Eating back calories

Hi there

I'm just wondering if you have to eat back the calories saved on exercise each day?? I usually get home at 7ish, work out then have a light meal. At this point I see what calories I've saved and when it's that late at night you don't want to be eating more food. Just wondering if this will hinder my weight loss progress? Can I save these calories up for the weekend when I go out??

NO if you do you're inhibiting your fat burning abilities. I explain in my blog, here's the link.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/asmcriminal/view/common-theories-disproven-108628

This is always a tricky one! For many people eating back the exercise calories is essential, otherwise they don't lose weight. The jury's out with me - I find if I eat them back then I don't lose weight. So I am "experimenting" If I exercise and don't eat them back I struggle with energy levels. So I am trying to eat half of them and aiming that my "net colories" = 1200 a day.

Hope that helps.

<~ Not a Health Expert...:)
I sometimes find myself feeling like I can eat mire calories if I burn more. But with me, it takes a lot longer, to loose the weight.
Not certain that you can save up and use later?!
"Sorry, not much help!"
Have an amazing rest of your night/day/afternoon.!:flowerforyou:

The correct answer is a resounding YES. Read this, it explains everything: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo

The correct answer is a resounding YES. Read this, it explains everything: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo

I am familiar with bank's methods. I disagree with them. If you feed the body when do you burn fat? you're constantly increasing your insulin that stores sugar in the muscle or fat. If your muscles are full of glucose, then it will get stored as fat. If you're constantly eating, when will your muscle be empty?
When you don't eat, Growth hormone is released which burns body fat. Also, it releases glucagon, which helps release body fat. Not eating has been proven to burn 4x more fat.

fasting burns 5x more fat.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12051710

The correct answer is a resounding YES. Read this, it explains everything: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo

I am familiar with bank's methods. I disagree with them. If you feed the body when do you burn fat? you're constantly increasing your insulin that stores sugar in the muscle or fat. If your muscles are full of glucose, then it will get stored as fat. If you're constantly eating, when will your muscle be empty?
When you don't eat, Growth hormone is released which burns body fat. Also, it releases glucagon, which helps release body fat.

fasting burns 5x more fat.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12051710

This may well be your most irresponsible post yet.

"Not eating has been proven to burn 4x more fat."

Way to encourage eating disorders and unhealthy behaviors and give vague, incomplete and completely irrelevant statements.

To OP: MFP is designed for you to eat the exercise cals, while maintaining the built in deficit you chose for your loss per week goal. Many people do have success with averaging the cals over the week instead of focusing on daily, but it does still need to be quality cals and you may have issues if you do it too often, go too overboard, or don't fuel properly during the week.

You can't argue with results. That's all I have to say to you ladyhawk. Here is a link just for you, you'll love it, how to eat 800 calories with out losing muscle mass, and dropping 25lbs of fat.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10204826

And to complete my links to studies, here is a link that shows gherlin(biochemical released with hunger) also triggers Growth Hormone.
http://ajpendo.physiology.org/content/293/3/E819.full

Hi there

I'm just wondering if you have to eat back the calories saved on exercise each day?? I usually get home at 7ish, work out then have a light meal. At this point I see what calories I've saved and when it's that late at night you don't want to be eating more food. Just wondering if this will hinder my weight loss progress? Can I save these calories up for the weekend when I go out??

NO if you do you're inhibiting your fat burning abilities. I explain in my blog, here's the link.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/asmcriminal/view/common-theories-disproven-108628

This is very good information , and i totally agree when i ate back my calories i did gain weight like crazy ,so i'm back to what worked before for me , not eating my exercise calories and avoid crabs .

Hi there

I'm just wondering if you have to eat back the calories saved on exercise each day?? I usually get home at 7ish, work out then have a light meal. At this point I see what calories I've saved and when it's that late at night you don't want to be eating more food. Just wondering if this will hinder my weight loss progress? Can I save these calories up for the weekend when I go out??

NO if you do you're inhibiting your fat burning abilities. I explain in my blog, here's the link.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/asmcriminal/view/common-theories-disproven-108628

This is very good information , and i totally agree when i ate back my calories i did gain weight like crazy ,so i'm back to what worked before for me , not eating my exercise calories and avoid crabs .

rori thanks for your support.

To OP: MFP is designed for you to eat the exercise cals, while maintaining the built in deficit you chose for your loss per week goal. Many people do have success with averaging the cals over the week instead of focusing on daily, but it does still need to be quality cals and you may have issues if you do it too often, go too overboard, or don't fuel properly during the week.

Hi Ladyhawk00 - I hear you with regards to making sure if I use up my cals over the weekend that they're good quality cals (and not to do it too often) I just look at people on diets like weight watchers and wonder if this is the way to go. I wouldn't eat huge meals or take aways on the weekends but I would go out for a few drinks on Saturday night and I tend to drink Coors light. I'm going away this weekend but after that I don't have anything planned until my hols so will be on laying off the beer at the weekend over the next couple of weeks. I just find some times my social life can get in the way of my weight loss!!!

Thanks for all the replies...lovin' this site already!!

As long as it's not a frequent thing and you're within goal for the week, you'll probably be ok. And I, for one, believe that since it shouldn't be a temporary "diet", you need to accommodate normal life - which includes having some "treats" on occasion and being able to be social and enjoy a night out. You just have to work it in to where your servings are reasonable and do it LESS than before.

I work out at night too and struggle with trying to meet my net calories after a great workout. Basically what I'm doing is eating every 2ish hours, and making sure I'm making wise food choices. If I eat something light after my workout and still end up with several hundred calories left, I don't stress about it. I'm not going to force myself to eat. I have seen some weight loss since I started doing this (2 lbs last week, I just started), so I'm going to stick to it.

Good luck to you. This is a topic of great debate here. Try different things and stick to what works for you!

I don't eat all of them, because I found it makes me me gain weight or stay the same if I eat all of them.

I might eat 100-200 cal more though on a good days of exercise or exercise a bit more when I ate too much.

I think different things work for different people? Just find out what works for you.

The correct answer is a resounding YES. Read this, it explains everything: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo

I am familiar with bank's methods. I disagree with them. If you feed the body when do you burn fat? you're constantly increasing your insulin that stores sugar in the muscle or fat. If your muscles are full of glucose, then it will get stored as fat. If you're constantly eating, when will your muscle be empty?
When you don't eat, Growth hormone is released which burns body fat. Also, it releases glucagon, which helps release body fat.

fasting burns 5x more fat.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12051710

"Not eating has been proven to burn 4x more fat."

Way to encourage eating disorders and unhealthy behaviors and give vague, incomplete and completely irrelevant statements.

To OP: MFP is designed for you to eat the exercise cals, while maintaining the built in deficit you chose for your loss per week goal. Many people do have success with averaging the cals over the week instead of focusing on daily, but it does still need to be quality cals and you may have issues if you do it too often, go too overboard, or don't fuel properly during the week.

You can't argue with results. That's all I have to say to you ladyhawk. Here is a link just for you, you'll love it, how to eat 800 calories with out losing muscle mass, and dropping 25lbs of fat.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10204826

And to complete my links to studies, here is a link that shows gherlin(biochemical released with hunger) also triggers Growth Hormone.
http://ajpendo.physiology.org/content/293/3/E819.full

Here's a very nice review of the first study:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1784876
Very low calorie diets (VLCD) of 400 to 800 kcal/day appear attractive as they generally show an increase in weight loss from 0.2 to 0.5 kg/week found with the traditional diet to 1.5 to 2.0 kg/week. Early use of very low calorie diets with poor quality protein and loose medical supervision resulted in about 60 deaths, many of which were attributed to loss of lean body mass and in particular, cardiac muscle atrophy. Although current very low calorie diets are presumed safe, concern regarding preservation of lean body mass (LBM) remains. Investigators have used exercise to slow the depletion of lean body mass during very low calorie diets; however, the results are not conclusive. A host of different methodologies and questionable documentation and design of exercise protocols precludes a definitive statement for the benefits of exercise during very low calorie diets for the purpose of LBM retention.

And here are studies that state the exact opposite of that study:

http://www.ajcn.org/content/57/2/127.full.pdf
http://www.ajcn.org/content/51/2/167.abstract?ck=nck
http://www.ajcn.org/content/53/4/826.full.pdf+html
http://www.ajcn.org/content/49/1/93.full.pdf+html
http://www.ajcn.org/content/45/2/391.full.pdf+html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=6694559&dopt=AbstractPlus

To OP: Apologize for hijacking your thread - just hate to see unhealthy info provided without at least offering a different perspective.

ladyhawk, we're way off subject. The issue is, you're misinterpreting what I am saying. NOT once have i said a VLCD is healthy. It's not healthy, we can both agree on that. What i am saying, we don't need as many calories as we think we do. That's all, Eating back your exercise calories has an adverse effect on weight loss. That's all I am saying.

Before someone jumps to the "eating more often speeds up metabolism." That is false. If you burn 2000 calories a day, and you eat 1500 calories a day, it doesn't matter if you eat them in the morning, or at night, or in 50 meals. You STILL burn 2000 calories a day and you're still consuming 1500. Doesn't matter how many times you chop up a carrot, it's still 1 whole carrot.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8399092

I am with you ladyhawk on the dangers of VLCD. I stated my point on that. I am estimating my BMR< but i'd say it's around 3200 calories. Today I ate under 1500 calories I believe. This is not starvation mode, I can lose weight on 500 calories a day, but that is very unhealthy.

There many health benefits associated with fasting(not eating). If it's done temporarily. A few studies concluded your metabolic rate doesn't drop within 72hrs. Notice I said nothing about exercise. I am not sure if that study was done with exercise or with out, that makes a big difference.

Long term fasting, yes it's dangerous, I wouldn't advise it. I wouldn't even advise fasting for 2 days. Maybe 1. To people who are reading this, all these studies with low calorie diets where under medical supervision, keep that in mind.

Is eating too many carbs dangerous? Yes, Is eating too much protein dangerous? Yes, is Eating too much fat dangerous? yes. Is eating too little of these macro nutrients dangerous? yes. Is too little exercise dangerous?, yes, is too much exercise dangerous? yes

Point is, too much or too little of anything is dangerous. I am sure you'd agree on that. You said some things, then you posted studies that completely oppose what you said to make a point. My point with that is, yes... studies can be misleading and misunderstood. What where these people eating on these diets? Where they trigger with certain people? How much did they exercise if they exercised at all? It doesn't say that stuff. It's best to listen to your own body and listen to what it's telling you. Despite what anyone says, including me, including you, including studies. Only one person knows their body best, and it's them. Things should be approached with a logical approach. Does it make sense to create a caloric deficit to lose weight? Yes. Does it make sense to not go to low with you calories? Yes. It's common sense.

I'm only speaking for myself here, but it might help others. I am an endurance athlete and I MUST eat at least part of my exercise calories or I will be sick. When I'm doing say, a 15 miler and burning about 1500 calories, if I don't put a nice chunk back in, I will literally be sick. Now, sometimes I can't eat as my body starts shutting down. That is why endurance athletes eat "Gu" and such. It's portable food to put in calories while exercising.

When I'm no doing endurance events, I go by hunger. If I still have a surplus of calories and I'm hungry, I eat. Problem is, you need to learn what real hunger is and what stress eating is (or whatever your triggers are).

Hoped that helped. :flowerforyou:

ladyhawk, we're way off subject. The issue is, you're misinterpreting what I am saying. NOT once have i said a VLCD is healthy. It's not healthy, we can both agree on that. What i am saying, we don't need as many calories as we think we do. That's all, Eating back your exercise calories has an adverse effect on weight loss. That's all I am saying.

Before someone jumps to the "eating more often speeds up metabolism." That is false. If you burn 2000 calories a day, and you eat 1500 calories a day, it doesn't matter if you eat them in the morning, or at night, or in 50 meals. You STILL burn 2000 calories a day and you're still consuming 1500. Doesn't matter how many times you chop up a carrot, it's still 1 whole carrot.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8399092

I am with you ladyhawk on the dangers of VLCD. I stated my point on that. I am estimating my BMR< but i'd say it's around 3200 calories. Today I ate under 1500 calories I believe. This is not starvation mode, I can lose weight on 500 calories a day, but that is very unhealthy.

There many health benefits associated with fasting(not eating). If it's done temporarily. A few studies concluded your metabolic rate doesn't drop within 72hrs. Notice I said nothing about exercise. I am not sure if that study was done with exercise or with out, that makes a big difference.

Long term fasting, yes it's dangerous, I wouldn't advise it. I wouldn't even advise fasting for 2 days. Maybe 1. To people who are reading this, all these studies with low calorie diets where under medical supervision, keep that in mind.

Is eating too many carbs dangerous? Yes, Is eating too much protein dangerous? Yes, is Eating too much fat dangerous? yes. Is eating too little of these macro nutrients dangerous? yes. Is too little exercise dangerous?, yes, is too much exercise dangerous? yes

Point is, too much or too little of anything is dangerous. I am sure you'd agree on that. You said some things, then you posted studies that completely oppose what you said to make a point. My point with that is, yes... studies can be misleading and misunderstood. What where these people eating on these diets? Where they trigger with certain people? How much did they exercise if they exercised at all? It doesn't say that stuff. It's best to listen to your own body and listen to what it's telling you. Despite what anyone says, including me, including you, including studies. Only one person knows their body best, and it's them. Things should be approached with a logical approach. Does it make sense to create a caloric deficit to lose weight? Yes. Does it make sense to not go to low with you calories? Yes. It's common sense.

One of the main points of the MFP program is eatting back the exercise calories. This keeps your deficit so you lose your goal amount of weight. Not eating them makes your caloric deficit larger, and if you don't have much weight to lose you risk burning a higher % muscle than you would if you had a smaller deficit. What does this mean, this means that with a larger deficit you may hit your goal weight faster, but you will have a higher BF% than you would if you had a smaller deficit. (skinny fat vs. thin and fit).

A larger deficit may work for you as you have a lot of weight to lose, the closer you are to your goal the more important it is to eat your exercise calories so your deficit is manageable for your body. i.e. with 15 or fewer pounds to lose your goal should be 0.5 lbs/week 250 cal deficit, which means you would set your goal at 0.5/week and eat 100% of your exercise caloires to maintain a deficit of 250/day.