Is 1500 calories too little to eat to lose weight?

rabbitjb wrote: »

steponebyone wrote: »

lemurcat12 wrote: »

steponebyone wrote: »

janejellyroll wrote: »

steponebyone wrote: »

rabbitjb wrote: »

I agree with comments but would like to ask what are you doing that you believe burns 500 calories?

Exactly 1 hour of the precore elliptical burned 470 calories on level 7, and the rest was brisk walking on the treadmill to cool off. The calories are shown right on the machines.

Gym machines are notorious for over-stating calorie burns.

Hmm, that sounds more like an opinion than a fact to me.

I have the same informed opinion based on lots of experience around here, as well as reading about the topic.

If you are an experienced, skilled swimmer, then yes you could be burning 500 calories from that. I doubt you are from the elliptical in an hour, and brisk walking won't burn calories at that rate.

That's why people recommend eating back only half until you see results and can adjust. You should eat back some, though.

If you think the machine is right for you, totally fine to start with eating them all back, though, and just adjust down if you don't like the results.

That

lemurcat12 wrote: »

steponebyone wrote: »

janejellyroll wrote: »

steponebyone wrote: »

rabbitjb wrote: »

I agree with comments but would like to ask what are you doing that you believe burns 500 calories?

Exactly 1 hour of the precore elliptical burned 470 calories on level 7, and the rest was brisk walking on the treadmill to cool off. The calories are shown right on the machines.

Gym machines are notorious for over-stating calorie burns.

Hmm, that sounds more like an opinion than a fact to me.

I have the same informed opinion based on lots of experience around here, as well as reading about the topic.

If you are an experienced, skilled swimmer, then yes you could be burning 500 calories from that. I doubt you are from the elliptical in an hour, and brisk walking won't burn calories at that rate.

That's why people recommend eating back only half until you see results and can adjust. You should eat back some, though.

If you think the machine is right for you, totally fine to start with eating them all back, though, and just adjust down if you don't like the results.

OK th

mccindy72 wrote: »

steponebyone wrote: »

Timelordlady85 wrote: »

omg, apples have no calories hooray! j/k, but I input my activity level and stats in MFP and aim for half my exercise calories back. How are you tracking your calories burned? I use a polar chest strap, I noticed that MPF tends to over estimate calorie burns.

That sounds reasonable. Last night I went to bed SUPER hungry, so I probably need to add 200 lbs when I burn that much. For me, I'm big on using different machines at the gym, and they have the amount on them of calories burned.

gym machines don't know who you are, individually, even if you put in your information. I have a Fitbit Charge HR and an elliptical that I entered all my personal statistics into. My Fitbit is very accurate at tracking my calorie burns during my workouts, and my elliptical is consistently giving me readouts of 100 calories higher than my Fitbit for my workouts. You can't trust gym machines. MFP's estimates aren't much better. Get either a Fitbit or a heart rate monitor with a chest strap if you want to be accurate with your workout calorie burns.

I might consider getting one! I heard they're great. & yeah that makes sense about the gym machines, but I do try to stick to higher intensity ellipticals. The stair machine also makes me sweat like crazy, so I know it's burning something. But thanks everyone for the input. I think I need to find a more reliable method of finding out how many calories I burn, or just stick to swimming and Zumba of course!

For the most part people answered my questions. Lol. This post turned ridiculous and entertaining real fast. But also, just remember some people have grown up thinking different things about nutrition, so like me we are still learning. If you comment, "Just no", that isn't going to help at all, especially since I had a valid and perfectly reasonable question. Thanks for all who didn't butcher it though.

Just as a point of information

A fitbit is not good on ellipticals

A HRM is only good if steady state cardio

Sweat does not equate to calorie burn unfortunately ...I kinda wish it did

livcrabtree wrote: »

Okay so, 3500 calories is equivalent to 1 pound. Exercise is a key element to losing weight, but diet is just as important. Calories are not necessarily the key to dropping pounds, but in fact what you eat is significant. If you eat 1500 calories of junk food a day, or 2000 calories of healthy food a day, you're certainly more likely to loose it by eating healthier. Cutting back on calories can be hard as you're not used to it, so aim for 6 meals a day: breakfast, morning snack, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner and night snack. Snacks are essential as they'll prevent craving junk food during the day. Try and snack on apples as they're equivalent to 0 calories as your body burns off the amount of calories in them trying to digest it.
Remember 3500 calories = 1 pound. Therefore if you're eating 1500 calories a day, it would be ideal if you could burn off 200, which would make you lose it faster!
I hope this helped, good luck