Maybe all this time I've had the wrong damn settings???

polar5554
polar5554 Posts: 576 Member
edited September 25 in Fitness and Exercise
So on my profile....it says

How would you describe your normal daily activities?

Sedentary: Spend most of the day sitting (e.g. bank teller, desk job)
Lightly Active: Spend a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. nurse, salesman)
Active: Spend a good part of the day doing some physical activity (e.g. waitress, mailman)
Very Active: Spend most of the day doing heavy physical activity (e.g. bike messenger, carpenter)

Here is my confusion....

While YES, I DO have a desk job (spend most of the day sitting), I also exercise 6 days a week doing Power 90 (the predecessor to P90X)...

I've also come across this version of explaining your activity level:

1. If you are sedentary (little or no exercise) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.2
2. If you are lightly active (light exercise/sports 1-3 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.375
3. If you are moderatetely active (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.55
4. If you are very active (hard exercise/sports 6-7 days a week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.725
5. If you are extra active (very hard exercise/sports & physical job or 2x training) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.9

#4 is describing VERY ACTIVE if you exercise 6-7 days a week (which is what I do)...

What do you think I should be using on MFP????

Replies

  • isabelk
    isabelk Posts: 153 Member
    Wow thanks for posting that. I had no idea what my daily requirements are. Yikes, I need to up my calories. This was a big eye-opener.
  • polar5554
    polar5554 Posts: 576 Member
    I guess I should have read the WHOLE post.... (thanks HIPSNICKERS1)

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/172515-frantic-about-adhering-to-the-right-calorie-intake-read-t
  • rileamoyer
    rileamoyer Posts: 2,412 Member
    I did the life style as I am with no exercise built in. Then I added the exercise as my goals. Worked for me.
  • mckant
    mckant Posts: 217 Member
    Is what you are currently doing working? I say if it's not broke don't fix it :wink: but if you're curious maybe you could switch it up for a few weeks and see what happens.
  • Mike523
    Mike523 Posts: 393 Member
    You should be set on sedentary. MFP handles exercise separately, which is why you add the calories you burn from exercise into your diary as a separate item.

    So your typical day is sedentary, and then you burn however many calories exercising on top of that.
  • cptino
    cptino Posts: 46 Member
    I was told that you can do one of two things:

    1. Select your activity level without considering exercise and manually add the exercise as you do it OR
    2. Select the activity level considering your exercise and do not manually add the exercise you do.
  • taso42_DELETED
    taso42_DELETED Posts: 3,394 Member
    Hah, I posted almost an identical thread about a month ago. I bumped mine to very active after that. It still wasn't enough calories, so then I manually bumped my daily calories up even more. I work a desk job and I'm very sedentary other than my daily exercise.

    Kudos to you for discovering this. I vote you go ahead and bump it up.
  • jram70
    jram70 Posts: 91 Member
    I did the life style as I am with no exercise built in. Then I added the exercise as my goals. Worked for me.

    This. Also probably why there is so much debate on eating exercise calories back or lots of people saying I am staying within my goals and working out but not seeing results. If your initial baseline is wrong then you will have limited success. I lost 18 lbs by picking correct lifestyle and then adding in exercise as I did them. And for what it is worth, I ate most of my exercise calories if I was hungry. If not - I didn't.
  • solpwr
    solpwr Posts: 1,039 Member
    I work at a desk all day (sedentary) and exercise a lot (6 days/week 80 minutes average). I put this into MFP and got what I believe is a realistic NET calorie goal. I have been counting calories without MFP since mid January, and lost 20 pounds during that time. But I don't think my counting was very accurate, I was doing to much estimation in my spreadsheet entries.

    I started MFP 10 days ago, and in that time have lost 5 pounds. That's a bit fast, but I had plateau'd for several weeks; so I'm factoring that in. We will see going forward, but I think a person needs to use sedentary if they work at a desk, because in the MFP context I think it is describing lifestyle other than exercise. Exercise is handled separately.
  • baisleac
    baisleac Posts: 2,019 Member
    You should be set on sedentary. MFP handles exercise separately, which is why you add the calories you burn from exercise into your diary as a separate item.

    I always find this statement interesting as when I add exercise as a goal, it doesn't change my calorie allowance on MFP at all... and as someone who exercises 6-7 days/week, I'm burning more calories sitting at my desk than someone who doesn't.

    I manually set my calories to 80% of my maintenance calories AND eat my exercise calories back AND am losing weight and inches at a steady pace. YMMV.
  • taso42_DELETED
    taso42_DELETED Posts: 3,394 Member
    I work at a desk all day (sedentary) and exercise a lot (6 days/week 80 minutes average). I put this into MFP and got what I believe is a realistic NET calorie goal. I have been counting calories without MFP since mid January, and lost 20 pounds during that time. But I don't think my counting was very accurate, I was doing to much estimation in my spreadsheet entries.

    I started MFP 10 days ago, and in that time have lost 5 pounds. That's a bit fast, but I had plateau'd for several weeks; so I'm factoring that in. We will see going forward, but I think a person needs to use sedentary if they work at a desk, because in the MFP context I think it is describing lifestyle other than exercise. Exercise is handled separately.

    I am living proof that this is not true for all people. The MFP numbers are a starting point for complete beginners. Over time, I think most people will find the best success fine tuning it to themselves. It's too easy to start believing that the numbers a computer program spit out are truly accurate to your body and lifestyle.
  • robin52077
    robin52077 Posts: 4,383 Member
    Also, I DO believe MFP estimates rather low. They told me MAINTENANCE was 1500...that's nuts. I was losing almost a pound a week at 1500. After wearing a BodyMediaFit for over a month I discovered a LAZY on-the-couch-all-day kind of day was 1600, and days I did ANYTHING, even housework or grocery shopping, it was over 1800..hitting 2200-2400 on days I was very busy at work or exercised hard....
  • deannarey13
    deannarey13 Posts: 452
    Ugh...this is a constant struggle for me. Am I eating too much or too little??? I do not believe that MFP calculates the caloric goals for many people.

    I have had very little movement in weight for months now. I have adjusted up and then back down based on differrent advice I have recieved. I work a desk job but workout hard (5 days per week average for 1-2 hours, both cardio and weight training) and am moderately lean (22% BF) at this time. I have my activity level set at Lightly Active. MFP has my caloric goals at 1570 for a .5 loss per week. Often I think that I work out so hard that I might actually need to eat more, but what do I know....
  • hpsnickers1
    hpsnickers1 Posts: 2,783 Member
    I guess I should have read the WHOLE post.... (thanks HIPSNICKERS1)

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/172515-frantic-about-adhering-to-the-right-calorie-intake-read-t

    You're welcome. All I did was relay someone else's info though. Some people will agree and some won't. But MFP numbers are just so generalized. They need to be to cater to all of us big and small. And I have done a lot of number changing and working with my macronutrient ratios.

    Like robin52077 I have a BodyMediaFit that I have been wearing for the last month. Her burn numbers are very close to mine. I think you can be labeled as sedentary if you are chained to your desk all day. I have a desk job but still put in over 5000 steps at work. The smallest burn I had was 1641 and that was a very, very, very lazy Sunday. The highest burn I had was 2323 and I only 250 of that was from focused exercise. MFP has me set at 1470 for Maintenance.

    And I love this little excerpt from a recent post regarding a Tom Venuto Article:

    "Do Cardio. Don’t Over-Do It. If you’re overweight, you can sometimes get away with very low calorie diets without adverse consequences if you’re not doing tons of cardio on top of it. Endurance athletes get away with high volume training because they provide ample amounts of food to fuel it (man, those guys can EAT!) Dieters and physique competitors on the other hand, often semi-starve themselves while doing huge amounts of cardio at the same time. Exercise research says that extreme amounts of cardio during a diet can actually cause the same type of adaptive metabolic downshift as eating too little food. Fitness and figure competitors have been known to do 2 or even 3 hours of cardio a day before competitions. This kind of overtraining can be counter-productive when you look at the metabolic damage and “cardio dependency” potential. And remember, if you’re not diligent, you can out-eat almost any amount of exercise. If you’re doing upwards of an hour of cardio a day and not seeing significant fat loss, you’d better take a close look at your diet first before you rush to add more cardio.

    Weight training: In the physique world, weight training is a foregone conclusion. But in the everyday world of non-athletes, weight loss = “diet,” not weight loss = “lift weights.” For Suzy soccer mom, “lift weights to lose weight” probably doesn't even compute. But weight training is so important for metabolic health and better body composition, that if you were forced to choose one or the other – cardio or weights – the weightlifting would be a NO BRAINER decision. If you have a concern about metabolic damage and you’re not weight training yet, there’s nothing else to discuss. Start pumping iron, then get back to me."
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