Questions about calories, exercise and the likes!

Jennak87
Jennak87 Posts: 112 Member
edited November 2024 in Health and Weight Loss
I really want to get this right from the offset, I have pushed myself too hard in the past and lost weight quickly but unhealthily and I have also overeaten without realising and found myself 50lbs overweight, so I was hoping someone could clear some things up for me so I can do this properly

I would ultimately like to lose in the region of 70lbs and I am currently 48lbs overweight. I've set my MFP goals to -2lbs per week, which from what I've read is fine because I have so much to lose. As it is the summer, I'm no longer on work placement or at uni so I've set my activity levels to sedentary. MFP has calculated my calories burned from day to day activity as 2090 and has set me the calorie intake goal of 1200 which gives me a weekly loss of 1.8lbs. All of this I understand.

Where I get lost is when it comes to calories burned during exercise and what those calories mean to me and how they affect my weekly goals. I have a HRM and I wear it during all of my workouts (except yoga) and I input the activity and the calories I've burned into MFP when I come home from the gym. I am fairly "active" in the sense that I go to 5 spin classes and a yoga class every week, Sunday is my only day off from the gym. I have read a lot of posts about eating back exercise calories and I know that people tend to do their own thing (either eating them all, half of them or none of them), but I still don't get what the deal is with my calorie goals vs net calories vs my weight loss.

For example, today I ate 1243 calories worth of food then this evening I went to the gym and burned 540 calories. Now my Daily Summary says I've only net 703 calories. I keep reading that the absolute minimum we should be eating is 1200 calories so, correct me if I'm wrong, but am I in the situation where I am always going to have to eat back all of my exercise calories in order to do this in the recommended (healthy, I assume) fashion? Does this also mean that I will never be able to achieve a 1000 calorie daily deficit required to lose 2lbs per week without going below the recommended calorie allowance? Or is the fact that I did actually eat 1243 what matters and exercise will just speed my weight loss up? So for example, today I had a deficit of 847 calories then I exercised and added 540 calories to that deficit, meaning I could lose maybe 3-ish lbs per week if every day was like today.

I hope that wasn't too long winded and confusing!

Replies

  • IsaackGMOON
    IsaackGMOON Posts: 3,358 Member
    Eat back your exercise calories to increase your net.

    You want to be hitting 1200 calories, not under, perhaps a few hundred calories over.
  • ibnfaqir
    ibnfaqir Posts: 139 Member
    The 1200 number already takes into account your activity level. If you choose to eat back your exercise calories your deficit will be lower. From what you said: 2090-(1200+540) is a 350 deficit instead of a 890 calorie deficit. You will lose at a slower rate if you eat back. Dont worry about net and think you will go in starvation mode. Even though your metabolism with weight loss you will experience weight loss.
  • Jennak87
    Jennak87 Posts: 112 Member
    IsaackGMOON wrote: »
    Eat back your exercise calories to increase your net.

    You want to be hitting 1200 calories, not under, perhaps a few hundred calories over.

    Thanks for the input! So, it's the net calories I should pay attention to and aim to get to 1200-ish?
    ibnfaqir wrote: »
    The 1200 number already takes into account your activity level. If you choose to eat back your exercise calories your deficit will be lower. From what you said: 2090-(1200+540) is a 350 deficit instead of a 890 calorie deficit. You will lose at a slower rate if you eat back. Dont worry about net and think you will go in starvation mode. Even though your metabolism with weight loss you will experience weight loss.

    My day to day burn is 2090, today I burned a further 540 through exercise but I ate 1243 so it's 2090 + 540 - 1200 so I'm pretty sure my deficit was 1387 :) Without exercise I'm already at a deficit of 890 calories, exercise only increases that deficit. I did just eat 372 calories though because I was a bit concerned about only netting 703 for the day and I wanted to get it to at least 1000. Better to err on the side of caution until I know what I'm doing for sure.

  • ibnfaqir
    ibnfaqir Posts: 139 Member
    No you are double counting your activity level.
  • sofaking6
    sofaking6 Posts: 4,589 Member
    ibnfaqir wrote: »
    The 1200 number already takes into account your activity level. If you choose to eat back your exercise calories your deficit will be lower. From what you said: 2090-(1200+540) is a 350 deficit instead of a 890 calorie deficit. You will lose at a slower rate if you eat back. Dont worry about net and think you will go in starvation mode. Even though your metabolism with weight loss you will experience weight loss.

    Not if she's using MFP NEAT method - I don't believe the calories are included. OP - using the HRM you can and should eat back your calories burned during exercise, just a couple of things to be careful of:
    1) HRM can give you a slightly inflated estimate, so maybe chop 20% off the number when you log it
    2) Be careful about your calories in - if you're not careful with your portion sizes and which entries you choose from the database, your numbers might be off.

    The other way you could do this is TDEE - that factors in your weekly exercise so no eating back your exercise calories. It can be easier if you know you're going to get those classes in every week, because you get the same allowance every day. Here's a calculator for that: http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/
  • Jennak87
    Jennak87 Posts: 112 Member
    sofaking6 wrote: »
    ibnfaqir wrote: »
    The 1200 number already takes into account your activity level. If you choose to eat back your exercise calories your deficit will be lower. From what you said: 2090-(1200+540) is a 350 deficit instead of a 890 calorie deficit. You will lose at a slower rate if you eat back. Dont worry about net and think you will go in starvation mode. Even though your metabolism with weight loss you will experience weight loss.

    Not if she's using MFP NEAT method - I don't believe the calories are included. OP - using the HRM you can and should eat back your calories burned during exercise, just a couple of things to be careful of:
    1) HRM can give you a slightly inflated estimate, so maybe chop 20% off the number when you log it
    2) Be careful about your calories in - if you're not careful with your portion sizes and which entries you choose from the database, your numbers might be off.

    The other way you could do this is TDEE - that factors in your weekly exercise so no eating back your exercise calories. It can be easier if you know you're going to get those classes in every week, because you get the same allowance every day. Here's a calculator for that: http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/

    Thanks for your reply. I did think my HRM might be overestimating my calories, but I haven't been eating them all back anyway so it's not really been an issue yet! I do measure and weigh pretty much everything (except things like the 4 lettuce leaves I use for lettuce wraps, that would be more hassle than they're worth) so I'm pretty confident that my calories in are correct.

    I just had a quick look over the calculator in your link. Is there a way to set it so I can lose 2lbs per week? It's only setting me at 1.3lbs and I'd like to aim for 2.
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