Do I count walking as exercising?

Yes, count it. That's why people use pedometers and fitbits. Just don't overestimate your calorie burn.

If I walk at work or walk around the grocery store or something ... no I don't count it.

If go for a walk ... I count it.

Like others, I count it if it's above and beyond what I normally do in a day.

Absolutely! You're making a special effort; not just walking to your car to go to the grocery store!

I only eat up to half my exercise calories. So if I entered my exercise for the day and got an extra 800 calories, I would eat no more than 400.

I walk my dog twice a day. I climb up and down to the street/4th floor several times a day. Walk to the store and back and walk to public transportation at least three days a week and back home again at night. I count none of it as exercise, because it is part of my daily lifestyle, like brushing my teeth, or taking a shower.
I walk a minimum of 30 minutes and often a bit more for myself and for my health and I count this as exercise. I am not 100% right now, because I am still recovering from a double heart attack, but before I walked six days a week. I counted the calories I burned, but did not make a special effort to eat the extra calories or any part of it.
So far I have lost 65 pounds.
My reason: Because I once before got used to eat at least half of my exercise calories back ( which at the time was considerably more than now, because I exercised a lot more). I had an accident and could not exercise and had a heck of a time to eat 400 calories a day less. It did not work and I started to gain weight. Since I burn a lot less calories on exercise now ( and have no intentions to exercise just so I can eat ...see previous sentences ) I just don't bother with the 100-150 calories I could eat more on a good day.
If I were a lot younger ( I am almost 70) and burned several hundred calories a day on exercise, I might increase my intake by a couple hundred calories, but at my age, activity level, health and being under five feet tall it's just no longer a big consideration for me.

editorgrrl wrote: »

CostaRica120 wrote: »

I've been participating in a walking challenge at work and have greatly increased my walking. I'm walking to an from work an hour each way and then some.

Work (including commuting, housework, yard work & child care) is part of your activity level, and should not be logged as exercise. Work = activity level; workouts = exercise.

Increase your activity level and don't log walking to & from work.

If your pedometer syncs with MFP, it'll give you an adjustment every day for the difference between your pedometer burn and your MFP activity level: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/apps

My pedometer doesn't sync to MFP. And I see what you're saying, but walking over 5km each way to work isn't (wasn't) part of my regular activity. I don't think my body knows the difference between the calories I burn during regular activity versus purposeful exercise, so I don't think it's as simple as counting one versus the other. I think I am burning more calories each day in my 2+ hours of walking to work compared to my 30 minute exercise run, so I don't know that it makes sense to only count the calories for the latter. I do know that the sedentary activity level on MFP already takes into account "some" level of physical activity. Does someone know how to figure out what that is? Maybe I could use that? For example, if sedentary includes 250 cals of regular daily physical activity, then maybe I could subtract that from my calorie estimate based on my pedometer and the excess is then my calories earned? (e.g. pedometer says I burned 800 cal, MFP already credits 250 cal, so I earned 550 extra?) Not that I'd necessarily eat all of that, since I know there's a margin of error, but would that make sense?

i did (i go to the gym now, but when i started, walking was my only exercise)

(Your doggies don't get to be walked every day? I bet they are sad. )

CostaRica120 wrote: »

I'm wondering about this too. I've been participating in a walking challenge at work and have greatly increased my walking. I'm walking to an from work an hour each way and then some. I've been waking around 20,000 steps per day and nearly hit 30,000 yesterday. I've compared calorie burn estimates on my pedometer, treadmill and MFP and they're all pretty close. My 20,000 steps = approx 800 calories. How many of those would you guys suggest I allow myself to eat?

How long did it take you to walk the 20,000 steps? What is your BMR? Does your pedometer, treadmill or MFP account for your BMR?

I count it if I go out and walk for the express purpose of getting exercise that day. Otherwise, no I don't count regular or part of life walking.

This is what I go by...

< 5000 Sedentary
5000 - 7499 Lightly Active
7500 - 9999 Moderately Active
10000 - 12499 Active
>12500 Highly Active

I don't count my steps as exercise until I reach 10,000 steps and only if at least 5000 of them were aerobic.

So the first 5000 steps gets me from sedentary to lightly active. Then if I have an additional 5000 steps that are aerobic then I will and 30 minutes of walking as exercise. That is approximately 2 miles done at 4mph.

If all that made sense.

_Terrapin_ wrote: »

CostaRica120 wrote: »

I'm wondering about this too. I've been participating in a walking challenge at work and have greatly increased my walking. I'm walking to an from work an hour each way and then some. I've been waking around 20,000 steps per day and nearly hit 30,000 yesterday. I've compared calorie burn estimates on my pedometer, treadmill and MFP and they're all pretty close. My 20,000 steps = approx 800 calories. How many of those would you guys suggest I allow myself to eat?

How long did it take you to walk the 20,000 steps? What is your BMR? Does your pedometer, treadmill or MFP account for your BMR?

Of those, 20,000 steps, 14,000 are my walk to and from work. So 14,000 = 2 hrs = 5.6 km (The remaining steps are shorter walks here and there and just walking around for regular activity).
My BMR is 1430.
I don't know if any of these measures account for BMR.