Is using MFP good enough for my goals?

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HurricaneForce1
HurricaneForce1 Posts: 17 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I'm currently down to 203.6lbs from 212ish, my BF% is from ~19% to ~17-18% I think. I go to the gym every day except Sunday and usually do cardio (running, stationary bike or rowing machine). 2-3 times a week I add in high weight low rep strength training.

MFP gave me a 2,400 calorie/day budget to start out on. So my question is 1). Is this accurate enough to base my goals on? 2). Based on that where should I target my calories for a good deficit to lose fat not muscle? And 3). Any other tips to help stay on track? Currently MFP is my only source of caloric and dietary tracking, so is this enough? Goal weight is 190lbs btw.

Replies

  • Cbestinme
    Cbestinme Posts: 397 Member
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    I'd like to venture a guess that you could use mfp. I'm going solely by your statement that you weigh 204 and want to weigh 190.
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
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    I guess I'm not seeing the exact question here. Many people have used MFP to reach their goal weight. Could you do it too? Probably. I'm not seeing anything in your post to indicate why you couldn't.
  • alexisslolypop
    alexisslolypop Posts: 4,593 Member
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    HurricaneForce1 wrote: »
    I'm currently down to 203.6lbs from 212ish, my BF% is from ~19% to ~17-18% I think. I go to the gym every day except Sunday and usually do cardio (running, stationary bike or rowing machine). 2-3 times a week I add in high weight low rep strength training.

    MFP gave me a 2,400 calorie/day budget to start out on. So my question is 1). Is this accurate enough to base my goals on? 2). Based on that where should I target my calories for a good deficit to lose fat not muscle? And 3). Any other tips to help stay on track? Currently MFP is my only source of caloric and dietary tracking, so is this enough? Goal weight is 190lbs btw.

    Hey!

    I'll go straight to the answers:
    1) I suppose you were real with the time that will take you to accomplish your goal so I think it will be really good for you (guys need more calories than girls, plus results are more likely to last longer if you don't starve yourself).
    2) That's something we all want to know :wink:
    I believe that keeping muscle mass depends mainly on the food you take, precisely the nutrients. Be sure to eat healthy foods and track macros. I don't agree with cutting out carbs completely because they are primary source of energy for cells, and opposite to that, diet based on really high intake of protein can cause you kidney problems. So please be careful with that. Best source of carbs are veggies, and fruits»in moderate intake (because of sugars). I think you can't go wrong if you lower the usage of processed food...
    3) Just keep going and don't stop. If you quit be sure to come back... Succes is about journey and not destination. If you do it the right way you'll fall in love with the process and it will keep you motivated and happy. Also, you can join many groups and threads in this community. There are many supportive people that can give you great advice. If you want, add some friends. It is nice to have people who go through same things and have same goals as you.

    Wish you all the best! :smiley:
  • jemhh
    jemhh Posts: 14,261 Member
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    MFP can help you meet your weight goal. Keep in mind a few things:

    1) Many items in the food database were input by users. This means that there are many with erroneous calorie and/or nutrient info. My suggestion is to check the nutrition info on foods you enter by either comparing them to food labels held in hand or to the USDA nutrient database. A very easy way to use the latter is to find the food you want and then copy its name from the USDA page and paste it into the MFP search page. On this page, for example, I would copy Chicken, broiler or fryers, breast, skinless, boneless, meat only, cooked, grilled and paste it into the MFP database. Then double check to be sure that the entry you get matches the USDA page.

    2) Your MFP profile asks you to set it up without regard for exercise. You are then supposed to log your exercise on the days when you do it. This means that you could set up your profile, tell MFP you want to lose a pound a week, and eat the calorie goal, which would let you lose around a pound a week. It is strongly encouraged to eat your exercise calories so that you can fuel your fitness. If you are concerned about the exercise calories being off, eat them all at first and after 3-4 weeks evaluate. Losing too quickly? Eat more. Losing too slowly? Eat less. Just right? Stay the course.

    3) If you do not want to bother logging exercise calories, simply list your activity level as Active in your MFP profiles. Based on your activities listed above, you are at least active. Again, evaluate after several weeks.
  • lorrpb
    lorrpb Posts: 11,464 Member
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    To lose mostly fat rather than muscle, do strength training and eat enough protein, per MFP recommended macros for your goals. If you have a large amount to lose, you will likely still lose some muscle.
  • HurricaneForce1
    HurricaneForce1 Posts: 17 Member
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    mjaykup wrote: »
    What's your height?

    6' 1". The current BF% is a guestimate. I don't have calipers yet. I feel like it's lower than that by another 2-3% but playing it conservative.

  • melvinrram
    melvinrram Posts: 5 Member
    edited October 2016
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    1). Is this accurate enough to base my goals on?

    It doesn't matter if it's accurate. Just do it and see how your body responds. If it's not responding how you want it to respond, change things. Your goals need to take into account that you're learning new things about your body and that your timeline is going to be inaccurate. Be okay with that.
    2). Based on that where should I target my calories for a good deficit to lose fat not muscle?

    Consider carb cycling. This is essentially about doing high carbs for 2 days and low carbs for 5 days. Spinach and broccoli would not count towards your carbs so you can have as much of that as you want.
    3). Any other tips to help stay on track?

    Meal prep. If you have good, healthy food ready in the right portions, it's 1000 times easier to stay on track.

    Measure your food and keep track of everything. It's awkward at first but after a while it's no big deal.

    Take photos of yourself in exactly the same way (location and body pose) to track progress. There are time when the scale does not show a change. If you look at picture and the weight difference is 5 lbs but you can visually see a massive change, you can have confidence that you're on the right track.

    Sleep enough. Sleep is so underrated when it comes to weight loss.
  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,344 Member
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    HurricaneForce1 wrote: »
    I'm currently down to 203.6lbs from 212ish, my BF% is from ~19% to ~17-18% I think. I go to the gym every day except Sunday and usually do cardio (running, stationary bike or rowing machine). 2-3 times a week I add in high weight low rep strength training.

    MFP gave me a 2,400 calorie/day budget to start out on. So my question is 1). Is this accurate enough to base my goals on? 2). Based on that where should I target my calories for a good deficit to lose fat not muscle? And 3). Any other tips to help stay on track? Currently MFP is my only source of caloric and dietary tracking, so is this enough? Goal weight is 190lbs btw.

    The calorie estimate looks like it's in the ballpark for your height, weight, age and activity level. The thing about calorie calculators is that weight loss is an inexact science and you can't take what a calculator says as gospel - but fortunately our bodies provide us with a built-in feedback loop which allows us to dial it in from there. Shoot for your calorie goal and track your calories as accurately as possible for a few weeks. If you're losing weight at the intended rate, you're on track; if you're gaining/maintaining, reduce your calories by a couple hundred; if you're losing too fast, increase them by a couple hundred. Rinse and repeat until you're getting the intended results.

    Strength training and adequate protein intake will help spare muscle as you lose fat. Read the first post in this thread and set your macronutrients up accordingly. If you're not already on a solid, established strength training program, choose one from the first post in this thread - don't just make a program up or go into the gym and lift randomly/haphazardly.

    If you want some more involved advice, read Part 1 and Part 2 of this article - there is excellent and detailed advice there about training: http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/training/weight-training-for-fat-loss-part-1.html/

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