BMR - lose weight?

Lousover
Lousover Posts: 7 Member
edited December 24 in Food and Nutrition
Hi all, my basal metabolic rate as calculated on a tanita scale is 1306kcal. Can anyone tell me what calorie range I need to be heading for to lose weight? I'm so fed up of doing diets like WW and SW and I want to incorporate foods I should be eating at my time of life! thanks 🙏

Replies

  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,885 Member
    MFP will calculate it for you. How much do you have to lose?
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,458 Member
    Yeah, BMR is really not a very big factor in choosing a target.

    Set your Goals in the Goals tab and work within the calories it gives you.

    Here is a rough guide to setting the amount you can safely lose in a week. Take a look at the second column and choose your weight loss goal accordingly:

    cfpqwo9vvrsi.png

  • Lietchi
    Lietchi Posts: 6,888 Member
    BMR in itself isn't going to tell you how much you can eat to lose weight, you also need to take into account your activity level and exercise.

    If you set your MFP goals, MFP will calculate this for you: it calculates your allowed calories based on your BMR and activity level (not counting exercise) and when you exercise and log it on MFP (or if you use a fitness tracker), you get extra calories to consume.
  • Lousover
    Lousover Posts: 7 Member
    lemurcat2 wrote: »
    MFP will calculate it for you. How much do you have to lose?

    I would like to lose about 1 1/2 stone and generally do weights twice a week. Spinning classes twice a week with walking in between x
  • Lousover
    Lousover Posts: 7 Member
    Mmm....so if I have 21 pounds I would like to lose, aiming for a pound loss a week, on average I burn about 2200 calories I day and should aim for a 500 calorie deficit per day that would leave with me a 1700 calorie intake per day. This seems too much. MFP ask me to enter my calorie intake it doesn't seem to do it for me? clearly doing something wrong!!
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,458 Member
    ageinglou wrote: »
    Mmm....so if I have 21 pounds I would like to lose, aiming for a pound loss a week, on average I burn about 2200 calories I day and should aim for a 500 calorie deficit per day that would leave with me a 1700 calorie intake per day. This seems too much. MFP ask me to enter my calorie intake it doesn't seem to do it for me? clearly doing something wrong!!

    This is correct.

    Eat 1700 per day for one pound weight loss per week. That sounds right. If you are currently using 2200 a day and you want to lose one pound per week, that would be 3500 calories per week or 500 calories per day, so 1700.

    On days you exercise, you eat MORE, too.

    That is the way healthy weight loss works. It's sustainable and reasonable, not slash-and-burn.

    Here's the explanation from the site: https://support.myfitnesspal.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032625391-How-does-MyFitnessPal-calculate-my-initial-goals-

    Here is the great "getting started" thread: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1080242/a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants/p1

  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,885 Member
    edited February 2020
    ageinglou wrote: »
    Mmm....so if I have 21 pounds I would like to lose, aiming for a pound loss a week, on average I burn about 2200 calories I day and should aim for a 500 calorie deficit per day that would leave with me a 1700 calorie intake per day. This seems too much. MFP ask me to enter my calorie intake it doesn't seem to do it for me? clearly doing something wrong!!

    Why do you think 1700 seems like too much?

    MFP asks your stats and your loss goal per week and your activity level. You should put in either 1 lb or 0.5 lb/week (I personally think 1 lb is okay), and if your activity level does not include daily exercise (the way MFP phrases it does not include it) you would then log and eat back exercise.

    If you want to get your estimated goal from somewhere besides MFP, you'd figure out TDEE (NOT BMR) using average daily exercise and then subtract either 500 or, often, something like 15 or 20%. Then you'd just input that as your goal and not add exercise, but the numbers should be about the same when the same loss goal is selected and once exercise is added back to MFP's goal.
  • quiksylver296
    quiksylver296 Posts: 28,439 Member
    ageinglou wrote: »
    Mmm....so if I have 21 pounds I would like to lose, aiming for a pound loss a week, on average I burn about 2200 calories I day and should aim for a 500 calorie deficit per day that would leave with me a 1700 calorie intake per day. This seems too much. MFP ask me to enter my calorie intake it doesn't seem to do it for me? clearly doing something wrong!!

    Sounds about right to me!

    I can lose on 2000 calories per day.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    ageinglou wrote: »
    Mmm....so if I have 21 pounds I would like to lose, aiming for a pound loss a week, on average I burn about 2200 calories I day and should aim for a 500 calorie deficit per day that would leave with me a 1700 calorie intake per day. This seems too much. MFP ask me to enter my calorie intake it doesn't seem to do it for me? clearly doing something wrong!!

    How does that seem too much if you burn 2200 calories per day (TDEE)? You would lose weight eating anything below your TDEE. Your BMR is the calories you burn merely existing...so you burn 1306 calories just being alive...you would burn them in a coma. Then you burn calories going about your day to day and then finally exercise. 1700 to lose about 1 Lb per week seems about right.
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,458 Member
    I wanted to circle back to this that I said above:
    On days you exercise, you eat MORE, too.

    If you arrived at that 2200 calories by using some TDEE calculator, then you wouldn't eat more on exercise days.

    If you just input your daily activity and weight loss request into Myfitnesspal and it gave you 1700 for a one pound loss per week, then you would eat more on exercise days.

    Just clearing up my rather vague sentence. Read that link I posted about, "How does Myfitnesspal calculate my calorie goal."...it's different if you used some other online TDEE calculation.
  • Lousover
    Lousover Posts: 7 Member
    Thank you all I will have a look at the links and also for your advice/opinions. I use a fit bit which estimates my average calorie burn per day is 2200. The 1700 calorie seemed a lot as I always thought to lose weight you needed to aim for approx 1200 cals per day...hence why it was never sustainable 🤣
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
    Lousover wrote: »
    Thank you all I will have a look at the links and also for your advice/opinions. I use a fit bit which estimates my average calorie burn per day is 2200. The 1700 calorie seemed a lot as I always thought to lose weight you needed to aim for approx 1200 cals per day...hence why it was never sustainable 🤣

    To lose weight you need a calorie deficit. For a small group of people, 1,200 is an appropriate amount. But most people can eat more than that and still lose weight.
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,458 Member
    So...look at your BMR and add daily activity - such as your job, your showering, your walking around, cleaning house, doing dishes, whatever it is that you do in a day. When your Fitbit adds all that up it's giving you around 2200. So to lose weight you deduct 500 calories (or less) from that. So anything below your TDEE (which is that 2200) will create a calorie deficit and you will lose weight.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 28,052 Member
    Lousover wrote: »
    Thank you all I will have a look at the links and also for your advice/opinions. I use a fit bit which estimates my average calorie burn per day is 2200. The 1700 calorie seemed a lot as I always thought to lose weight you needed to aim for approx 1200 cals per day...hence why it was never sustainable 🤣

    You'll enjoy this then :smiley:

    https://www.aworkoutroutine.com/1200-calorie-diet/
  • Lousover
    Lousover Posts: 7 Member
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    Lousover wrote: »
    Thank you all I will have a look at the links and also for your advice/opinions. I use a fit bit which estimates my average calorie burn per day is 2200. The 1700 calorie seemed a lot as I always thought to lose weight you needed to aim for approx 1200 cals per day...hence why it was never sustainable 🤣

    You'll enjoy this then :smiley:

    https://www.aworkoutroutine.com/1200-calorie-diet/

    Haha!!! So this is where the 1200 calorie diet comes from...and I thought I was reasonably intelligent as well!!! Brilliant guys, thanks for all of the sensible insight and straightforward advice. Why make it complicated eh!!! 👍
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