n00b question about workout and total calories

In theory, when you exercise you can eat more food. Net calories are really what matters, not total calories. That said, in my experience MFP often overestimates calories burned for various activities. If you are running or walking, I'd recommend just linking another app, like RunKeeper, to MFP for more accurate results.

As for weight, if you are just beginning to work out, you may actually gain weight due to delayed onset muscle soreness, DOMS. In the short run, especially if you are just beginning, your weight is likely to be volatile. In the long run, if you measure intake and burn accurately, MFP is likely to be very close to what you will experience.

Good luck!

Ok so this seems pretty basic, when I use my fitness pal app I have a couple of sections at the top of my screen

Goal, Food, Exercise, Net, Remaining.

I have been holding myself to a 1500 calorie a day diet for 8 days now and I have been exercising every other day. When I exercise it takes the calories I have used and cut back my net, leaving me with more remaining again. How does this work???? Does working out allow me to eat more food??? Worse yet will working out reduce my net enough to cause my body to go into starvation mode?


Thanks in advance

Scott Stoner

K lets start off with the 1500...really? I am 41 and a woman and lose weight on 1700 a day, you are eating less than me...up that to 1800 min.

MFP uses NEAT method

NEAT = Non-exercise activity thermogenesis

NEAT is the energy expended for everything we do that is not sleeping, eating or sports-like exercise. It ranges from the energy expended walking to work, typing, performing yard work, undertaking agricultural tasks and fidgeting. Even trivial physical activities increase metabolic rate substantially and it is the cumulative impact of a multitude of exothermic actions that culminate in an individual's daily NEAT.

So your deficet is built into your calories already and you need to eat some of those exercise calories back to fuel your next workout...

Now starvation mode..it doesn't exist...it's a myth...your body will not hold onto or create fat from nothing. There is something called Adaptive thermogenesis yes where your body will slow the burning of calories based on lack of calories but it will burn calories from fat then lean muscle...that's why low calorie diets aren't good.

Scott, take that phrase "Starvation mode" and put it in the trash.

Next, if you want to eat the calories you worked off, you can, but you don't have to. you are on a 1500 calorie intake. That's a good amount albeit kind of low. If you are working out 3.5 times a week, depending on how hard you work out, you can eat a few back. The way I look at it, it gives me some wiggle room if I eat something I didn't plan on.

Follow your bodys cues. Don't be totally strict and don't use it as an excuse to over indulge. This starvation mode thing confuses a lot of people. You have to be in a deficit in order to lose.

1500 is a good amount :huh: ? Sure, if you consider ~400 calories below BMR as a good amount.

Dude, you're going to burn out at 1500 calories a day, even if you don't exercise. If you do, you're flat out not properly fueling yourself.

Thanks for the responses. Currently I am a very picky eater and I eat crap most of the time. I yo yo back an forth between 285 and 215, usually every time I come off a diet. I usually go with the HCG diet of 500 a day for 21 days then follow a loose atkins diet. However this time I am aiming at the calories because I want to make a lasting difference. I will not get past the picky eating any time soon and I am seeing a psychologist about this issue. So I am hoping that by training my body to physically eat less hence the 1500 calories a day. This leaves me with a small breakfast, small lunch and a moderate size dinner. For my eating habits I feel this my best approach. I am finally able to eat the same foods that I would normally eat, however I have scaled back the amounts.

You understand that 1500 calories is below your BMR, correct? To lose weight you're sacrificing as much muscle as you are fat using this approach.

Also... scales lie. Don't try to measure your success by how many pounds or kilograms you weigh from one day to the next. Measure your body fat percentage in the most easily reproducible way you can and track that from week to week, month to month. I've gone from weighing 170 lbs at 26.5% body fat to weighing 175# at 19.5% body fat.

Focus on slightly building or at least retaining lean muscle mass by resistance training and strength exercises during a caloric deficit period.

Dude would really need to up the calories in order to focus on bulking or retaining lean mass.