Calories Earned with Exercise - What do you do?
elawoman72
Posts: 76 Member
Hello, all!
I just realized my calories are upped with exercise. You must upgrade to change that feature to change that option.
Do any of you consume the adjusted calories?
I just realized my calories are upped with exercise. You must upgrade to change that feature to change that option.
Do any of you consume the adjusted calories?
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Replies
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I always eat back my exercise. Everyone does it differently tho.1
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I set my activity level as sedentary, btw, to make sure I wasn't double counting any exercise calories
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The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.1
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Yes - both for weight loss and maintenance at goal weight.
I eat all of them.
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I eat 100% of them. I took the time to figure them out by trial and error. Otherwise, I would be under-eating and my workouts would suck.
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I try not to eat them back if I don't need to (aka feeling super hungry). That way I have wiggle room if I didn't exactly measure everything. My calories in could be higher so I find it nice to have that as a fail safe I guess is what you'd call it.1
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If you don't want your calories to increase with exercise, just set the number of calories burned during exercise to 1 (lowest possible number) when logging1
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No, I don't eat them all unless I am hungry or if I go out to eat and I want to enjoy something special. I always leave daily calories as a buffer for the weekends.
MFP is not accurate, neither are the machines at the gym, and I read that fitness trackers are not 100% accurate either; and on top of that we are not 100% bullet proof with the measuring and/or weighing of our food. So as long as I eat above my BMI and as long as I have enough calories and nutrients in my body to fuel my life and workouts I am good to go.
Just do what is best for you. Try and learn.
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I ate half of them back (to account for over-estimation) until I got my Fitbit and began eating all of them back. Been doing that since July and lost/maintained exactly as I expected.1
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I generally don't eat all of them back. It's not that I think the calories allocated for exercise are that far off, it's more that I recognize I tend to rest more after vigorous exercise. If I'm hungry though, I eat every last one of them.1
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I eat them all back because I get big burns and need to have at least 1200 net calories.1
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I eat them back and then some, sometimes. Other times, no.1
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OMG Me and my sister were just texting each other about this exact subject I don't put in my exercise till end of the day so I don't eat those extra calories, but some days you need them so it just depends on the day but I get around it by not putting them in till end of the day if don't want to use those exercise calories1
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I try not to eat back my exercise calories or at least not eat them all back depends on my day too if I have had a horrible day I will be careful to not eat back but if I have a good day and a hard workout I will eat them back1
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My activity level is set to sedentary with a target of 1.5 pounds weight loss per week. I walk my dog, lift or jog 4-6 days a week. I always eat some of my calories back, but I try never to eat all of them, because my primary goal right now is fat loss. I've gone to bed with too much of a deficit a few times, and felt weak in the gym or out on the road the next day, so I always make sure to eat at least SOME of those calories back.1
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I don't eat my exercise calories back. Seems a bit silly to me. However, if you do, I would recommend not eating more than half of what MFP gives you. They tend to be extremely generous in their burn estimates. You have other options too. Record your exercise but don't eat the calories. Don't record your exercise until after you've logged and closed your diary for the day. Just don't record your exercise (for me exercise is a daily part of my routine - I don't record it at all).
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I drink.booze1
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elawoman72 wrote: »Hello, all!
I just realized my calories are upped with exercise. You must upgrade to change that feature to change that option.
Do any of you consume the adjusted calories?
I adjust the calorie burn (MFP tends to OVERestimate your caloric burn) by multiplying the amount of calories MFP says I burned by .666*** and enter that in my Exercise Dairy. Then I eat all or most (depending on how hungry I am that day) those calories back. (I do tend to try and leave a few extra calories for the weekend as that's when I will be mostly likely to exceed my calories and this helps keep my weekly amount in overall deficit..)
If you are following the TDEE method, you don't. If you are using MFP under its default setting, you would not be doing TDEE though so what I said could apply.
*** There are varying opinions on how much overestimation MFP does. Many cut the calorie estimate in half. For now, .666 is still working for me but if I discover my weight loss stalling (when my calories "look" at a deficit in my diary) then I will adjust the amount of exercise calories claimed downward.1 -
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When I was using my Polar FT4 I ate most of my calories back to account for variations in tracking but since I got my Fitbit at Christmas I have to be super careful and only eat back what I actually burned working out. I still cut that back a little too. My Fitbit gives me a bigger burn than FT4 ever did. I'm not sure what one is the most accurate but I tend to error on the side of it gave me more calories than it should have.1
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If you feel hungry and had a good workout and have extra calories, eat. If not, don't. Listen to your body first... then let the program dictate what you should do.1
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The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.
I don't think MFP overestimates calories burned. I just think a lot of people on here aren't looking at the data correctly.
Let's say a calculator has shown me that my TDEE when sedentary is 2400 cal/day - 100 cal per hour
If MFP/Machine/HRM shows 300 cal burned for an hour long workout, you need to keep in mind that 300 cal represents the total burn for the hour. BUT - and this is where I think a lot of people on here get it wrong - I have NOT earned 300 calories of extra food. I have earned a maximum of 200 extra calories. Why? Because I would have burned 100 sitting home and doing nothing. Remember that even with an HRM, it's not calculating "delta above baseline" .. it is calculating "total calories expended during the workout". It is necessary to know your TDEE without the formal exercise, and deduct that from the workout to really know how much extra you have earned.
It would be nice if MFP did this math for you, but it doesn't ...1 -
I do eat most if not all of them on average for the week if not daily, but I'm careful in my attempts to over-estimate calories in and underestimate calories burned in order to maintain a deficit.1
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I hope you don't mind that I tag a question on here...everyone says MFP is overestimating calories burned. I use my Samsung Galaxy S4 Active as my tracker (which doesn't sync). Anyway the treadmill said I burned 1348 calories in an hour and 45 minutes and my phone and MFP was only about 20 calories different or so and MFP was lower. Neither of these take into account incline change. If I only used 1/2 of what MFP said it would be like 400 calories for 1 hour and 45 minutes. Is that correct? I don't usually eat all my calories back anyway, but comparing the treadmill, phone,and MFP...I thought MFP was more accurate. What should I use?
I am 5'10.5 and when I weighed last was 155.81 -
elawoman72 wrote: »
That's only a good tip if you are actually sedentary.
If you have an active lifestyle/job then sedentary is inappropriate.
Remember activity settings and exercise are separate on MFP.
It's not really sensible to deliberately enter inaccurate data into an estimating tool to skew the answer!
Enter your details accurately and truthfully to get a reasonable start point, log your food and exercise as best you can then adjust based on actual results over a significant period of time (a month as a minimum).
It's not as complex as people make it.
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The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.
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lindamkelly2 wrote: »The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.The way MFP is set up, you're supposed to eat exercise calories back. However, due to overestimation of calories burned, most will do only half of them.
Most of the time I don't even eat 1200 calories. I never eat the extra calories after exercise. My trainer told me if I eat all of the calories I would only maintain my weight. I'm trying to lose 10 lbs.1 -
elawoman72 wrote: »Hello, all!
I just realized my calories are upped with exercise. You must upgrade to change that feature to change that option.
Do any of you consume the adjusted calories?
when i did mfp, yes...it's the way the tool is designed and it makes perfect sense when you realize that you haven't accounted for exercise activity in your activity level and that that activity should probably be accounted for somewhere...for ya know...recovery and performance and whatnot.1 -
elawoman72 wrote: »
That's only a good tip if you are actually sedentary.
If you have an active lifestyle/job then sedentary is inappropriate.
Remember activity settings and exercise are separate on MFP.
It's not really sensible to deliberately enter inaccurate data into an estimating tool to skew the answer!
Enter your details accurately and truthfully to get a reasonable start point, log your food and exercise as best you can then adjust based on actual results over a significant period of time (a month as a minimum).
It's not as complex as people make it.
This is always what gets me...it took me about 30 seconds on MFP to figure out how the math worked and what was going on...and I'm not exactly brilliant.1
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