Eat your workout calories?

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  • stephyy4632
    stephyy4632 Posts: 947 Member
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    I try to eat them back but on days like today where i burned 1167cals this morning and am planning a trip to the gym again tonight for weight work and mostlikly some eliptical time ( I love that machine its fun for me) I`m 100% sure that I will be under my cals tonight
  • PSUgrl921
    PSUgrl921 Posts: 368 Member
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    Eat them back! If you don't, you go into starvation mode. AT THE VERY LEAST make sure that you are consuming 1200 calories a day-- meaning you have 1200 calories that you did not burn with exercise.
  • MissMaryMac33
    MissMaryMac33 Posts: 1,433 Member
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    Depends how many you're burning... some days I burn 300, some days over 900 ....
    I just try to leave a 250-350 calorie deficit and always eat at least my basic net of 1400. (1200 was too low and I stopped losing)
    (250 calorie deficit a day to lose 1/2 pound a week, 500 deficit to lose 1lb a week)
  • MrsCon40
    MrsCon40 Posts: 2,351 Member
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    www.shouldieatmyexercisecalories.com

    I eat them, it's how the program here is designed. They give you a calorie deficit to meet your chosen rate of loss before you ever lift a finger in exercise (why you may get less calories here than you do somewhere else that doesn't get you to eat back exercise calories because they use the exercise to reach your deficit)
    That means Sunday was a 3000 calorie day here and yes, I lost weight on weigh in day.

    Exactly. This is how MFP works.

    If you don't want to use MFP how it was designed, don't - but I wish people would quit recommending others don't eat them.
  • FifiLea
    FifiLea Posts: 80 Member
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    I *have* to eat mine, if I didn't I would be completely starving ALL the time and then I'd scoff down 2 mars bars or something rather than planning to eat something nice and healthy.

    I see my food as fuel and if I've used some up then I like to replace it. I know that if I feel hungry or deprived then I'm not going to stick to this.
  • kappy_hollowell
    kappy_hollowell Posts: 399
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    I *have* to eat mine, if I didn't I would be completely starving ALL the time and then I'd scoff down 2 mars bars or something rather than planning to eat something nice and healthy.

    I see my food as fuel and if I've used some up then I like to replace it. I know that if I feel hungry or deprived then I'm not going to stick to this.

    Good advice
  • Qarol
    Qarol Posts: 6,171 Member
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    Secondly, MFP tells a lot of people to consume 1200 calories who likely shouldn't be. It's just their stopping point where they don't allow anyone to go below.
    I'm not sure MFP tells people to eat 1200 calories a day. I just think so many people think of 1200 a day as some magic number for weight loss. It's not. A lot of people need more than that. It's simply a floor not to go below.
  • laurenpence
    laurenpence Posts: 147
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    I read the same thing...eat your exercise calories......well I did that and my weight loss was so slow that it got me down. So I talked to a personal trainer who is also a nutrionist and I explained to him that I burn between 600-1000 calories a day working out and my food intake jumps anywhere from 1200-1600 calories a day. I asked if I should eat my calories back and he asked me what my goals were....so i said to lose weight. Well his answer is what sounded right in my head.... dont eat your calories back unless you feel hungry, and still stick to healthy foods....dont go shove your mouth full of oreo's. So I started doing this 2 weeks ago.......and I have lost 12lbs in 2 weeks. I was a little scared by this, but he reassured me that with the amoun of good healthy foods I am eating that I am fueling my body properly and using my fat stores as energy. Then I started thinking about the biggest loser...you know the show. On the show they have mentioned that with eating only 1400 calories a day and working out 6 hours a day then the body needs to be fueled correctly to sustain this and still lose weight......this is why they are able to drop so much weight. You dont see them eating back all 6 hours of theyre hard work.....nope just feeding their body the way it should be fed.
  • sleepytexan
    sleepytexan Posts: 3,138 Member
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    People with a lot to lose and/or people who are brand new to exercise can lose weight both ways.

    However, once you are at a healthy to lean body fat percentage and working out regularly burning lots of calories, you will come to a point where you will plateau or even gain weight if you fail to eat the exercise calories.

    Here is a nice explanation as to why:

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/196502-for-the-people-who-work-out-like-crazy-and-are-not-losing

    I am one who gained 15 lbs. because I didn't know that. I had never counted calories in my life, and never given a thought to how much I was burning compared to how much I was eating. The tipping point came when I starting dancing with a new company 4 hours a week, then added a 35-mle bike ride -- all while eating the same old amount of food I always had. The weight game came suddenly and I couldn't understand why -- I had never had an issue in my life. I struggled for over a year eating minimum WW points (appx 1200 cals) and yo-yoing 3 lbs. up and down. Finally I found MFP and the above thread, FOR THE PEOPLE WHO WORK OUT LIKE CRAZY AND ARE NOT LOSING.

    Turns out that due to my vigorous exercise schedudle, I had been netting fewer than 800 cals (sometimes a negative amount) daily for more than a year.

    Within 2 mos of learning this, I now eat 1530 - 3500 calories a day depending on that day's exercise, and I have lost 13 of those 15 lbs.
    It's a beautiful thing.

    Since even an unfit person can still lose weight while eating exercise calories, I never understand why they don't. ( I don't mean walking-across-the-parking-lot or doing-laundry "exercise").

    I think a big reason so many people fail at weight loss and getting fit is because they DON'T eat calories they have earned by exercising. They they feel deprived, they're starving, so they binge, gain, and give up. Why make it hard?

    I love being able to eat the calories. In fact, I feel hungry on 1530 if I don't exercise, so that incents me to work out and stay fit.


    blessings.
  • sleepytexan
    sleepytexan Posts: 3,138 Member
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    I read the same thing...eat your exercise calories......well I did that and my weight loss was so slow that it got me down. So I talked to a personal trainer who is also a nutrionist and I explained to him that I burn between 600-1000 calories a day working out and my food intake jumps anywhere from 1200-1600 calories a day. I asked if I should eat my calories back and he asked me what my goals were....so i said to lose weight. Well his answer is what sounded right in my head.... dont eat your calories back unless you feel hungry, and still stick to healthy foods....dont go shove your mouth full of oreo's. So I started doing this 2 weeks ago.......and I have lost 12lbs in 2 weeks. I was a little scared by this, but he reassured me that with the amoun of good healthy foods I am eating that I am fueling my body properly and using my fat stores as energy. Then I started thinking about the biggest loser...you know the show. On the show they have mentioned that with eating only 1400 calories a day and working out 6 hours a day then the body needs to be fueled correctly to sustain this and still lose weight......this is why they are able to drop so much weight. You dont see them eating back all 6 hours of theyre hard work.....nope just feeding their body the way it should be fed.

    The people on biggest loser are VERY big. BBC did a documentary on a 400 lb. + pound man that did not eat at all for a year. He only had water and vitamins. He did not die; he lost over 100 lbs. because he had so much fat.

    The more fat a person has, the longer they can go without eating--their body can live on their fat stores. This is also the same principle as to why bigger people burn more calories doing the same amount of exercise as a smaller person, and why they drop weight faster. It doesn't mean it's a good idea for a healthy individual with a normal to athletic body fat percentage. You will not find any athletes subsisting on net 1200 or below calories a day. Why? because they can't perform on that. Because they don't want their body consuming their lean muscle (source of strength).

    There is crazy debate on this, just exactly because everybody is at a different point of body fat. If you have 30-something percent or more body fat, you don't have enough lean muscle mass for your body to touch. Get below 20 as a woman, or 13 as a man, and it's a very different story.

    If you work out for 6 hours you will probably not eat those calories back in a day. But I think you might be hard-pressed to find a handful of people who NEED to lose weight if they work out 6 hours a day.

    If you do have a big burn day (such as a 50-mile bike ride or something similar), you can reconcile those calories by eating some of them the next day when you are taking a day off. 3500 cals deficit per week = 1 lb. lost.
  • stroutman81
    stroutman81 Posts: 2,474 Member
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    Exactly. This is how MFP works.

    If you don't want to use MFP how it was designed, don't - but I wish people would quit recommending others don't eat them.

    I've been here for about a year I suppose. And I receive at least a dozen emails per day from people in this community. Admittedly I don't partake on the boards as much as some others.... so maybe I'm missing something. But based on the large volume of emails I receive, I can tell you that I've encountered a large number of people who shouldn't have been eating their exercise calories based on where their deficits were once intake and expenditure was factored.

    There honestly can't be a blanket recommendation saying everyone should or shouldn't eat them as the circumstances that govern energy balance are going to vary from person to person and circumstance to circumstance.
  • stroutman81
    stroutman81 Posts: 2,474 Member
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    I'm not sure MFP tells people to eat 1200 calories a day. I just think so many people think of 1200 a day as some magic number for weight loss. It's not. A lot of people need more than that. It's simply a floor not to go below.

    Poor choice of wording. MFP doesn't tell people to eat anything. They have calculators that some people misuse is more like it. They assume that shooting for 2 lbs per week, for instance, is a good idea when many smaller folks should not set the mark that high.

    And MFP will limit these folks by not allowing them to go below 1200. Which is a good call. At least there's some governor in place. Though it'd be better to explain why larger deficits don't make a heck of a lot of sense for smaller folks, who, by default, have lower energy needs per day.

    And the point remains... there's nothing magic about 1200. Yeah, it's a good general rule... but I've encountered a lot of people on this very board who believe going below 1200, regardless of their weight or energy expenditure, will trigger catastrophic events... and that's simply not the case.
  • lclarkjr
    lclarkjr Posts: 359 Member
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    Ah the great divide between eating your exercise calories and not. I honestly don't care whether anyone else eats theirs back or not. The biggest head scratcher for me is the large number of people who don't eat their exercise calories back that assume that those of us who do, are eating them back in the form of pies and cakes and cookies and other unhealthy treats... :noway:
  • stroutman81
    stroutman81 Posts: 2,474 Member
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    Ah the great divide between eating your exercise calories and not. I honestly don't care whether anyone else eats theirs back or not. The biggest head scratcher for me is the large number of people who don't eat their exercise calories back that assume that those of us who do, are eating them back in the form of pies and cakes and cookies and other unhealthy treats... :noway:

    Haha, welcome to the fitness world. Everything is viewed with polarized lenses. Everyone excludes the middle... false dichotomy or whatever you want to call it.. Which is why I said there certainly is not a right or wrong here that can be globally applied to everyone.
  • PAM1164
    PAM1164 Posts: 2 Member
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    I was reading another post that mentioned you should eat your BMR calories instead of the 1200 recommended by MFP. It also mentioned you should eat most of your exercise calories. I would like to see what everyone think of this scenario.
  • sleepytexan
    sleepytexan Posts: 3,138 Member
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    I was reading another post that mentioned you should eat your BMR calories instead of the 1200 recommended by MFP. It also mentioned you should eat most of your exercise calories. I would like to see what everyone think of this scenario.

    works for me and makes me happy!
  • stroutman81
    stroutman81 Posts: 2,474 Member
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    Yeah, for the most part I'm a fan of eating at least your BMR. There are instances where that's not the case... but they're definitely exceptions to the rule.

    As for also eating back your exercise calories... I feel like a broken record... but it's going to depend. I know the world would be a lot simpler if there were right/wrong, black/white propositions but it's simply not the case. The real world comes in many shades of gray.

    By the way... when calculating BMR with my clients, assuming they're not crazy lean or very overweight, I'll simply multiply their weight by 10. For the vast majority of folks, this is going to be a close estimation.
  • o4itsme
    o4itsme Posts: 16
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    I suppose I may not have expressed my concern clearly . Since I am new to the site, I didn't know how MFP set their program. I was more so wondering if the program was: you burn calories then you eat those calories. I guess I am just better off knowing the specifics. I didn't really notice a handbook or a guideline area. I was mainly wondering how the program was written to work. I'm not saying I don't want to hear your opinions because I love all the advice, but more so the black and white answer of how MFP wants you to use their program.
  • Rae6503
    Rae6503 Posts: 6,294 Member
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    MFP tells a lot of people to consume 1200 calories who likely shouldn't be.

    I'm of the opinion that there should be cutoffs where if you weigh below a certain weight, you can't select a 2 lb rate of weight loss per week... as it's highly unrealistic for lighter folks.

    I feel this way exactly. WHY do so many people try for 2lbs / week or 1200 calories? WHY make it hard? Chances of staying with it when it's hard are pretty low...
  • Rae6503
    Rae6503 Posts: 6,294 Member
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    I suppose I may not have expressed my concern clearly . Since I am new to the site, I didn't know how MFP set their program. I was more so wondering if the program was: you burn calories then you eat those calories. I guess I am just better off knowing the specifics. I didn't really notice a handbook or a guideline area. I was mainly wondering how the program was written to work. I'm not saying I don't want to hear your opinions because I love all the advice, but more so the black and white answer of how MFP wants you to use their program.

    MFP wants you to eat the calories.

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