Exercise Calories...Again

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  • Deena_Bean
    Deena_Bean Posts: 906 Member
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    I eat them back minus the amount of calories I would've burned by sitting on the couch (around 70-90/hour). Seems fair to me - I use a HRM to track my calories burned. I also use MapMyRun and I have to say that it is usually about 50-100 calories over what my HRM says. Not sure if that helps you, but it's how I roll.
  • iheartinsanity
    iheartinsanity Posts: 205 Member
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    I think you've gotten some great answers. MFP blog posted something a while back about not eating (all) your exercises calories back. Everytime I mentioned this to my physician in the past, he laughed at me thinking I was trying to pull something over on him. I am in weight loss mode right now (will be bulking this year, then late in the year cutting) and if I'm hungry, I eat. If I'm not, I don't. I use MFP to hold myself accountable to my food and exericse...but use my bodymedia fit armband to see what I'm really burning and what I need to do in order to lose weight.
  • fswku
    fswku Posts: 19 Member
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    I use RunKeeper, and I normally eat back the calories I burn during a workout. So far it's been working just fine and I've been losing right at 2lbs/week.

    Just checked the calculator on Runner's World and it's spot on with what RK told me I burned today.

    A thought on adapting to training: Yes, that's going to affect your calorie burn. But at the same time, as a beginner, a 5K is going to burn more because that person is taking longer to go the distance. An experienced runner using a 5K as a warmup is going to burn less because it's taking them far less time to cover that distance. So as long as you're keeping your stats accurate in RK, then the math looks like it will always add up.
  • tmauck4472
    tmauck4472 Posts: 1,783 Member
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    reginab1984 wrote: »
    "Can I eat back my exercise calories?" I know it's been asked, time and time again, and the answers are typically as follows: 1) "No." 2) Only eat back 50%, because MFP and typical gym equipment overestimates calories burnt." I understand all of that. But, I'm a runner, and I use RunKeeper to track my runs. It has my stats (height, weight, etc...) and monitors every single aspect of my run: distance, pace, etc... As a result, I feel that RunKeeper's estimations of the calories I burn are pretty accurate, since it bases the end result off of my personal stats and my run stats. I have MyFitnessPal linked with RunKeeper, so the calories that RunKeeper says I burned are reflected on my diary for that day. So, here's the question again: Can I eat back these exercise calories without cutting them in half, since I feel the original number is pretty accurate?

    Actually it isn't as accurate as you think. I have map my run and even that isn't as high as MFP but it's higher than my HRM. On Map my run if it says 500 calories you can bet my HRM says 300 or below.
  • SuggaD
    SuggaD Posts: 1,369 Member
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    Trial and error is the way to go. I don't eat mine back all the time. Some days I do eat them all. Some days I go over. Some days I only eat some. It balances out and I maintain doing that. When I start losing weight, I eat more. When I start gaining, I eat a little less.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    reginab1984 wrote: »
    "Can I eat back my exercise calories?" I know it's been asked, time and time again, and the answers are typically as follows: 1) "No." 2) Only eat back 50%, because MFP and typical gym equipment overestimates calories burnt." I understand all of that. But, I'm a runner, and I use RunKeeper to track my runs. It has my stats (height, weight, etc...) and monitors every single aspect of my run: distance, pace, etc... As a result, I feel that RunKeeper's estimations of the calories I burn are pretty accurate, since it bases the end result off of my personal stats and my run stats. I have MyFitnessPal linked with RunKeeper, so the calories that RunKeeper says I burned are reflected on my diary for that day. So, here's the question again: Can I eat back these exercise calories without cutting them in half, since I feel the original number is pretty accurate?

    Sure, I did. With the exception of really long runs (90 mins +), which are impossible to eat back all of anyway and where I think you get overestimation because it doesn't back out the calories you'd otherwise burn, I always ate most of my running calories, or at least felt free to. I also used Runkeeper, and I always lost at about the predicted rate.

    Some don't log that accurately and thus need to make up for it in part with the exercise calories, but if you are pretty confident in your logging, give it a try. If you aren't losing or losing less than you think you should be, you can always reduce the exercise calories eaten back then.
  • tostaky
    tostaky Posts: 30 Member
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    Why dont you eat back only (say) 50% of all the burnt calories in excess of (say) 500?
    Say you run off 700 calories, you eat only 100 extra.
    You run off 1000 calories, you eat 250 extra
    You run off 450cal, no extra cals to eat.

    You could make a rule like that with your own parameters.
  • reginab1984
    reginab1984 Posts: 41 Member
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    Thanks for all of the helpful feedback, y'all! I never thought of subtracting the calories I would have burned by not doing anything...great suggestion. I also like the idea of coming up with some parameters for eating back calories based on the amount I burned. Thanks again!
  • SergeantSausage
    SergeantSausage Posts: 1,673 Member
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    stealthq wrote: »
    SergeantSausage wrote: »
    When all else fails, EXPERIMENT, OBSERVE, RECORD, MODIFY, VERIFY.

    I mean,really, how hard is it to eat them back, see what happens in 3 or 4 weeks, make adjustments, and carry on.

    This is about lifestyle, right?

    Life. *A lifetime.*

    A couple of weeks back and forth, or even a couple of months taking time to verify what works for your specific lifestyle and genetics, isn't going to derail a future lifetime of good habit, right?

    Right?



    Not about a lifestyle, actually.

    She's trying to drop to race weight. Presumably there's a time limit to get there. Hopefully it's far enough to allow her time to experiment.


    I beg to differ.

    Look at my profile pick.

    Racing *IS* a lifestyle.
  • vismal
    vismal Posts: 2,463 Member
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    paultucker1007 wrote: »
    vismal wrote: »
    What it probably does not account for is you adapting to the training. A beginner might run a 5k and be exhausted where as an experienced runner may just be getting warmed up. The better you become at an activity, the less calories it causes you to burn.

    Not really. Most people just go faster and burn more calories, rather than stay at the speed they started at.
    Running faster doesn't burn much more calories, if any more calories, then running at a slower pace if the distance remains constant. Take a 10k for example. Using the mapmyrun calorie counter, and a 30 year old 200lb male as a test subject. He runs a 10k in either 60 minutes, 50 minutes, or 45 minutes.
    60: 1053 calories, 50: 1056, 45: 1053. Virtually no difference.
    Using a 145 lb 5'6 female:
    60: 698, 50: 700, 45: 698. Again, no significant difference.

    The reason for this is because of the time you spend doing the activity. You of course burn more calories per hour running faster, but you also spend less time total doing the activity. Again this all requires distance to be the constant. If you however just go out and run for an hour every time you run, as you get faster you will run further in the same amount of time and burn more calories.
  • RosieWest8
    RosieWest8 Posts: 185 Member
    edited January 2015
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    My experience -- I calculated my TDEE based on a sedentary lifestyle because I'm a school psychologist and am sitting at my desk or with students most of the day. I purchased a simple Polar HRM and use it when I do cardio workouts (I don't lift really and when I do it's very low amount of weight. I also do body weight stuff a bit). However, I only use my HRM when I'm doing my cardio workout which is usually running/jogging or a stationary bike. Start it at the beginning of my workout and stop it when I'm finished. It gives me an 'average' HR and I use this site:

    http://www.shapesense.com/fitness-exercise/calculators/heart-rate-based-calorie-burn-calculator.aspx

    To estimate my calories burned based on my age, weight, height, sex, and duration of exercise. I would manually put this calorie burn amount into MFP. I eat back 100% (usually) of my exercise calories and have lost ~40lbs since joining MFP.

    So...that's what worked for me but I know it's different for everyone and it's true you probably just have to pick a method and try it for a few weeks and then assess whether you lost, gained or stayed the same.

    I will also mention that when I was at grad school and using the universities equipment that allowed you to put your age/weight into the machine and one that had those HRM on them....I found that their estimate of calories burned was about as accurate as the way I used above to estimate it so some machines are pretty good. The ones that are off are probably the ones that don't allow you to put in as much info or don't have built in HRM.

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