Ok straight answers please?

Ok let me explain it another way. If you are overweight and you lose 3 lbs of fat in 1 week do you eat 3 lbs of fat because you lost it. Same with calories Just because you use 300 calories does not mean you eat 300 calories. If you start with 2000 calories and you burn up 1000 because you have a sedentary life style and do nothing all day do you eat 3000 calories because you burned up 1000 o f the beginning calories. No You eat less calories because your body will use up the fat it has stored for energy as long as you continue to feed the body. The trick is to eat healthy foods that are better for you with the right kinds of fats and fiber so your body will not continue to store them.

First of all, 3lbs of dietary fat does not equal 3lbs of stored fat in your body. Your body stores calories as fat when you eat more calories than your body requires to maintain its current weight.

If you are in a calorie deficit, your body will not store anything as fat.
And the calorie goal that MFP assigns people has already taken into account their goals, personal information, and activity level and already includes the calorie deficit needed to lose weight.

If you eat that calorie goal, you will lose weight. If you add exercise, burn more calories, and eat them back, the deficit is still the same, and you will lose weight.

The calories that the elliptical machine gives you probably aren't correct, but they are much more reliable than those that MFP gives. That being said, that's an awful lot of calories burned. I would think you are feeling the effects of too few calories if you're not eating back some of those calories burned. MFP is pretty good about warning you when you're eating too few. With too few, you run the risk of damaging your body from insufficient nutrition, AND it slows down your metabolism...

Ok let me explain it another way. If you are overweight and you lose 3 lbs of fat in 1 week do you eat 3 lbs of fat because you lost it. Same with calories Just because you use 300 calories does not mean you eat 300 calories. If you start with 2000 calories and you burn up 1000 because you have a sedentary life style and do nothing all day do you eat 3000 calories because you burned up 1000 o f the beginning calories. No You eat less calories because your body will use up the fat it has stored for energy as long as you continue to feed the body. The trick is to eat healthy foods that are better for you with the right kinds of fats and fiber so your body will not continue to store them.

Strong 1st and 2nd posts :noway:


OP....I don't eat exercise calories back. Occasionally when I do a long run I will eat a bit back, but only because of the fact that it's an endurance workout. I personally find there too be too little room for error when estimating calories burned, especially if you are lifting. I use my body as a guide and if I need a little extra, then I'll eat a little extra. This is what has worked for ME though. I know there are people that are adamant about eating them back and have had success. I will also say that I have my goal set to 1/2 lb per week to lose so my deficit is not super aggressive. Do what works for you, but I will caution you to be very careful with how many calories burned you log. 900 is an awful lot in an hour and overestimating could completely stop any progress you may see. And that's also not accounting for any errors in logging, weighing, measuring, etc.

Good luck!

Yes I was hungry today! Lol I did the elliptical for a half hour, then my treadmill, and just put in a little extra late night workout while my kids played in the basement! That's why I wanted to know how many eat theirs back, I ate healthy when I was hungry so no worries there, I can tell when my body starts feeling funky that I need something.

You probably aren't burning 900 calories using an elliptical for 30 minutes. I don't know your size, but if this helps put it in perspective for you......I'm a 5'6, 118lb female and in 30 minutes I burn about 150-175 on the elliptical...if I'm lucky. (calorie burn via HRM) So don't eat back what your elliptical tells you you're burning. Cut it in half, if not more.

Basically, yes, I think you should eat them back if you're using MFP method. If after a while you find you're not losing enough, you could always scale back and try eating something like 75% or 50% of what you burned. I know several people who do that.

This is what I was going to offer. This is what I am doing. So far I'm able to eat back all of MFPs exercise calories and am losing. If I stall, then the plan is to reduce them as described above.

~Chelle

I use my TDEE which already included activity. I'm also anal about weighing my solid food and measuring liquids. Now that I've said that I do put in some massive burns via my hrm so I still track my exercise and eat at least enough to match my BMR.

I've been at this for awhile so I have a good idea of what my numbers are as far as BMR and TDEE. But comparing with MFP, the two methods are within 100 calories if I ate the exercise calories back. So even if I were using MFP as it is designed I would eat my exercise calories back. This is more important when you burn more calories because your body needs the additional fuel.

I do not typically eat back my exercise calories but I do eat a healthy amount. My daily caloric intake is around 1800 then I burn 500-600 each day so my net is still around 1200.