Doing it right but not getting results
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According to this app 15 minutes pilates 143 calories. Maybe I'm not as thorough as I thought. So are you suggesting I limit myself to 2000 plus a quarter of what I burn. The app suggests 50 per cent cars 30 protein 20 fats
Macros aren't really important for weight loss. But, yes, you need to cut your calories and only eat back a percentage of the exercise calories. I have no clue how an app could say 15 minutes of pilates burns 143 calories. That's utterly ridiculous.0 -
According to this app 15 minutes pilates 143 calories. Maybe I'm not as thorough as I thought. So are you suggesting I limit myself to 2000 plus a quarter of what I burn. The app suggests 50 per cent cars 30 protein 20 fats
The exercise calories that MFP gives are over inflated. 143 calories for just 15 minutes of pilates seems way too high to me. I think you need to keep in mind that all these calculators are just providing you estimates and aren't 100% accurate. So if you're not losing weight on the amount of calories that you've been eating based on what you've been given by the calculators then you need to lower your caloric intake.0 -
Then I shall cut down to 2000 plus a quarter of my burn0
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You may very well be eating more than you think. You should really get a food scale.0
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Three of the things that we always have to remember is that the calculation for our calorie usage is an estimate, we are really good at underestimating our food consumption, and we overestimate the calories burned when exercising.
I'm going to start with an assumption based on your 2480 to 3000 calorie allowance that you set MFP's activity level in the calculator to "Very Active". You probably need to lower that a tick to "Active".
In the US, the serving size measurement in cups is often completely unrealistic, and doesn't match the gram weight offered in parenthesis. Plus, multiple studies show we underestimate how much we ate by a median of 30%. Meaning a reported 2480 calories intake typical closer to 3200 calories. Inaccuracy is a huge problem for weight loss, and everyone is prone to it. Weighing your food is most accurate. Using an actually measuring cup set is the next step down. Eyeballing it is the least accurate.
Finally exercise is awesome for hundreds of physiological aspects of our bodies, but the research is in. We cannot out exercise our eating habits, meaning exercise doesn't burn the calories we think. Eat habits are crucial.
Reevaluate the methods being using. Make changes because somewhere there are errors.0 -
Obviously you are eating more than you are logging. It is common. Accurate measurements are important, and our perceived serving sizes are not reality.
I don't even log exercise calories at all. I just cant trust the readouts.
Combination of both these factors can be huge.
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Along with making sure that you are weighing your food you have to make sure that you are using the correct food entries. That is why people are asking you to set your diary settings to public. Many of them are user entered and may be incorrect or outdated. Go into the helpful posts thread pinned at the top of the forum and read the one named "Logging Accurately".0
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Derf_Smeggle wrote: »Finally exercise is awesome for hundreds of physiological aspects of our bodies, but the research is in. We cannot out exercise our eating habits, meaning exercise doesn't burn the calories we think. Eat habits are crucial.
I agree with this, but for accuracy sake it is possible to out work a poor diet. It is not reasonable however, and generally the people able to do this are athletes who need 4,000+ calories a day simply to maintain weight. It is also the difference between doing 30 to 60 minutes exercise a day for healthy, and doing 3 to 5 hours of it. Extremely difficult and a bad idea as well to even try due to the stress applied going from active to extreme.
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That 2480 sounds like what you should eat to maintain your weight. I'm not sure how tall you are, but usually MFP sets it a lot lower if you put that you want to lose weight.
not for a 6' tall male.
OP, I would invest in a food scale if you haven't already. also, make sure you're selecting legitimate entries from the database, not generic entries like, "so and so's homemade lasagna" or whatever. also, check the batteries in you scale.0 -
If you are gaining weight you are eating in a surplus. Period. Back when you were losing weight you were eating at a deficit. It's simple math. Either you are eating more than you think or burning less than you think or a combination of the two. Either way, the only thing absolutely required for fat loss to occur is a calorie deficit.
If you are not losing then, I'm sorry, but you are not "doing everything right."0 -
It sounds like you've made a really good start and that you just need to tweak a few things. OK, to try and sum up the feedback so far ...
- You need to be at a calorie deficit to lose weight. If you're not losing weight, you're eating more calories than your body needs. Doesn't matter if it's healthy food or not. Calories from healthy food are not magic, still the same as junk food, calorie for calorie.
- MFP and cardio machine burns are notoriously high/inaccurate.
- Try inputting your numbers in Scooby. http://scoobysworkshop.com/calories-burned/ Scooby can help you determine calorie needs and goals and you can manually set them in MFP.
- Weigh your solid food and measure your liquids for an accurate count of calories. Relaying on packaging and standard servings will likely have you consuming more calories than you need. For example: one Trader Joe's Jumbo Egg is 60 calories. However, when I weigh them, I've never had them come in at less than 75 calories. That's a 25% gain. Those little things add up over time. Bread, same thing. One slice is often 1.15 servings. And so on.
- Consider getting a fitness tracker to help you. I wear one daily (Garmin, many people like FitBit) that syncs with MFP and measures burn based on my stats. I also wear a chest strap during exercise.
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Well I'm on day 3, of 2000 plus a quarter of my burn, today I've only had 1500 calories in all.0
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Experiment with your calorie intake and your own results. I can't speak for anyone else- but for me; if I ate the calories the app suggested and overestimated my workouts like it does sometimes, I'd never lose anything.0
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Another vote for eating too much. Besides, yoga and pilates do not burn many calories at all so your burns are possibly over-inflated.
While it's true that Gentle and Restorative types of yoga do not burn many calories, flow styles like Vinyasa, Ashtanga, Power, etc, sure do.
But the general advice to not eat back all of your exercise calories from any activity is sound.0 -
Eating right, does not mean eating in a deficit. A deficit is required to lose.0
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