Do I really burn 4000-5000 calories?

rks581
rks581 Posts: 99 Member
in Goal: Maintaining Weight
My current goal is recomp by gaining muscle. MFP uses my Garmin watch and logged exercise to come up with a daily calories out figure and it's often very high -- 2 days back it was 5775 calories! I'm fairly active, have a fast metabolism and I'm a bit fidgety, always moving and flexing my muscles. And I can easily eat 4000 calories worth of food.

I am not gaining weight. My concern is if I'm supposed to eat, say, 5500 cals and I only eat 4000 or 3500, I may not be gaining muscle at an ideal rate. I do get lots of protein, however.

Thanks for your advice.
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Replies

  • emilysusana
    emilysusana Posts: 416 Member
    Sounds like a ton to me, but I'm a 5'2 female. I think the only way to know for sure is to log as accurately as possible for a period of time (like a month), see what changes occur in your body over that period of time, and reassess.
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
    What are your stats? And are you logging your exercise AND linking your Garmin?
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,920 Member
    You gain weight by eating over what you burn. If what you say is true, then you should be LOSING weight.
    5775 calories burned a day is a lot. That's obviously not coming from exercise, unless you're like doing 3 hour long endurance workouts. What type of work do you do?

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  • srclark89
    srclark89 Posts: 79 Member
    I have found the calculation of calories out is excessively high. The circuit I do is designed to burn a max of 400 and yet mfp calculates 1200 and others. I'd like to know if anyone has checked the numbers. No way did I burn iooo calories gardening. I find myself shortening the time calculation to make it more realistic.
  • SolotoCEO
    SolotoCEO Posts: 293 Member
    I have a friend who is a fire fighter. Last week he had two days that his fitbit said he burned over 5000 calories. Each day he was called on two fires, recorded over 11 miles, 1800 stairs, and tons of steps. Unless your activity is in that range - the calories out seem to be a bit excessive.
  • rks581
    rks581 Posts: 99 Member
    I'm 6'0 220 lbs. I've noticed the calories are way under the cardio equipment at the gym. I never actually consume 5500 calories, usually about 3000, which is about what I feel my body needs.

    Right now I do about 7k steps a day and 10-15 floors. I also do regular strength training and running. My work doesn't involve a lot of movement, though.

    I don't separately log exercise in MFP, I let my watch do that for me.
  • bbell1985
    bbell1985 Posts: 4,571 Member
    Seems high even for your stats and lightly active at 7k steps. How much running are you doing? At what rate were you losing and how many calories were you eating during that time last?
  • powered85
    powered85 Posts: 297 Member
    What logged exercise are you sending over from your garmin? And is it a wrist based heart rate model? Sounds quite high.

    I'm around your height but 170 and it takes a 5 mile run at under a 7min/mi pace to get 550 calories burned.

    My BMR + activity level is around 2300-2500 calories per day outside of planned exercise.
  • amusedmonkey
    amusedmonkey Posts: 10,330 Member
    Something is wrong with your gear. Are you sure you set up your garmin info correctly? You may have switched units by mistake or mistyped a number. I doubt you are running the full 7k steps, which would give you an average of 8 miles depending on your stride length. Are you using a heart rate garmin? It would be overestimating your calories by a lot during strength training, after drinking coffee, if you stress...etc. I remember "burning" 600 extra calories once when I used a heart rate tracker simply by not sleeping well and working a stressful project. Apparently I'm unknowingly springing while sitting on my desk.
  • rks581
    rks581 Posts: 99 Member
    It is a heart rate model and I suspect the heart rate is what's causing the errors. Hopefully I can get a VO2max plus BMR test done soon, that would be very useful to know.
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,920 Member
    I'm around 207lbs and even with exercise only burn about 3200 calories a day. Granted I'm also almost 53, but even then it wouldn't be another 2000 calories extra.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
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    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
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  • powered85
    powered85 Posts: 297 Member
    rks581 wrote: »
    It is a heart rate model and I suspect the heart rate is what's causing the errors. Hopefully I can get a VO2max plus BMR test done soon, that would be very useful to know.

    I've read that many times on the Garmin forums. Perhaps try disabling it temporarily if you can? Also ensure your profile(weight/height/age) and resting and Max heart rate is setup.

    You running the latest firmware on the device? That could also be the problem.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 33,792 Member
    srclark89 wrote: »
    I have found the calculation of calories out is excessively high. The circuit I do is designed to burn a max of 400 and yet mfp calculates 1200 and others. I'd like to know if anyone has checked the numbers. No way did I burn iooo calories gardening. I find myself shortening the time calculation to make it more realistic.

    I've compared it to my heart rate monitor (for appropriate activities) and to more detailed, specialized exercise calculators.

    I think the CO estimates are closer to accurate for exercises/activities that are inherently quantified (like walking X mph) and often howlingly ridiculous for some of the unquantified things that can be done in a huge varieties of ways. "Gardening" is a prime example, and I think it's one of the worst. When I've done things like double-dig a new growing bed by hand (with vigor), or move a rock bed-border, it can be . . . well, maybe not awful. A little planting & weeding? Its estimate is just laughable.

    I'm sure circuits are similar: Huge variation in what people do, and how hard they do it.

    I always look for more accurate ways to estimate exercise, like purpose-specific calculators (e.g. biking ones that include detail speed & terrain & such) or heart rate monitor (for SS cardio for sure, but it's better than MFP even for quasi-cardio-like non-SS difficult to quantify things like some gardening activities). Perhaps you already know this, but you can change the calories for an exercise instance instead of the time, or set up a custom exercise if it's something you do regularly (after which MFP will scale the calories it gives you in future uses, based on your initial entry).

    Regardless, calculators are going to be estimates. I can see personal deviations from their results based on things like how experienced/skilled/efficient I am at certain things - I burn fewer calories - or when I try something beyond my current fitness levels - may burn more calories.

    Sorry for the thread hijack, OP.
  • powered85
    powered85 Posts: 297 Member
    You could try the spreadsheet in this thread. Quite extensive and could give you a good estimate of current bmr/tdee especially if you know your bf%

    http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/813720
  • rsclause
    rsclause Posts: 3,103 Member
    My runtastic app has me at about 830 calories at the end of a one hour run thats six miles long and my fit bit hits 10K steps. I think something is being very generous on giving you 5000 calories burned.
  • WatchJoshLift
    WatchJoshLift Posts: 520 Member
    If you're burning that much, then you're killing it!
  • SioLazer
    SioLazer Posts: 1 Member
    I'm a big fan of bodybuilding.com. Here is a link to a page full of fitness calculators you can use as a cross reference. http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/calculators.htm
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
    rks581 wrote: »
    It is a heart rate model and I suspect the heart rate is what's causing the errors. Hopefully I can get a VO2max plus BMR test done soon, that would be very useful to know.

    FYI, your VO2max changes pretty fluidly. Having it tested might be eye-opening, but if only done once, it'll be of limited value. While the accuracy is less than in a lab test, you're probably better off with one of the Garmins that will assess your VO2max every time you run with an HRM or ride with HRM+power.
  • trigden1991
    trigden1991 Posts: 4,658 Member
    I'm 25 years old, 235lbs, not fat (<15%), average 15k steps a day and train 5 times a week. My maintenance is around 3500cals. I do work an office job though so it's not beyond the realms of reason but I do highly doubt it's that high.

    You say you "earn" 5000 calories but only eat around 3000cals and aren't changing weight so I'd say your maintenance is around there.
  • mburgess458
    mburgess458 Posts: 480 Member
    The short answer is "no".

    You answered your own question. If you are eating no more than 4,000 calories a day and not losing tons of weight then you aren't burning 5,000-6,000 a day. Measure what you eat over a week or two, measure what your weight does over that week or two, and do the math to see what you burned per day.

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