Eating back exercise calories clarification needed
mhwitt74
Posts: 159 Member
I am new to this forum and see a lot of words and expressions that I do not completely understand. When you guys talk about eating back your exercise calories does that mean your daily needs plus exercise calories? Say I need 1900 calories a day, and after an exercise I have burned say 800 calories. Does this mean that I still should eat the 1900?
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Replies
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Hi? I'm a newbie too. I think it means that you can/should eat enough of the 800 calories, or all of them, to ensure that you don't go below your daily calorie allowance.
It relates to the theory that if you eat less than the amount calculated as your BMR, basic metabolic rate then your body goes into starvation mode and starts hoarding calories. I'd never heard of this before and it's a little controversial. There's a post explaining it all at the top of this thread.0 -
If your calorie goal comes from MFP, it's designed for you to eat back the calories you burn from exercise.
So if your goal is 1,900 and you burn 300 -- your new goal is 2,200.
The trick is to ensure you aren't over-estimating the calories you are burning.4 -
Annfurtado wrote: »Hi? I'm a newbie too. I think it means that you can/should eat enough of the 800 calories, or all of them, to ensure that you don't go below your daily calorie allowance.
It relates to the theory that if you eat less than the amount calculated as your BMR, basic metabolic rate then your body goes into starvation mode and starts hoarding calories. I'd never heard of this before and it's a little controversial. There's a post explaining it all at the top of this thread.
"Starvation mode" (which doesn't exist in the way you're using it) isn't why it's recommended to eat back the calories burned from exercise. The reason why MFP recommends eating back calories is because it's important to fuel your activity -- eating enough prevents excessive muscle loss, ensures energy, helps you meet your nutritional needs, and may help prevent cravings.3 -
how are you burning 800 calories through exercise?1
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If MFP gave you the 1900 number then it means you should eat that PLUS exercise calories. I would be cautious though - 800 is a lot of calories - how did you come up with that number? If it is from MFP it is probably extremely over estimated. This is why most people say to eat 1/2 or some other portion of the exercise calories.3
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If MFP says you need 1900 cals per day, then you exercise and burn 500 cals, MFP will adjust for that and then say you need 2400 cals (your original 1900 + the 500 exercise cals).
The "debate" is whether or not you should eat back those 500 cals... so do you eat 2400 for the day, 1900, or somewhere in between.
The way MFP is designed to be used, you should be eating back those calories (so 2400 total, if we continue using this example). Not everyone uses MFP that way, instead they use their TDEE. In that case, they wouldn't eat back those 500 calories.
To further muddy the waters, there is a large portion of the population that find estimates for the number of cals burned during exercise to be highly inflated, and so they suggest only eating back a portion of those 500 cals.
I don't want to bog down this post by getting into the differences/pros/cons of the MFP approach vs TDEE, but if you want to go there, we can... just ask.
That's kinda the cliff notes to all this. Ask if you want more details or clarifications on any of it.2 -
Think of calories the way you think of gasoline, because calories are fuel for your body. The more you drive, the more gas you put in your car; the more you exercise, the more food you put in your body.Annfurtado wrote: »It relates to the theory that if you eat less than the amount calculated as your BMR, basic metabolic rate then your body goes into starvation mode and starts hoarding calories.
This is kind of a myth. In history, there have been a lot of examples of wars and famines, and they never make people fat. It's true that you'll feel tired and lethargic after a while if you don't eat enough and that will probably result in you doing less, which will have you burn less calories. It's more that your body needs different fuels and nutrients to do its regular chores, like making new hair and fingernails and helping you recover from exercise.1 -
If you got your goal from mfp then you should eat back the exercise calories. If you used an online TDEE calculator to get your goal then do not eat back exercise calories. Mfp gives you a goal to lose weight without any exercise, so when you do exercise you have to add those calories in. TDEE considers exercise when calculating your goal. If your exercise is very consistent then TDEE is a good way to go. But if you don't exercise regularly then adding it as you do it might be best. If you think your exercise calories seem inflated then only eat back half of them and after about 4 weeks reevaluate. If you are losing faster than expected eat back more of them and if you are not losing as fast as expected eat back more.1
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Muscleflex79 wrote: »how are you burning 800 calories through exercise?
Do you mean that as in like that's impossible? Or do you really want to know how? Well its different for each person as every one is a different weight/height. I burn between 800-1200 calories every morning at 5am fast walking on the treadmill, 3-3.5mph at a incline of 10-15 never going below a 8 incline, for 60 min.
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I eat back my exercise calories, but I make sure the calorie burn estimates are plausible. The only way you'd burn 800 calories is if you went for a 5+ mile run. Generally, my walking + yoga + kettlebells get me an extra 200-400 cal/day.1
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If you're going the MFP plus exercise route, to make the sums easier, halve the time you enter in your diary and this will automatically half the number of calories you log. Then eat all calories logged.
So if the MFP database says your 40 minute cardio was 500 calories, enter 20 minutes in your log and MFP will enter 250 calories.2 -
I repeat a valid question, what did you do and how long did you do it and what is your weight doing it that you claim 800 calories burned?
I have 2 different cardio machines in my home. One requires that I give it my weight before I start using it, and includes a chest-strap heart rate monitor. I highly trust what it says I burn when I use it. The other machine is indifferent to my weight and I know that it cannot accurately or even almost accurately tell the truth about what I burn. I've also recently taken up shooting hoops in my driveway. I have no idea how to log that. I've recently also taken up an exercise called "battle ropes". That has become popular in recent years, but on-line compendia of exercises don't include it. Again, any claim of calorie burn in that is speculative.1 -
I love how people get so hung up on the 800 calories burned that they fail to actually answer OP's question.5
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Nearly everyone also answered the question. We're just giving advice to be cautious of MFP's calorie burn estimates, as they can be pretty inflated for some exercises and inputs. Eating back exercise calories is good. Overestimating exercise calories kills your losses.I love how people get so hung up on the 800 calories burned that they fail to actually answer OP's question.3 -
Muscleflex79 wrote: »how are you burning 800 calories through exercise?
Do you mean that as in like that's impossible? Or do you really want to know how? Well its different for each person as every one is a different weight/height. I burn between 800-1200 calories every morning at 5am fast walking on the treadmill, 3-3.5mph at a incline of 10-15 never going below a 8 incline, for 60 min.
That calorie burn seems suspiciously high. I bet that is total calories, rather than active calories.
I weigh 200 pounds and my active calories are around 5 per minute when walking and 10 per minute when running. It seems unlikely that yours would be so much higher, even walking on an incline.0 -
Muscleflex79 wrote: »how are you burning 800 calories through exercise?
Do you mean that as in like that's impossible? Or do you really want to know how? Well its different for each person as every one is a different weight/height. I burn between 800-1200 calories every morning at 5am fast walking on the treadmill, 3-3.5mph at a incline of 10-15 never going below a 8 incline, for 60 min.
That calorie burn seems suspiciously high. I bet that is total calories, rather than active calories.
I weigh 200 pounds and my active calories are around 5 per minute when walking and 10 per minute when running. It seems unlikely that yours would be so much higher, even walking on an incline.
This^
We are all burning calories just sitting in a chair for 60 minutes and My Fitness Pal has already given us credit for those calories. How many calculators take this number out of the equation? Not many.
OP - calorie burns are often inflated because they are "gross" calories.....not net.0 -
If MFP says you need 1900 cals per day, then you exercise and burn 500 cals, MFP will adjust for that and then say you need 2400 cals (your original 1900 + the 500 exercise cals).
The "debate" is whether or not you should eat back those 500 cals... so do you eat 2400 for the day, 1900, or somewhere in between.
The way MFP is designed to be used, you should be eating back those calories (so 2400 total, if we continue using this example). Not everyone uses MFP that way, instead they use their TDEE. In that case, they wouldn't eat back those 500 calories.
To further muddy the waters, there is a large portion of the population that find estimates for the number of cals burned during exercise to be highly inflated, and so they suggest only eating back a portion of those 500 cals.
I don't want to bog down this post by getting into the differences/pros/cons of the MFP approach vs TDEE, but if you want to go there, we can... just ask.
That's kinda the cliff notes to all this. Ask if you want more details or clarifications on any of it.
OK, don't want to sound like an idiot but what is TDEE?0 -
I am going to tag my question on here since it is related, I think. I have been on the same calorie goal for 2 years. I never followed what MFP suggested, but what was given to me by a weight loss program. I have two questions, is it unwise to now go up in calories to what mfp suggests? My second question is how do I know what my net calories eaten are?0
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If MFP says you need 1900 cals per day, then you exercise and burn 500 cals, MFP will adjust for that and then say you need 2400 cals (your original 1900 + the 500 exercise cals).
The "debate" is whether or not you should eat back those 500 cals... so do you eat 2400 for the day, 1900, or somewhere in between.
The way MFP is designed to be used, you should be eating back those calories (so 2400 total, if we continue using this example). Not everyone uses MFP that way, instead they use their TDEE. In that case, they wouldn't eat back those 500 calories.
To further muddy the waters, there is a large portion of the population that find estimates for the number of cals burned during exercise to be highly inflated, and so they suggest only eating back a portion of those 500 cals.
I don't want to bog down this post by getting into the differences/pros/cons of the MFP approach vs TDEE, but if you want to go there, we can... just ask.
That's kinda the cliff notes to all this. Ask if you want more details or clarifications on any of it.
OK, don't want to sound like an idiot but what is TDEE?
TDEE = Total Daily Energy Expenditure.
Basically, it's all the calories you burn throughout the day doing everything you do, from breathing to cleaning the house to exercising.0 -
Muscleflex79 wrote: »how are you burning 800 calories through exercise?
Through UA Record and then verified at the gym I go to. I spend at least 2 hours per workout. Treadmill and then total body workout.2 -
Ready2Rock206 wrote: »If MFP gave you the 1900 number then it means you should eat that PLUS exercise calories. I would be cautious though - 800 is a lot of calories - how did you come up with that number? If it is from MFP it is probably extremely over estimated. This is why most people say to eat 1/2 or some other portion of the exercise calories.
Through UA Record and then verified at the gym I go to. I spend at least 2 hours per workout. Treadmill and then total body workout.0 -
I am going to tag my question on here since it is related, I think. I have been on the same calorie goal for 2 years. I never followed what MFP suggested, but what was given to me by a weight loss program. I have two questions, is it unwise to now go up in calories to what mfp suggests? My second question is how do I know what my net calories eaten are?
Whether or not you should change your calorie goal depends on
(1) whether or not you're making progress towards your goal
(2) how sustainable your current calorie goal is.
If you log all the calories you eat and all the calories your burn through exercise, MFP will tell you what your net intake is. It's right on the from/home page of MFP... Goal = Food - Exercise = Net0 -
MFP gives you different calorie goals depending on what you tell it. The rate of loss (0.5 lb/week or 2 lb/week) and activity level (sedentary or highly active?) will give very different advice. If you're own target and the one MFP suggests are different, you're not telling MFP what your program had in mind. If your program suggests less than MFP, you can eat more and lose more slowly, as long as it's still less than what it would take for you to maintain.I am going to tag my question on here since it is related, I think. I have been on the same calorie goal for 2 years. I never followed what MFP suggested, but what was given to me by a weight loss program. I have two questions, is it unwise to now go up in calories to what mfp suggests? My second question is how do I know what my net calories eaten are?
Net calories = food eaten - exercise calories burned. So if you enter everything you eat, and you enter all your exercise, it shows you net calories on the home page.
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And OP, if you're killin' it in the gym for 2 hours, you probably do need to eat some of those calories back if performance is important to you. Too low will definitely show in your workouts.1
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JeromeBarry1 wrote: »I repeat a valid question, what did you do and how long did you do it and what is your weight doing it that you claim 800 calories burned?
I have 2 different cardio machines in my home. One requires that I give it my weight before I start using it, and includes a chest-strap heart rate monitor. I highly trust what it says I burn when I use it. The other machine is indifferent to my weight and I know that it cannot accurately or even almost accurately tell the truth about what I burn. I've also recently taken up shooting hoops in my driveway. I have no idea how to log that. I've recently also taken up an exercise called "battle ropes". That has become popular in recent years, but on-line compendia of exercises don't include it. Again, any claim of calorie burn in that is speculative.
Through UA Record and then verified at the gym I go to. I spend at least 2 hours per workout. Treadmill and then total body workout.0 -
annacole94 wrote: »I eat back my exercise calories, but I make sure the calorie burn estimates are plausible. The only way you'd burn 800 calories is if you went for a 5+ mile run. Generally, my walking + yoga + kettlebells get me an extra 200-400 cal/day.
That's not entirely accurate as far as to what you have to do to burn 800 calories. It depends a lot on what you weigh, height, how long you workout etc...0 -
tbh then if you spend 2 hours at the gym 800 is kinda low I normally spend 2.5-3 hours at the gym and depending on how hard I push I normally log between 1500-1900 ( I know most machines are never that accurate so only eat back 20-30%) so I would have thought 800 is not that hard in 2 hours0
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I burned over 1000 calories yesterday hauling my 185-pound, 5'3" backside for an 8-mile run, according to my chest-mounted HR monitor and Garmin math. That doesn't help answer the OP's question either.
If you've burned off, say, 800 calories and you don't eat them back, that's extra deficit you've created for yourself and that's all well and good - if you feel OK. Many people find that they need to eat back at least a portion of those calories to not feel exhausted every time they exercise. As has been mentioned, how you calculated your caloric requirements and goals will play into that.
The most important thing you can do with MFP is to be honest with it. The includes your activity level in calculating, accurate food logging, and reasonable exercise assessments.0 -
annacole94 wrote: »I eat back my exercise calories, but I make sure the calorie burn estimates are plausible. The only way you'd burn 800 calories is if you went for a 5+ mile run. Generally, my walking + yoga + kettlebells get me an extra 200-400 cal/day.
That's not entirely accurate as far as to what you have to do to burn 800 calories. It depends a lot on what you weigh, height, how long you workout etc...
Yeah, I hear you. Understand, we get the occasional person claiming to burn 800 calories in a one hour yoga class. You're not that person. Eat back some of what you burn, ideally before and after your workout to support it.0 -
If MFP says you need 1900 cals per day, then you exercise and burn 500 cals, MFP will adjust for that and then say you need 2400 cals (your original 1900 + the 500 exercise cals).
The "debate" is whether or not you should eat back those 500 cals... so do you eat 2400 for the day, 1900, or somewhere in between.
The way MFP is designed to be used, you should be eating back those calories (so 2400 total, if we continue using this example). Not everyone uses MFP that way, instead they use their TDEE. In that case, they wouldn't eat back those 500 calories.
To further muddy the waters, there is a large portion of the population that find estimates for the number of cals burned during exercise to be highly inflated, and so they suggest only eating back a portion of those 500 cals.
I don't want to bog down this post by getting into the differences/pros/cons of the MFP approach vs TDEE, but if you want to go there, we can... just ask.
That's kinda the cliff notes to all this. Ask if you want more details or clarifications on any of it.
OK, don't want to sound like an idiot but what is TDEE?
TDEE = Total Daily Energy Expenditure.
Basically, it's all the calories you burn throughout the day doing everything you do, from breathing to cleaning the house to exercising.
So is this TDEE the most accurate way to track calories burnt?0
This discussion has been closed.
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