissect this a bit.

    1) Make sure that when you click "goals > change goals > guided" that you are setting your activity level to very active. This will give you how many calories you burn by being alive.

    2) Try to, every day, enter in the things you eat in your food diary, and the amount of calories you burn from exercise in your exercise diary. Myfitnesspal will automattically add the calories you burned to your daily recommended calories.
    Think of it like this:
    (Calories you eat) - (Calories you burn from exercise) - (Calories you burn by being alive) = (Caloric deficit)
    This can be changed to this (Myfitnesspal automatically does this):
    (Calories you eat) = (Calories you burn from exercise) + (Calories you burn by being alive) - (However much of a deficit you want)

    3) I don't feel there is anyone that can tell you what macro nutrient ratio is best for you. The simplest is 40/40/20 (carbs/protein/fat), but I would make sure to eat at least 150g of protein a day at the activity level you're at. Protein is your friend. Your macro nutrient ratios can be altered via "goals > change goals > custom" after you've done the guided version.

    Hope this helped.
  • jmak3333
    jmak3333 Posts: 2
    Track your macro nutrients (Fat, Carbs, Protein). To figure out your maintenance calories take your body weight and multiply it by 14-16. Since you are active throughout the week you should try 15. For example, 120 x 15cal = 1800. To lose 1lb a week you want to be in a caloric deficit of 500 calories per day. (3500 = lb). Now that you have your maintenance calories, you need to figure out F, C, P. Go with 1 gram of protein per lb of body weight. Each gram of protein is 4 calories. Example, 120g of protein = 480 calories. Next, you want to figure out your fats. To do that you take your calories for example, 1300, and multiply it by 0.25. So 1300 x 0.25 = 325 calories. Each gram of fat is 9 calories therefore 325/9 = 36. Then take your protein and fat calories and subtract it from your maintenance calories. Example: 1300- 480 - 325 = 495. The remaining calories will be your carbs. Each gram of carb is 4 calories therefore 495/4 =124. So for this example the macros would be 120g protein, 42 Fat, 124 carbs. To have the best results, do not eat the calories you have burned during a workout. If you feel extremely hungry then maybe have an extra 200 calories on the days you work out. Have a 'cheat meal' once in awhile to keep yourself satisfied. Some times the calories will not match up exactly with the macro nutrients but do not worry about the calories too much, focus on the macros. This really works.
  • reaganz
    reaganz Posts: 3
    Thanks so much, I realized I had my settings on losing 1lb a week which I set when I had a lot more to lose so I changed it and wow I have been eating way too little calories for my needs. I set it to maintain right now and says I should have around 2000-2100 cal per day which seems like a lot considering I was doing around 1300 a day. I will check into this macros calculations, thanks so much. RIght now weigh approx 142-140 and body fat is 25%. I don't really want to lose a lot more weight, more losing inches/lowering body fat right now and then increasing lean muscle. How do you get more calories into your diet. I normally eat around 140g protein per day which they say should eat 1g of protein per lb. But I have been keeping my carbs low to 100g a day which I think might be way too low from the intense workouts I am doing and also keeping fat in the 30g a day so I guess I need to eat more good fat too. Any recommendations would be great.

    Right now my normal meal plan

    Breakfast 7-7:30am
    1 whole egg and 4 whites or 2 eggs and 3 whites or 5 whites
    1/4 cup oatmeal
    1/4 almond milk
    1tbs of flax seed
    1/4 cup berries

    Workout 9-10:30

    Post workout
    1 scoop of beverly international ump protein 20g
    Banana

    Lunch
    4-6 oz of normally grilled chicken
    2 cups of green normally spinach for a salad
    4oz sweet potato
    Sometimes I will put some nuts or cheese on my salad with a homemade balsamic dressing

    Afternoon
    Non fat greek yogurt plain with some PB2 or some almonds and a apple or another scoop of protein

    Dinner
    6oz lean protein chicken, fish, turkey
    Veggies baked with some olive oil
    4oz complex carb maybe brown rice or sweet potato again

    Water I get around 2-3 liters a day

    That is about 1300-1400 cal a day so how can I get another 500-700 cal in without feeling super full and bloated.

    Thanks!
  • Alta2000
    Alta2000 Posts: 655 Member
    Read the road map

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/912920-in-place-of-a-road-map-3-2013

    and for macros
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/911011-calculating-calorie-macronutrient-needs?page=1#posts-13821336
  • reaganz
    reaganz Posts: 3
    These are awesome resources. Thank you so much!
  • auddii
    auddii Posts: 15,357 Member
    If you're worried about upping your calories by 800, just increase it 100 each week until you reach maintenance levels. And if you include your workouts in your activity level, then you don't eat the extra calories (you can log the workouts as 1 calorie). Or, if you chose a lower activity level that did not include your exercise, then you would eat back the calories.

    Good luck with maintenance, and congrats on reaching your goal!
  • Alta2000
    Alta2000 Posts: 655 Member
    If you choose a sedentary level, and eat back the calories, make sure that you do not eat them at 100% if you use the mfp calculations because they are not very accurate. I put sedentary because I have a very different schedule every day and that determines my exercise time availability. I eat back the exercise calories on 65% on what mfp calculates that I burnt.
  • jmak3333
    jmak3333 Posts: 2
    You're 140lbs and want to maintain muscle and lose fat. Your macros should be around 140g protein, 160g carbs, and 45g fats.. which equal to 1600 calories. 100g of carbs per day is too low, you;ll be pretty tired most of the time. Good luck!
  • supameow
    supameow Posts: 1 Member
    Hiya! This is my first post too but I thought I'd chip in since I've learned loads in the past few months.

    First of all you should calculate your basic metabolic rate which is the calories you would burn without activity. Then you add the amount of activity you do (normally), and if you do intensive training, you add that on top. There's a very scientific and detailed free calculator online by Michael Elias on PhysiqueFX, which is a pre-filled Excel spreadsheet. http://www.physiquefx.com/ (click BMR calculators and the first one should be the one)

    Second, if you don't really want to lose weight you need to eat more the days you train by the number of calories that you're burning on those days. I am no nutritionist but I do believe that 1200 - 1500 calories is too little, especially if you are training. Training increases your metabolic rate, and by eating so little you're basically decreasing it and not nurturing yourself enough. In the end your muscles can't repair and your body cannot get the rest it needs nor can it 'heal' itself from the training.

    For example, my basic metabolic rate (I'm 5'2" and 119lbs) is 1980 calories. I'm trying to lose fat and replace it with lean muscle (note the difference between saying that and saying "trying to lose weight") and I train by lifting weights 3 times a week. On the days I don't lift, I eat 1600-1700 calories. On the days I lift I try to eat 1800 - 1900 calories, which include my protein shake.
    In a nutshell, eating too few calories will inevitably lead to losing lean mass.

    Finally, you should try to use the Home>Daily>chart function on MyFitnessPal, as it tells you how much of each macro nutrient ("macros") you're consuming. You should ideally try to hit them equally (too much of one thing means too little of another), although some nutritionists/trainers recommend a 40-30-30 (40% of your calories should be carbs, 30% should be fats and another 30% should be protein).

    I hope you found this useful as I sure wish someone had told me all this before I started training on 1200 cals and feeling faint for a week!!! ... until I was told: You're eating too little.

    Good luck with your goals!!

    PS You can adjust your macros by percentage online on MyFitnessPal too!

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