Eating Burned Calories

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9RG1RL
9RG1RL Posts: 1 Member
in Getting Started
Hey there! Newbie here. Should I be ignoring my calories that I burn or include them in my daily total?

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  • Panini911
    Panini911 Posts: 2,325 Member
    edited April 2019
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    if you used MFP to calculate your goal calories - then yes. MFP is designed to eat back calories. It gives you an amount to eat including the calorie deficit for selected rate of loss WITHOUT purposeful exercise.

    The exercise would increase the deficit which can lead to under eating which is bad.

    here is a more detailed explanation: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10503681/exercise-calories-do-i-eat-these-a-video-explanation/p1
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,080 Member
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    From Help at the top of every page: How does MyFitnessPal calculate my initial goals?

  • Scottgriesser
    Scottgriesser Posts: 172 Member
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    ^ yup.

    Now, the big trick is actually figuring out your burned calories accurately. Going off of fitbits or machine readouts could throw you into a world of hurt. (potentially)
  • Yivs_87
    Yivs_87 Posts: 246 Member
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    Or you can choose to not let MFP determine your allowance, but create your own calorie and macros goals based on TDEE (total daily energy expenditure or in other words just how much calories you need in order to maintain your current weight with your current activity). And then calculate a cut based on that TDEE (usually recommended is about 20% less or -500 calories/day).

    Easiest to calculate is: https://tdeecalculator.net
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    Yivs_87 wrote: »
    Or you can choose to not let MFP determine your allowance, but create your own calorie and macros goals based on TDEE (total daily energy expenditure or in other words just how much calories you need in order to maintain your current weight with your current activity). And then calculate a cut based on that TDEE (usually recommended is about 20% less or -500 calories/day).

    Easiest to calculate is: https://tdeecalculator.net

    There's a couple of important words missing in your phrase...
    "total daily energy expenditure or in other words just how much calories you need in order to maintain your current weight with your current activity and exercise"

    TDEE method and MyFitnessPal both have you eating back exercise calories, an average instead of a variable amount for the former. Inherently less accurate and opposed to potentially more accurate (at least you know duration and intensity after the event).
    That the fairly vague TDEE method also works should reassure people that estimating exercise isn't a hopeless endeavour.

    OP - if your main exercise is cycling is relatively easy to get perfectly reasonable/usable estimates. You aren't constrained by using the exercise database here. I just use the headings and overwrite my own more accurate estimates from a power meter or Garmin or Strava.
  • Commander_Keen
    Commander_Keen Posts: 1,179 Member
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    I believe, although I could be wrong, the more you burn ( TDEE + Exercising) the quicker you will lose your weight.
  • liz0269
    liz0269 Posts: 139 Member
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    I chose to use MFP plus exercise because if I miss a workout or two, I will be overeating if I use TDEE. This way I have to earn those calories.

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