Negative what now?

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PlunderingSteelGorilla
PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I've had the Negative Calorie Adjustment turned on since I started here. Never done anything to my numbers.

Then I switched activity trackers and it now shows in my logs. UA Calorie Adjustment. At first I though "Cool! Fresh data!". Now I think "Dafuq?".

Yesterday I logged 165 minutes of exercise (6km+ walking, 22km+ cycling) burning 1,416 calories.

My diary shows me that my UA adjustment gives me 318 extra calories.

What math is involved to give me such a low number at days end?
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Replies

  • MelanieCN77
    MelanieCN77 Posts: 4,047 Member
    edited April 2017
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    It's obviously something to do with the interaction of your new tracker and MFP. I understood NCA to be built on the difference between your stated activity level and your actual level at the end of the day. For example if you are set to very active and have an otherwise quiet day with a hike, it might still take cals away because that's not what highly active is. It always seemed like meddling to me, I keep it switched off and am set to sedentary, and log all exercise.
  • Silentpadna
    Silentpadna Posts: 1,306 Member
    edited April 2017
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    PlunderingSteelGorilla wrote: »
    I've had the Negative Calorie Adjustment turned on since I started here. Never done anything to my numbers.

    Then I switched activity trackers and it now shows in my logs. UA Calorie Adjustment. At first I though "Cool! Fresh data!". Now I think "Dafuq?".

    Yesterday I logged 165 minutes of exercise (6km+ walking, 22km+ cycling) burning 1,416 calories.

    My diary shows me that my UA adjustment gives me 318 extra calories.

    What math is involved to give me such a low number at days end?

    What is your MFP activity setting? If it is sedentary, the adjustments would be large. If it is active (closer to what you expect to be doing), it would be small.
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    Set to sedentary.
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    Bump
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,866 Member
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    What's the device you're connecting?

    Google fit understimates my activity by 20%+. Fitbit overestimates me by about 5%.

    The first day of connection may have wonky results. check that time zones are the same.
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    Not using a device, just an app on my phone.
    Using UA MapMyFitness when I exercise.
    In my diary it if I click on exercise it shows what I burned (1,416). But the food/diary page, tells me I earned 318.
    What happened to the other 1,100? Or am I totally clueless?
    ghrw1xnip049.jpg
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,866 Member
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    Map my fitness is giving MFP an estimate of what you burned based on what it has recorded on its on.

    What it has recorded on its own may or may not include everything you have recorded on MFP directly.

    MFP is adding your sedentary calories and all these activities you have out in and coming up with a total for the day... Say 5000 Calories based on. 1600 Cal of sedentary living + 3400 of exercises you recorded.

    The other app makes its own estimate of what you burned to a particular point of time using its own calculations. 1400 Cal for breathing, plus he teitched sideways a few times for another 2000 Cal. Etc. Comes up with a total.

    Then integration reconciles the two numbers.

    If you have negative calories disabled you only get bonus points (i.e. it is a one way addition in case the other app detected extra activity)

    Negative calories enabled means you trust the other app to detect your daily activity more than you trust MFP (because for example I wear my Fitbit 24/7 and it has much more accurate not depending on my logging information about what I do). So if the other app detects that you've done less than Fitbit it take away food... cause you haven't been as active as MFP thought!

    Probably what is happening here is that your other app has not detected some of these activities.

    (Note in the case of Fitbit the activities you log on mfp with overwrite the activities detected by the Fitbit during the same time frame and it would not be recommended that you log on both sides)

  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,866 Member
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    Click on the little "i" , it will explain the calculation MFP used for the negative adjustment.
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,866 Member
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    Note, it is not showing you burned 1400. It is. Showing you burned 1400 Less than what you have told MFP you burned!
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    I don't input any exercise in MFP. It is all synced through the app's.

    MFP: Log all intake
    MMF: Track all exercise

    Daily calories i need to consume, according to MFP, is 1,760 without exercise.

    Any exercise I do should increase that 1,760 number based on how much I burn. How much, is the question. From what I understand the Negative Calorie setting will determine that number. If so, why was the # so much lower than my burn?
  • Geocitiesuser
    Geocitiesuser Posts: 1,429 Member
    edited April 2017
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    That is really really weird. Maybe you should contact support, I'm thinking there is some kind of bug?

    I use map my walk sometimes too, you can see here it listed my walk at 330ish calories, but it adds 0 for the "under armor adjustment". The other two (tkd and cycling) I manually entered.

    bI1ZT0x.png
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    Geocitiesuser wrote: »
    That is really really weird. Maybe you should contact support, I'm thinking there is some kind of bug?

    I use map my walk sometimes too, you can see here it listed my walk at 330ish calories, but it adds 0 for the "under armor adjustment". The other two (tkd and cycling) I manually entered.

    bI1ZT0x.png

    Do you have Negative Calorie Adjustment on?
    I've check my numbers all week and at no point do the numbers match at all. Was wondering if there was a set formula it uses as these numbers appear totally random to me.
  • Geocitiesuser
    Geocitiesuser Posts: 1,429 Member
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    > Do you have Negative Calorie Adjustment on?

    To be honest I have no idea. I have whatever the default MFP settings are.
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    Geocitiesuser wrote: »
    > Do you have Negative Calorie Adjustment on?

    To be honest I have no idea. I have whatever the default MFP settings are.

    Default is to have it off.

    I am going to compile data from this week and send to MFP support for clarity. See if they can decrypt the data for me.
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    I have added up all numbers from MFP exercise and MMF workout logs.

    Friday, April 21:
    1. - MMF logged 2.7 hours of exercise (6km+ walking, 22km+ cycling) burning 1,734 calories.
    2. - MyFitnessPal Exercise log shows I exercizsed 2 hours 4 minutes buring -1,734 calories.
    3. - UA Calorie Adjustment calories burned = -1,416
    4. - MFP food log shows "*You've earned 318 extra calories from exercise today"

    Thursday, April 20:
    1. - MMF logged 2.15 hours of exercise burning 1,101 calories.
    2. - MyFitnessPal Exercise log shows I exercizsed 2 hours 11 minutes buring 1,101 calories.
    3. - UA Calorie Adjustment calories burned = -469
    4. - MFP food log shows "*You've earned 632 extra calories from exercise today"

    Wednesday, April 19:
    1. - MMF logged 2.09 hours of exercise burning 1,103 calories.
    2. - MyFitnessPal Exercise log shows I exercizsed 2 hours 7 minutes buring 1,103 calories.
    3. - UA Calorie Adjustment calories burned = -473
    4. - MFP food log shows "*You've earned 630 extra calories from exercise today"

    Where do the numbers for 3 & 4 each day come from, or how are they generated? Are they correct? What do they mean (if they are correct, I have no idea what they mean)?
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,866 Member
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    Looks to me that your MFP exercise gets pushed to MMF exercise over-writing whatever MMF would have recorded in that time frame.

    Then the "new" MMF value gets pushed back to MFP as the "correct" value. Since this new value is now higher than what MFP would consider you based on your selected setting of sedentary, you've now "earned" exercise calories.

    My suggestion? Don't track exercise on both MFP and MMF. Enter your exercise directly on MMF and only MMF till you can figure things out.

    Furthermore since it is a phone based tool and will (probably) never detect ALL of your activity, it may or may not be an improvement over just tracking using MFP.

    **** Remember that your adjustment is called an exercise adjustment but it isn't. it is an accounting adjustment.

    So when you earn" 300 Cal of exercise adjustment you are only "earning" an accounting adjustment.

    That accounting adjustments is over and above the exercise you logged in MFP which inflates both sides of the ledger.

    So your actual exercise earned over the base sedentary value that you started with on MFP is actually the 1000 Cal you are loging as exercise on MFP PLUS the extra 300 cal you are being told that you earned. NOT just the 300 Cals.
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    I do not enter any exercise in MFP, only MMF.
    I assume you mean I should stop the sync between the two and manually enter in the exercise values on MFP at days end.
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,866 Member
    edited April 2017
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    PlunderingSteelGorilla wrote: »
    I do not enter any exercise in MFP, only MMF.
    I assume you mean I should stop the sync between the two and manually enter in the exercise values on MFP at days end.

    You are showing cardio exercises with activity type, minutes and caloric expenditures on MFP's side of the ledger.

    Usually details like these would not show up on MFP from most other trackers UNLESS you were entering the data directly via MFP.

    If this is not the case, then the adjustment and posting of information process is not working 100% the same as it does with other trackers possibly because all these applications are part of UA now.

    And if that's the situation maybe support will help you out and I look forward to you updating us as to what exactly is happening there!
  • PlunderingSteelGorilla
    PlunderingSteelGorilla Posts: 207 Member
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    I have never manually entered any exercise info in MFP. I've used Endomondo and MapMyFitness, they always sync with MFP and enter the workout details for me. Strictly hands off for me.

    Endomondo entered all values correctly, but it never showed any negative calorie info, or told me I earned anything extra.

    MMF enters all values correctly and it shows negatives etc., but the numbers are...weird.
  • glassjailer
    glassjailer Posts: 27 Member
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    I'm chiming in here because I am experiencing a similar issue. I've been trying to figure it out but so far it has me scratching my head in utter confusion.
    I log exercise in Map My Walk primarily, due to my main exercise being walking/hiking/running. I wear a garmin Vivofit to log steps, and wear that during the entirety of my day, workouts included.
    Map my walk syncs with MFP, Garmin syncs with MFP, but MMW doesn't talk to Garmin which may be where the breakdown is happening.

    I have my activity set at lightly active. My step count swings between 11k on a slow snoozy day to 38-40k on a long workout day.
    I recently switched over to negative adjustments as an experiment, and so far it is confounding. I'm syncing at least 8+ times per day, and yet MFP is showing that my garmin step count is regularly losing me calories, often the more I exercise, the bigger the negative adjustment.

    Today I 'earned' some 1100 calories from exercise, currently at 18k steps, and MFP is saying due to my Garmin steps, I am losing 700 some odd calories from my 1100 logged through MMW.

    Am I 'double dipping', (so they say) by using the MMW and Garmin step tracking? I don't want to have the hassle of inputting activity into the Garmin app because I find it a hassle, doesn't seamlessly track my gps location/walk times etc. But, with the negative adjustment turned on, my numbers are totally unexpected and wonky. I figure if I've walked 9 miles in a day, I'd get more calories back to fuel that activity.
    Maybe I should just turn off the negative adjustment (even though I find it pretty motivating) and try not syncing MMW with MFP at all.
    Any thoughts? I'm so confused, and I've read it ins of threads and postings and info abou this topic and I am still wildly confused.

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