Eating Exercise Calories

Here's how it works...you put all of this groovy info about yourself into this calculator called MFP. You're supposed to choose an activity level that best describes your day to day WITHOUT any exercise...just your normal hum drum. This calculator then calculates your theoretical NON-EXERCISE maintenance number based on your stats and activity level as per statistical averages of the general populous. From this number, MFP will take a cut of XXX calories as per your desired rate of loss...250 calories per day cut for 1/2 Lb per week...500 calories per day cut for 1 Lb per week...1,0000 calories per day for 2 Lbs per week (aggressive). 1200 net calories is the lowest MFP will go as it is extremely difficult to get actual proper nutrition below that intake...and really, anything lower than that would be considered a VLCD for the vast majority and should only be done under medical supervision to ensure minimum nutritional requirements are being met.

So let's say you do what most people do and select "sedentary" and 2 Lbs per week loss rate goal...MFP is pretty much going to default to around 1200 calories because for one, if you're sedentary you don't need that many calories to maintain; and 2, 1,000 calories per day is ****ing huge deficit of energy. Usually if you say sedentary and 2 Lbs, that 1200 calorie goal is only about a 600 - 800 calorie deficit from your theoretical "sedentary" maintenance number.

So that means that MFP is assuming your NON-EXERCISE maintenance number to be around 1800 calories or so...pretty typical for a sedentary to light active female of average size...this gives you a deficit built into your diet of 1800 - 1200 = 600 calories per day...just over 1 Lb per week. Now if you exercise you are adding additional activity...so your maintenance number moves from 1800 calories per day to 1800 + 500 = 2,300 calories per day and your new calorie goal goes from 1200 calories to 1,700 calories...but you still maintain the same 600 calorie deficit you were at because 2,300 - 1,700 = 600 calories per day.

When I entered all my data into MFP I told it that I had an active lifestyle. I am currently using a pedometer for my own curiousity and my job alone contributes between 10,000-15,000 steps a day, depending on what I need to get done that day and I am also constantly crawling around the floor since I work as a lab tech. I am not sure if this information would also be used in the MFP calculation.

Here's how it works...you put all of this groovy info about yourself into this calculator called MFP. You're supposed to choose an activity level that best describes your day to day WITHOUT any exercise...just your normal hum drum. This calculator then calculates your theoretical NON-EXERCISE maintenance number based on your stats and activity level as per statistical averages of the general populous. From this number, MFP will take a cut of XXX calories as per your desired rate of loss...250 calories per day cut for 1/2 Lb per week...500 calories per day cut for 1 Lb per week...1,0000 calories per day for 2 Lbs per week (aggressive). 1200 net calories is the lowest MFP will go as it is extremely difficult to get actual proper nutrition below that intake...and really, anything lower than that would be considered a VLCD for the vast majority and should only be done under medical supervision to ensure minimum nutritional requirements are being met.

So let's say you do what most people do and select "sedentary" and 2 Lbs per week loss rate goal...MFP is pretty much going to default to around 1200 calories because for one, if you're sedentary you don't need that many calories to maintain; and 2, 1,000 calories per day is ****ing huge deficit of energy. Usually if you say sedentary and 2 Lbs, that 1200 calorie goal is only about a 600 - 800 calorie deficit from your theoretical "sedentary" maintenance number.

So that means that MFP is assuming your NON-EXERCISE maintenance number to be around 1800 calories or so...pretty typical for a sedentary to light active female of average size...this gives you a deficit built into your diet of 1800 - 1200 = 600 calories per day...just over 1 Lb per week. Now if you exercise you are adding additional activity...so your maintenance number moves from 1800 calories per day to 1800 + 500 = 2,300 calories per day and your new calorie goal goes from 1200 calories to 1,700 calories...but you still maintain the same 600 calorie deficit you were at because 2,300 - 1,700 = 600 calories per day.

Now you may ask, why not just keep the additional 500 calories and tack that onto the 600 and have a deficit of 1,100 calories? The reason is that your net calories would be very low...too low really to provide your body with what it needs...a net of 700 calories is just far too low for the vast majority. The other issue here is that most people really aren't sedentary, but that's what they put and that further strains their calorie restrictions.

You should at least be eating some portion of those exercise calories back..I would leave some margin for error as it is difficult to accurately determine calorie burns and it is also likely that you underestimate your intake (pretty much everyone does, even if they're religious about food scales and measuring tools). That is the way that this tool is designed.