Is it ok not to eat back your "work out" calories?

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weight3049
weight3049 Posts: 72 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
My only exercise for the day is walking for 1 hour, which is about 200-300 calories burned. Since this amount is low can I just not log it or will that make my calorie intake(?) too low for the day?

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  • Nony_Mouse
    Nony_Mouse Posts: 5,646 Member
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    It will make your calorie intake too low. MFP is designed such that you are meant to eat any calories from purposeful exercise in addition to your base calories.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,058 Member
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    If your overall weight loss goal rate is very slow (like 0.5 pounds a week) and you still have at least 20 pounds (or more) to lose, it's probably OK, at 200-300 calories of exercise daily. Even then, you'd want to watch for any signs of weakness or fatigue that are otherwise unexplained (as anyone should do when starting calorie restriction).

    If your weekly loss goal rate is higher, or you have relatively little weight to lose (or if you were doing more exercise), it would be a risky plan, for compliance (thus for success) and for health.

    Undereating/fast loss is generally a bad plan for most people, unless under doctor's orders to lose quickly for health reasons, and under close medical supervision while doing it.

    This is assuming that MFP (rather than a TDEE calculator) has set your calorie goal.
  • Lillymoo01
    Lillymoo01 Posts: 2,865 Member
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    If you don't want to log your daily walks you can always bump your activity level up to lightly active instead of sedentary which would account for the 7000+ steps you would get from walking. That way you have a consistent number of calories a day without having to log additional exercise and without undereating.

    You are probably closer to active (over 10,000 steps) but I am factoring in the fact that there is most likely some inaccuracies with logging as most seem to underestimate how much they are eating. If you find you are losing weight quicker than expected after a month you can always increase your activity level (or at least the calories given).
  • Gisel2015
    Gisel2015 Posts: 4,136 Member
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    Or you may decide not to eat the extra exercise calories on week days and save them for the weekend where you can safely eat more (e.g. eating at a restaurant).

    Or you can eat only 50% of the calculated amount. But burning 200 or 300 calories for only a hour of walking, is a little bit too much IMOP, unless you are a big person or walk very fast. How are you getting those numbers?

    (https://www.livestrong.com/article/300443-how-many-calories-do-you-burn-walking-30-minutes-to-an-hour/)
  • weight3049
    weight3049 Posts: 72 Member
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    Gisel2015 wrote: »
    Or you may decide not to eat the extra exercise calories on week days and save them for the weekend where you can safely eat more (e.g. eating at a restaurant).

    Or you can eat only 50% of the calculated amount. But burning 200 or 300 calories for only a hour of walking, is a little bit too much IMOP, unless you are a big person or walk very fast. How are you getting those numbers?

    (https://www.livestrong.com/article/300443-how-many-calories-do-you-burn-walking-30-minutes-to-an-hour/)

    Calories burned are estimates. If I walk 1 hour on the treadmill with the settings I always use it reads 370ish calories burned, when I walk at my local park using MapMyWalk calories burned is 330ish so I am lowballing that number.
  • Lillymoo01
    Lillymoo01 Posts: 2,865 Member
    edited January 2020
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    Gisel2015 wrote: »
    Or you may decide not to eat the extra exercise calories on week days and save them for the weekend where you can safely eat more (e.g. eating at a restaurant).

    Or you can eat only 50% of the calculated amount. But burning 200 or 300 calories for only a hour of walking, is a little bit too much IMOP, unless you are a big person or walk very fast. How are you getting those numbers?

    (https://www.livestrong.com/article/300443-how-many-calories-do-you-burn-walking-30-minutes-to-an-hour/)

    200-300 calories in an hour for walking is quite realistic I would have thought. I burned around 500 calories extra this morning, walking nearly 2 1/2 hours at a moderate pace and I am not even 100 pounds.
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,596 Member
    edited January 2020
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    Sedentary setting includes let's say no more than 5000 steps of activity for most people

    Lightly active again probably no more than 8000

    Active probably no more than say 12000

    Very active probably no more than 16000

    If your walking consistently puts you above the numbers that are "included" in your activity setting, accurate accounting has the expectation that you will account for the activity.

    The quality of your logging, your settings, and your body will all together decide whether it matters.

    The design of the MFP app is to fully account for everything going in and out!

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