Need your help on calculations
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gintaready
Posts: 19 Member
Can somebody check if my calculations are good? I believe most people here have better knowledge than me (all I knew is "eat 1200 kcal, no more" and ended up hungry and not losing anything).
I will provide as many info as I have:
I am a female, 26 years old.
Height - 165 cm. Weight - 79.7 kg.
Body fat: 34%.
Desirable weight: 56 kg.
BMR: 1590
Muscle mass: 33.2%
Bone mass: 8.2kg
Activity level: lightly active 3 times x week
I calculated my daily allowance to lose weight on a healthy pace and it is about 1650 + eating back excercise calories on the days I move more. Am I right? Thanks!
I will provide as many info as I have:
I am a female, 26 years old.
Height - 165 cm. Weight - 79.7 kg.
Body fat: 34%.
Desirable weight: 56 kg.
BMR: 1590
Muscle mass: 33.2%
Bone mass: 8.2kg
Activity level: lightly active 3 times x week
I calculated my daily allowance to lose weight on a healthy pace and it is about 1650 + eating back excercise calories on the days I move more. Am I right? Thanks!
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Replies
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Sounds good. Stick to those numbers for 6-8 weeks. If you're losing what you expect to lose, keep it up. Losing too fast, add a few more calories. Losing too slow, subtract some.
Also, buy a food scale. Weigh and log all your food, no cheating, skipping or forgetting.4 -
If you're using a TDEE calculator, you won't be eating exercise calories back2
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It is not possible to be your size and not lose on 1200 calories. If that's what you believe happened, IMO, the first thing you need to do is fix your logging. Because without that, it won't matter what your target calorie goal is, you'll miss it.
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It is not possible to be your size and not lose on 1200 calories. If that's what you believe happened, IMO, the first thing you need to do is fix your logging. Because without that, it won't matter what your target calorie goal is, you'll miss it.
Are you saying that bigger persons can only lose on 1200 kcal diet?0 -
gintaready wrote: »It is not possible to be your size and not lose on 1200 calories. If that's what you believe happened, IMO, the first thing you need to do is fix your logging. Because without that, it won't matter what your target calorie goal is, you'll miss it.
Are you saying that bigger persons can only lose on 1200 kcal diet?
No he isn't. Nearly everyone can lose eating 1200 calories.
What was the article you read?1 -
gintaready wrote: »It is not possible to be your size and not lose on 1200 calories. If that's what you believe happened, IMO, the first thing you need to do is fix your logging. Because without that, it won't matter what your target calorie goal is, you'll miss it.
Are you saying that bigger persons can only lose on 1200 kcal diet?
No, he's saying that if you are genuinely eating 1200kcal you WOULD be losing weight. You should start weighing and logging your food to ensure that you are not unintentionally eating more than 1200kcal.1 -
It is not possible to be your size and not lose on 1200 calories. If that's what you believe happened, IMO, the first thing you need to do is fix your logging. Because without that, it won't matter what your target calorie goal is, you'll miss it.
But she also said "and ended up hungry" and I take that as she knew she wasn't able to stick to 1200 calories.3 -
If you're using a TDEE calculator, you won't be eating exercise calories back
See this... if you looked and included exercise 3 days/week, then no you wont eat exercise calories back. If you use this site and choose say 1to 1.5lb loss/week, you would eat that plus exercise calories.
What does MFP tell you to eat?1 -
gintaready wrote: »
I could definitely be wrong, but I don't know of another calculator that instructs you to eat back exercise calories other than MFP. When averaged out over a week, MFP's calculations (base calories + exercise) should roughly equal the calculations you get from other TDEE calculators that don't give you additional exercise calories; they're different ways to get to the same number. Double-check the article you read to see if it mentions eating back exercise calories or if your anticipated weekly exercise sessions are already included in the calculations.0 -
gintaready wrote: »
I could definitely be wrong, but I don't know of another calculator that instructs you to eat back exercise calories other than MFP. When averaged out over a week, MFP's calculations (base calories + exercise) should roughly equal the calculations you get from other TDEE calculators that don't give you additional exercise calories; they're different ways to get to the same number. Double-check the article you read to see if it mentions eating back exercise calories or if your anticipated weekly exercise sessions are already included in the calculations.
Gonna stick my nose in here and disagree a little.
MFP gives you a deficit based on lbs per week to lose (so 500 cal deficit for 1 lb per week). Any of the TDEE calculators I've seen are your TDEE less a percentage (so TDEE - 20%). It can be a bit confusing as the -20% deficit won't be the same as the 500 calorie deficit. Of course, you can just figure out your TDEE and knock 500 off of it to get, what should be, the same result, but it did confuse me a bit at first.
But this is just me being picky.0 -
gintaready wrote: »
I could definitely be wrong, but I don't know of another calculator that instructs you to eat back exercise calories other than MFP. When averaged out over a week, MFP's calculations (base calories + exercise) should roughly equal the calculations you get from other TDEE calculators that don't give you additional exercise calories; they're different ways to get to the same number. Double-check the article you read to see if it mentions eating back exercise calories or if your anticipated weekly exercise sessions are already included in the calculations.
www.aworkoutroutine.com/eating-back-calories-burned/ this was the article i've read regards the back eating. What do you think?
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www.aworkoutroutine.com/eating-back-calories-burned/ this was the article i've read regards the back eating, can someone comment? Thank you0
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gintaready wrote: »gintaready wrote: »
I could definitely be wrong, but I don't know of another calculator that instructs you to eat back exercise calories other than MFP. When averaged out over a week, MFP's calculations (base calories + exercise) should roughly equal the calculations you get from other TDEE calculators that don't give you additional exercise calories; they're different ways to get to the same number. Double-check the article you read to see if it mentions eating back exercise calories or if your anticipated weekly exercise sessions are already included in the calculations.
www.aworkoutroutine.com/eating-back-calories-burned/ this was the article i've read regards the back eating. What do you think?
He's using TDEE to come to the numbers. MFP doesn't use TDEE, it uses NEAT (which excludes exercise). If you want to use MFP as designed, then you put in your figures including your non-exercise activity level, and it gives you a calorie limit that includes you deficit. If you exercise (or increase your general activity) you need to eat these back as your deficit has been built in.
If you are consistent week on week with your activity and exercise, then TDEE can be a simpler method. You figure out you total calorie burn (including exercise) and eat some number less than that (either a % less or a fixed calorie level less) and you don't eat back your exercise calories.
Pick a method and go with it. I'm going to suggest you work with what MFP gives you, at least until you have things figured out and feel comfortable.
And, about the site aworkoutroutine, except that he is focused more on body building than I am and has a general dislike for cardio (I enjoy the treadmill), I think it is an excellent read and read most of it before even finding MFP. One of the very few things I follow on facebook.1 -
Tacklewasher wrote: »gintaready wrote: »
I could definitely be wrong, but I don't know of another calculator that instructs you to eat back exercise calories other than MFP. When averaged out over a week, MFP's calculations (base calories + exercise) should roughly equal the calculations you get from other TDEE calculators that don't give you additional exercise calories; they're different ways to get to the same number. Double-check the article you read to see if it mentions eating back exercise calories or if your anticipated weekly exercise sessions are already included in the calculations.
Gonna stick my nose in here and disagree a little.
MFP gives you a deficit based on lbs per week to lose (so 500 cal deficit for 1 lb per week). Any of the TDEE calculators I've seen are your TDEE less a percentage (so TDEE - 20%). It can be a bit confusing as the -20% deficit won't be the same as the 500 calorie deficit. Of course, you can just figure out your TDEE and knock 500 off of it to get, what should be, the same result, but it did confuse me a bit at first.
But this is just me being picky.
Whether they're taking off a certain number of calories or a percentage doesn't invalidate my point -- MFP excludes weekly exercise in the base calculation (and thus expects you to "eat back" any calories earned by exercise), whereas TDEE calculators include weekly exercise and do not allow you to "eat back" exercise calories.1 -
Ok thank you everyone, so please assure me: if i counted maintenance - 20% = calories to lose weight, then I DO NOT eat back excercise calories. Right?0
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gintaready wrote: »Ok thank you everyone, so please assure me: if i counted maintenance - 20% = calories to lose weight, then I DO NOT eat back excercise calories. Right?
Depends. How are you coming to your maintenance number?
Give us your stats and we can give you better advice.
Sex
Height
weight
activity level
goal loss per week
goal weight
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gintaready wrote: »Ok thank you everyone, so please assure me: if i counted maintenance - 20% = calories to lose weight, then I DO NOT eat back excercise calories. Right?
Does your estimated calories to maintain include the exercise? If so, you don't want to eat back exercise calories because that would be double-counting. If not, then you can eat them back. This would restore you to your original 20% deficit.
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Tacklewasher wrote: »gintaready wrote: »Ok thank you everyone, so please assure me: if i counted maintenance - 20% = calories to lose weight, then I DO NOT eat back excercise calories. Right?
Depends. How are you coming to your maintenance number?
Give us your stats and we can give you better advice.
Sex
Height
weight
activity level
goal loss per week
goal weight
Yes I gave them all in the first post, just scroll all the way up and you will see
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Theoretically, 1200 calories should get you something very close to 2 pounds loss per week (slightly less) which is very doable if you can adhere to the calorie limit. At 1650, you would lose something like 1 pound per week (slightly less). Both figures are before exercise.
Re: exercise, it's up to you but conventional wisdom on this site is to start with eating back half of your exercise calories. This is mainly to stay conservative - most people drastically overestimate their exercise calories.
To answer your question, you theoretically can eat 1650 plus your exercise calories and lose weight. To be really safe with your loss goals, start by eating back half of your exercise calories, track your losses for a few weeks, and then adjust up or down as needed (down if you find yourself not losing as fast as you'd like and have energy to spare, up if you find yourself chronically fatigued and low energy).
Personally, my preference is to start by not eating back any exercise calories and then to adjust slowly upwards until I find the minimum amount of calories that gives me enough energy to fuel my day to day. This goes against the prevailing winds on the site but by starting lower and adjusting up, you can figure out the right target within a week or two (you'll know if you're eating too few calories within days and can fix your energy levels immediately just by eating something) and you'll be losing weight at a decent pace the entire time.
By starting at a point where you're potentially eating more than you need to, it could take a good 3-6 weeks to zero in on the right numbers and during that time you might not be losing anything at all. That's a good month to month and a half wasted.
I especially prefer the 'low then up' approach when your baseline calorie target is 1650 - that's actually quite a bit of food and since you'll only be targeting 1 pound a week you won't run much of a risk of cutting too close to the bone energy-wise. In reality, with a target of 1 pound per week and a base target of 1650 your real enemy will be willpower, regardless of whether you eat back your exercise calories or not.0
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