Interpretation

donjtomasco
donjtomasco Posts: 790 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I am in week 4 and just wanted to check in about something. Other then a calculated type of fasting, I think that 1,200 calories is the minimum we want to consume per day right? (or maybe this is based on our weight and height, of which I am a male 5'10" and 54 yo). Obviously, the maximum intake to still lose weight of any amount is less then our calculated daily maintain estimated calories.

What if I am working out daily and plugging as accurately as possible "ALL" intake and "ALL" burns? Does the minimum to consume for the day now rise to an adjusted net calories of 1,200? Not that I am trying to eat the minimum amount, I am actually trying to just stay within 1,200 per day NET and my reduced calories to lose 1# per week. If I feel good eating less on a day, I will eat less. I have had a few cheat days and recovered just fine from those too. So on days where I am feeling fine with less calories, I DON'T want to eat UNDER an amount that will work against my weight training, like "Eating in my workout" that I read a lot about here, but don't really understand.

Basically, I am keeping it simple. Log as accurately as possible, errr on the upside on intake and errr on the low side on burns, and stay well above the minimum daily intake for safety and well being and stay well below the maximum daily maintain amount, "ON AVERAGE AND OVER TIME".

Thank you.

Replies

  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
    1200 is the minimum for women, 1500 for men.
  • Sarah_Shapes_Up
    Sarah_Shapes_Up Posts: 76 Member
    There's calculators out there to give you a ball park for calories. I think what you're looking for might be your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure) Using that number as a base, you can subtract from it to lose weight and not worry about tracking exercise. Try to eat as much as you can while still losing 1-2lbs/week. As you lose, you might have to lower calories to continue to lose, and it would suck to have nowhere to drop lower to.
  • donjtomasco
    donjtomasco Posts: 790 Member
    THANK YOU!!!!!
  • donjtomasco
    donjtomasco Posts: 790 Member
    So I just went to Fitnessfrog.com and it gave me a TDEE of 2832. Just so I don't screw this up, can you explain what I do from here? My goal is to lose 1# per week, so 500 cal a day less (I think).

    Thank you!!!
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,412 Member
    edited May 2016
    donjtomasco wrote: »
    So I just went to Fitnessfrog.com and it gave me a TDEE of 2832. Just so I don't screw this up, can you explain what I do from here? My goal is to lose 1# per week, so 500 cal a day less (I think).

    Thank you!!!

    Yes, don't add in any extra for your exercise days. 2332 every day. Keep really good records, adjust after 4-6 weeks if needed.

    For the record, I still prefer the MFP way. I like the flexibility.
  • middlehaitch
    middlehaitch Posts: 8,486 Member
    You are correct. Minus 500 will give you 1lbs a week loss, and a much healthier calorie goal then 1200.
    :)
    Cheers h.
  • donjtomasco
    donjtomasco Posts: 790 Member
    Wow, MFP has me at 1,970 per day, adding back the 500 is 2,470. So Fitnessfrog is 2332 per day. 362 calorie difference seems like an error somewhere????? CMRIVERSIDE, why do you say not to add my exercise calories?

    So, unless I am wrong, MFP has my maintain weight at 2,470, Fitnessfrog has my maintain weight at 2,832. If I take 500 off of each for my 1 pound/week loss, would I not then get exercise calorie credits to eat those calories burned?

    I don't know why I can't grasp this.....sorry. And THANK YOU!!!!!
  • shed77f
    shed77f Posts: 41 Member
    I may be wrong but I think fitness frog is a TDEE calculator, this factors your exercise into its calculation already. (This is why it's higher).

    Mfp is the neat method, just general activity level but not including exercise. So with mfp you enter exercise separately on days you do it and eat some/ all of the calories back on those days. You are alloted less calories on days where you don't do any additional activity.

    Personal preference which one works best for you. I quite like the NEAT method as it means my calories won't be wrong if I have to miss exercise due to time / injury etc.

    Hope this helps .... & makes sense..
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,412 Member
    edited May 2016
    donjtomasco wrote: »
    Wow, MFP has me at 1,970 per day, adding back the 500 is 2,470. So Fitnessfrog is 2332 per day. 362 calorie difference seems like an error somewhere????? CMRIVERSIDE, why do you say not to add my exercise calories?

    So, unless I am wrong, MFP has my maintain weight at 2,470, Fitnessfrog has my maintain weight at 2,832. If I take 500 off of each for my 1 pound/week loss, would I not then get exercise calorie credits to eat those calories burned?

    I don't know why I can't grasp this.....sorry. And THANK YOU!!!!!

    When you did the fitnessfrog thing, it asked you if you were planning to do exercise, right?

    If you were to use MFP's number of 2470(maintenance) and add in 400ish calories for exercise, you would be at the fitnessfrog maintenance number.

    It's just two ways of calculating and the numbers are the same on both sites - just exactly what shed77f said. It's really only the difference between 2470 and 2332 - which is negligible. I mean 138 calories is within the margin of error range. Negligible. Especially since "exercise calories" are not really quantifiable without really sophisticated equipment that you won't be using, and unless you are preparing every single meal yourself and using a gram food scale, your food calories will be off by easily 5-10% in your logging.

    So if you are using the fitnessfrog numbers, you eat the same number every day, regardless of whether or not you exercise. It works fine if you are consistent with your exercise every week.

  • donjtomasco
    donjtomasco Posts: 790 Member
    CMRIVERSIDE, fitness frog asked the same thing as MFP. The ONLY difference (that I can tell) is that fitness frog does not use the 'activity level' to give a net calorie per day, but NEITHER does MFP (the best I can tell). MFP comes up with the net by asking how much you want to lose. So still, I am seeing that I can eat more according to fitness frog, and less according to MFP. Not that it matters, but this is what it looks like. MFP and fitness frog simply come up with a different number.

    The last time I did this a year ago, there were so many different numbers from site to site, that I ended up going to every site I could find, and jotting down what they said was my daily goal, then dropped the top and bottom one or two if they were WAY off, then took the average of the remaining.

    Whatever I am doing it appears to be working. I am just a little AR about details. :)

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