Want to Calculate Maintenance Calories

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VeryKatie
VeryKatie Posts: 5,950 Member
edited March 2016 in Goal: Maintaining Weight
Hello!

I'm attempting to figure out an empirical formula for calculating my "assumed weekly maintenance calories" for making my hopefully soon switch from deficit to maintenance.

If I assume that:
I ate 11237 calories total last week (Calories eaten = Ce)
I burned 1590 calories last week during exercise (Calories burned = Cb)
And I lost 0.6 lb over the week so assuming that was a deficit of 3500 * 0.6 = 2100 total for the week (Calories weight lost = Cw)
And Calories maintenance = Cm

How would I use those to back-calculate my assumed maintenance calories? Can someone provide a math formula?
I'm thinking it's something close to

Cm = (Ce - Cb) + Cw

... but am easily convincing myself otherwise.

Yes I'm using this to make a spreadsheet to get an average but for some reason can't quite figure out which side of the equation things would be on.

Thanks for any help.

Replies

  • puffbrat
    puffbrat Posts: 2,806 Member
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    Your formula looks correct to me. I would tend to phrase it differently for my own way of thinking, but the result would be the same.

    I would use:

    Cm = (Ce + Cw) - Cb so that I am putting the CI factors together and CO (exercise) separate. But again, it is effectively the same equation as yours.
  • VeryKatie
    VeryKatie Posts: 5,950 Member
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    Ok good! Thanks! I guess this would get maintenance calories not including exercise right? So in maintenance I would eat Cm plus Cb if I had a Cb that day?
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
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    I don't have a degree in math so I'm backing away from this thread now :smiley:
  • SandraAylward
    SandraAylward Posts: 1 Member
    edited March 2016
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    A formula that I have used is:
    Current weight in pounds x 11.1 = Calories per day required to maintain your weight without any exercise (I.e. Sedentary)
    If you exercise, you add those calories to what you can take in. I prefer to assume that I will exercise 6 days/ week and average this calories burned over 7 days. I do not eat less on days on which I rest from exercise - it evens out if I add 6xcalories burned/workout divided by 7 to my basic calorie requirement. That way, my eating plan doesn't change radically from day to day.
    E.g. 135 pounds X 11 =1485 calories
    6 workouts/week x 400 calories/workout = 2400 calories \ 7 days = 343 calories
    Total daily maintenance calories = 1485 + 343 = 1828
  • mirrim52
    mirrim52 Posts: 763 Member
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    Are you using net or total calories?
    Forget about exercise and use total calories eaten. It is simpler.
    TCe+Cw=maintenance level.
    You only need to use exercise calories if you are using net calories. It doesn't matter where you calorie burn came from, exercise or normal life. You ate 11237 calories and lost 0.6 lbs, therefore ate 2100 calories less than burned in that week. Your TDEE was (11237+2100)/7 = 1905

    1 week isn't really enough data to get an accurate number though. You want at least a month in order to account for the non-linear nature of weight loss.
  • VeryKatie
    VeryKatie Posts: 5,950 Member
    edited March 2016
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    mirrim52 wrote: »
    Are you using net or total calories?
    Forget about exercise and use total calories eaten. It is simpler.
    TCe+Cw=maintenance level.
    You only need to use exercise calories if you are using net calories. It doesn't matter where you calorie burn came from, exercise or normal life. You ate 11237 calories and lost 0.6 lbs, therefore ate 2100 calories less than burned in that week. Your TDEE was (11237+2100)/7 = 1905

    1 week isn't really enough data to get an accurate number though. You want at least a month in order to account for the non-linear nature of weight loss.

    Yes I agree, I'm setting up the spreadsheet to calculate/average for the next 6-8 weeks and I will be excluding the first 3 assuming there are higher water weight losses in those weeks :)
    I suppose there's no harm in knowing both net and total - I'm still working on building a habit around exercise.
    Thanks very much!
  • xKoalaBearx
    xKoalaBearx Posts: 181 Member
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    You could also try reverse dieting to figure out your maintenance calories. You slowly increase your daily calories until you stop losing weight. i.e. Each week add 100 cal/day then another 100 cal/ day the next week, etc.

    I tried calculating and while it can get you in the ballpark, in the end it doesn't matter because our bodies don't follow calculations exactly. Only through trial and error by accurate logging and seeing how your weight responds over time will you really know your TDEE.

    I successfully lost my weight at 1500 cal/day and through reverse dieting eventually discovered my maintenance level is around 2300 cal/day. (When I calculated, I got 2050 cal/day.) If I didn't experiment, I wouldn't have known I could actually eat much more than that. In any case, it's been a very smooth transition to maintenance for me.
  • macchiatto
    macchiatto Posts: 2,890 Member
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    I'm doing what @xKoalaBearx suggested.
    It's weird though b/c my weight loss slowed dramatically once I got near goal weight. I lost 15 lbs total in Nov-Dec, 4 lbs in January, and a little over 1 lb in Feb. Makes calculations tricky since in Nov-Dec I would have thought 1350 cals was a good 600-700 cal/day deficit based on weight loss rate, but results in Feb/early March make it seem much closer to maintenance. I'm curious to see how many calories I can actually add now without gaining. (So far I've only gone up to 1450.)
  • VeryKatie
    VeryKatie Posts: 5,950 Member
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    xKoalaBearx wrote: »
    You could also try reverse dieting to figure out your maintenance calories. You slowly increase your daily calories until you stop losing weight. i.e. Each week add 100 cal/day then another 100 cal/ day the next week, etc.

    I tried calculating and while it can get you in the ballpark, in the end it doesn't matter because our bodies don't follow calculations exactly. Only through trial and error by accurate logging and seeing how your weight responds over time will you really know your TDEE.

    I successfully lost my weight at 1500 cal/day and through reverse dieting eventually discovered my maintenance level is around 2300 cal/day. (When I calculated, I got 2050 cal/day.) If I didn't experiment, I wouldn't have known I could actually eat much more than that. In any case, it's been a very smooth transition to maintenance for me.

    That's my plan, but I do want to have the ballpark number so I can kind of jump to it a bit faster and then slow down my increases from there.

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