to eat or not to eat....
lilspider
Posts: 31 Member
Should you eat the exercise calories or not? This has been always the question for me. I generally dont eat all of them, but should I?
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Replies
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Yes.
MFP is designed in a way that you eat back your intentional exercise. A lot of users will only eat pack a percentage to give a buffer in case of overestimating calories when exercising.5 -
You can try...you will get a better idea of how accurate they are when you log for a while and track how much weight you lose.4
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It's how MFP is designed and it makes it easier to meet your nutritional goals and still enjoy a wider variety of foods while still being in a deficit. Why wouldn't you?4
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Thanks both for your reply. I will try to eat all of them for a bit thanks for the great tip.
I just generally dont feel hungry to eat all of it so what gives... I guess I should be happy.
Also I only notice it after dinner and then it is too late to eat 500 calories lol2 -
Thanks both for your reply. I will try to eat all of them for a bit thanks for the great tip.
I just generally dont feel hungry to eat all of it so what gives... I guess I should be happy.
Also I only notice it after dinner and then it is too late to eat 500 calories lol
Do you use a scale to log your food?1 -
Thanks both for your reply. I will try to eat all of them for a bit thanks for the great tip.
I just generally dont feel hungry to eat all of it so what gives... I guess I should be happy.
Also I only notice it after dinner and then it is too late to eat 500 calories lol
Assuming that 500 calories is an accurate estimate of how many calories you're burning through exercise, you can always roll them over into the next day. You don't have to cram them into the end of your day, your body doesn't do a hard reset at midnight.4 -
As others have said, MFP is designed for you to eat back a reasonable estimate of exercise calories. Be sure to set you MFP activity level (in your profile) based on non-exercise activity (like home chores, job, non-exercise hobbies, etc.).
The real test is actual weight loss rate after 4-6 weeks (comparing same relative point in at least 2 different monthly cycles for premenopausal women). Losing weight too fast creates health risks (don't want that!), but you do of course want a sensible, steady loss rate. Eating back exercise calories is just part of finding that balance.
Someone who sets an ultra slow loss goal (like 0.5lb/week, even when they have many pounds left to lose), and who does small/irregular amounts of exercise, is probably fine just letting exercise calories increase their calorie deficit, because in total they won't lose too fast. But someone who sets up their profile for 2 pounds a week loss, then does hundreds of calories of exercise most days on top of that . . . well, that can be a path toward unsustainability (such as binges), weakness, fatigue, or worse health complications. For sure a problem? No. But for sure higher risk.
Best wishes for success!4 -
Yes I weigh all my food religiously with my kitchen scales. I've been tracking for two weeks and lost 2kg so far so it is working.2
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Congratulations on your weight loss!
Maybe start with eating back half your exercise calories. Many exercise calorie estimates are rather off. If you find you lose too fast (and lose too much muscles) then eat back more.1 -
Thanks everyone this has been really insightful read and has made me appreciate the calories I have left more. I have always thought that as long as I don't feel hungry I should be ok, but on some days I have quite a few calories left and then end up munching chocolate in front of TV because I can (Which then throws my macros out of the window!!
) 1 -
If you are trying to maintain your weight and not lose than sure you can eat them back . But if your goal is to lose weight I don’t see why you would want to eat back your hard work. Don’t forget , your calorie deficit should be made with food not exercise0
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Brandon1992 wrote: »If you are trying to maintain your weight and not lose than sure you can eat them back . But if your goal is to lose weight I don’t see why you would want to eat back your hard work. Don’t forget , your calorie deficit should be made with food not exercise
I disagree with this.
You need proper nutrition to fuel your body and your workouts. Plus your body is only able to lose a certain amount of fat per day. If you go over that then you will lose muscles mass at a much higher rate than is necessary. You might be a guy, but for a woman it's *kitten* difficult to rebuild lost muscle. And once you're at a certain age loss of muscle mass can also lead to osteoporosis. And not forget: your heart is also a muscle. Would you rather your body consumes your heart than lose at a healthy rate?
With regards to proper nutrition: a woman needs about 1100 calories per day just to keep her body alive and all organs working. This is non-negotiable. You can't just use your kidneys a bit less, let your brain take a break from running all bodily functions for a few hours each day, reduce heart beats by 40%. If TO is on 1200 calories per day, and works out for 500 she'd only consume 700 calories per day. Mind explaining how that is healthy in any way? Yes, we don't know how much she's eating. But that means that you can't make such a bloody statement. It's unhealthy. And could be dangerous.9 -
Brandon1992 wrote: »Don’t forget , your calorie deficit should be made with food not exercise
A calorie deficit can be made by food or exercise, or a combination of both. As long as you are burning more calories, than consuming. But it also needs to be done in a healthy way. Hitting minimum requirements is a necessity for health.5 -
Try out different methods, see what works for your goals... I did this and got to know more about how my body reacts to certain situations. One week you eat the 'burned calories' as well, one week you don't and then you can see what works for your goals.
I don't eat them back on now, trying to cut some weight.. But this would not necessarily work for others.. As long you feel the fun of it you should try whatever works within your comfort. No right or wrong, as long you don't OVEReat you daily macros0 -
Yes I weigh all my food religiously with my kitchen scales. I've been tracking for two weeks and lost 2kg so far so it is working.
I would also say that you should no believe 2 weeks of "how you feel" data. It can be misleading because the body will do its best to cover for a large energy deficit over a short interval. As time progresses if you maintain that large deficit you may find yourself in a binge-like overfeed or in what I now call deficit sick. I recently went through this myself doing fairly rigorous work around the house that was not being captured on my fitness watch. I ate my exercise calories but it was not enough to also cover my chores energy expenditure and I crashed myself. It took over a week to feel normal again. It was mightily unpleasant to feel so drained for so long.8 -
I fully agree with notion of experimenting but I'm skeptical that one week can tell you much. Three months should yield fairly definite results. But I would suggest letting at least a month to go by before drawing any conclusions.ClimbingWolf wrote: »One week you eat the 'burned calories' as well, one week you don't and then you can see what works for your goals.
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Brandon1992 wrote: »If you are trying to maintain your weight and not lose than sure you can eat them back . But if your goal is to lose weight I don’t see why you would want to eat back your hard work. Don’t forget , your calorie deficit should be made with food not exercise
Do you understand how MFP determines calories goals? Exercise isn't taken into account, you're already at a deficit with their goal. If you're making that deficit larger through additional activity, eating more to account for that isn't "eating back hard work," it's ensuring you have the energy to continue working on your fitness.9 -
This conversation has been really useful for me. I am on 1200 cals a day so in other words if I do 500 cals worth of exercise it takes it down to 700? - which is way too little.7
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I would also like to add I sit on my bum most days because of work but always go for walks to get at least 10k steps each day as well as do some weight training with my dumbbells1
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This conversation has been really useful for me. I am on 1200 cals a day so in other words if I do 500 cals worth of exercise it takes it down to 700? - which is way too little.
1200 calories is the bare minimum for women.
How tall are you?
How much are you wanting to lose?
How fast are you trying to lose it?
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I am looking to lose 10 kg (which I think is about 25 pounds or so) and I am 5.5...Not really in a rush but I am struggling to meet my calorie goals even if I am not dieting on most days. And then there are days I eat super unhealthy (well was still 2 weeks ago).0
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What do you have your rate of loss set at?0
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I agree with @AnnPT77 's point. You can't really micro-engineer the project at the beginning, though people do try. There's a certain amount, a lot actually, of necessary "see how things go" and fine tuning. There's broad agreement that you need 6 weeks of data to draw any conclusions. That is, 6 weeks of getting on the scale, counting your calories, and getting a feel for things.
In the meantime, eating back half your exercise is a good idea. After 6 weeks you'll be able to see whether that resulted in the correct amount of weight loss. Calorie estimates for exercise are all over the place and often way too high, and all you can do is put a temporary stake in the ground as far as what % to eat back, and see how it goes for six-ish weeks, and then fine tune.
The main thing to fully grok is that MFP's NEAT-based system is going to give you less calories than a TDEE-based calorie tool IF you work out regularly, waaaay less, because it expects you to add your exercise cals to your food intake.. Translated into English:
A tool like TDEEcalculator.net says, based on your gender, age, any workouts you do, etc., "Your break-even calorie level is 2200", and you on your own decide you want to lose a pound a week, which requires a 500 calorie deficit, so you eat 1700.
MFP doesn't work like that. It assumes the 500 cals of cardio you're doing will be counted separately and eaten back, and therefore tells you to eat 1200, meaning "1200 PLUS your 500 exercise calories".
Either way, if your break even is 2200, you have to have 1700 net calories per day (food minus exercise) to lose a pound a week.
In this little example, if you use MFP's system and don't eat back the cardio, you will end up eating 1200, which is way too little food for a 1 lb/week goal. So that's why you eat the exercise cals back when using MFP. It's the same amount of food in the end, 1700 calories, it's just added up differently. The mathematics don't really matter and a lot of people use TDEE not MFP's system. But the point is, if you got a calorie target from MFP, it assumes you will eat back your exercise calories, and if you don't, you could easily fall into an unsafely huge calorie deficit. Try to avoid that; it isn't sustainable and isn't good for you.4 -
Just for clarification on this...
If the calorie goal is set to 1800 calories per day, and one exercises and burns 750 calories, lets say you aren't entering exercise calories into MFP...then one would actually only be eating only 1,050 calories, even if they ate their calculated 1800 calorie daily limit? And this is because you still have the calorie deficit that MFP calculated which is why you should eat your exercise calories?
If the BMR is 1500 calories and the TDEE is 2300 calories, the daily calorie limit is 1900, and one does't add in the 750 exercise calories into MFP, then this person is only eating 1,150 calories?
Huh...maybe I should be eating my exercise calories because I'm losing inches and not scale weight and its been 5 weeks and I'm getting bummed.
What about intermittent fasting in conjunction?
See I'm not losing weight at 1800-2000 calories a day and I don't eat my exercise calories back. I'm losing inches but I sit all day for work, then I exercise 30-120 minutes 6 days a week in the form or resistance training, walking, hiking, running, spinning, or body weight exercises. In 5 weeks, I've lost two pounds and about 6 inches off my body overall. I'm wondering if I should be eating those exercise calories back based on what my fitbit says I burned. I thought I have been overeating this whole time.0 -
Just for clarification on this...
If the calorie goal is set to 1800 calories per day, and one exercises and burns 750 calories, lets say you aren't entering exercise calories into MFP...then one would actually only be eating only 1,050 calories, even if they ate their calculated 1800 calorie daily limit? And this is because you still have the calorie deficit that MFP calculated which is why you should eat your exercise calories?
If the BMR is 1500 calories and the TDEE is 2300 calories, the daily calorie limit is 1900, and one does't add in the 750 exercise calories into MFP, then this person is only eating 1,150 calories?
Huh...maybe I should be eating my exercise calories because I'm losing inches and not scale weight and its been 5 weeks and I'm getting bummed.
What about intermittent fasting in conjunction?
Don't worry about BMR. It's a hypothetical number of how many calories you'd burn if you were in a coma. Since you're not in a coma, it's meaningless and shouldn't play any role in deciding how much to eat.
Yes, if you eat 1800 calories and do 750 worth of exercise, you are getting an effective 1050 calorie intake, which is too low. No question. Now, that 750 worth of exercise might actually be more like 400 since calorie estimates for exercise are often very high. So it may well be that your net calories, i.e. food minus exercise, is really round 1400 in this case. The problem being that it's supposed to be 1800. So that is why you eat some of the exercise calories back.
Intermittent fasting will not impact this.
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... don't know why this double post is here ...
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Just for clarification on this...
If the calorie goal is set to 1800 calories per day, and one exercises and burns 750 calories, lets say you aren't entering exercise calories into MFP...then one would actually only be eating only 1,050 calories, even if they ate their calculated 1800 calorie daily limit? And this is because you still have the calorie deficit that MFP calculated which is why you should eat your exercise calories?
If the BMR is 1500 calories and the TDEE is 2300 calories, the daily calorie limit is 1900, and one does't add in the 750 exercise calories into MFP, then this person is only eating 1,150 calories?
Huh...maybe I should be eating my exercise calories because I'm losing inches and not scale weight and its been 5 weeks and I'm getting bummed.
What about intermittent fasting in conjunction?
Don't worry about BMR. It's a hypothetical number of how many calories you'd burn if you were in a coma. Since you're not in a coma, it's meaningless and shouldn't play any role in deciding how much to eat.
Yes, if you eat 1800 calories and do 750 worth of exercise, you are getting an effective 1050 calorie intake, which is too low. No question. Now, that 750 worth of exercise might actually be more like 400 since calorie estimates for exercise are often very high. So it may well be that your net calories, i.e. food minus exercise, is really round 1400 in this case. The problem being that it's supposed to be 1800. So that is why you eat some of the exercise calories back.
Intermittent fasting will not impact this.
Thanks for the response. I did make an edit to my post with additional information if that may help. I use a fitbit to estimate my calorie burn, which in all cases is a smaller number than what MFP gives for the same exercise. I officially have no idea how much I'm supposed to be eating now. On average, based on my fitbit, I burn 2500-2600 calories per day with exercise. I'm guessing I should be eating about 2000-2100 calories per day if I were to set my own goal number and not add in exercise calories. Would that potentially work?0 -
Just for clarification on this...
See I'm not losing weight at 1800-2000 calories a day and I don't eat my exercise calories back. I'm losing inches but I sit all day for work, then I exercise 30-120 minutes 6 days a week in the form or resistance training, walking, hiking, running, spinning, or body weight exercises. In 5 weeks, I've lost two pounds and about 6 inches off my body overall. I'm wondering if I should be eating those exercise calories back based on what my fitbit says I burned. I thought I have been overeating this whole time.
Um, you're not losing weight but you're losing inches and you lost two pounds and 6 inches? That didn't make sense.
Nothing's wrong here other than you should eat some of those exercise calories back.
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Just for clarification on this...
If the calorie goal is set to 1800 calories per day, and one exercises and burns 750 calories, lets say you aren't entering exercise calories into MFP...then one would actually only be eating only 1,050 calories, even if they ate their calculated 1800 calorie daily limit? And this is because you still have the calorie deficit that MFP calculated which is why you should eat your exercise calories?
If the BMR is 1500 calories and the TDEE is 2300 calories, the daily calorie limit is 1900, and one does't add in the 750 exercise calories into MFP, then this person is only eating 1,150 calories?
Huh...maybe I should be eating my exercise calories because I'm losing inches and not scale weight and its been 5 weeks and I'm getting bummed.
What about intermittent fasting in conjunction?
Don't worry about BMR. It's a hypothetical number of how many calories you'd burn if you were in a coma. Since you're not in a coma, it's meaningless and shouldn't play any role in deciding how much to eat.
Yes, if you eat 1800 calories and do 750 worth of exercise, you are getting an effective 1050 calorie intake, which is too low. No question. Now, that 750 worth of exercise might actually be more like 400 since calorie estimates for exercise are often very high. So it may well be that your net calories, i.e. food minus exercise, is really round 1400 in this case. The problem being that it's supposed to be 1800. So that is why you eat some of the exercise calories back.
Intermittent fasting will not impact this.
Thanks for the response. I did make an edit to my post with additional information if that may help. I use a fitbit to estimate my calorie burn, which in all cases is a smaller number than what MFP gives for the same exercise. I officially have no idea how much I'm supposed to be eating now. On average, based on my fitbit, I burn 2500-2600 calories per day with exercise. I'm guessing I should be eating about 2000-2100 calories per day if I were to set my own goal number and not add in exercise calories. Would that potentially work?
Yes. That is the TDEE method, versus the MFP NEAT method, and either is fine. You are saying that your all-inclusive break-even is 2500-2600, including any exercise you're doing, and if that is true, then eating 2000-2100 should give you a pound a week of weight loss. So everything is solid with that plan, except that you may find the 2500-2600 isn't quite accurate. After 5-6 weeks, if your weight loss isn't 1 lb a week, you can (and should) adjust your caloric intake up or down as needed.
Depending on your age/sex/weight/height/blahblah, the 2500 may well be pretty close, though perhaps a bit high. As a 247 lb 5'10.5" male, my NEAT is 2350 and with exercise my TDEE for the day is usually 2750-2800. So I don't find a 2500 TDEE to be something that's wildly out there, and in 5-6 weeks you'd know for sure whether that was the right number. Just be sure to count calories accurately and diligently during those 5-6 weeks and not take cheat meals, so that you can get an accurate picture of things.2 -
Brandon1992 wrote: »If you are trying to maintain your weight and not lose than sure you can eat them back . But if your goal is to lose weight I don’t see why you would want to eat back your hard work. Don’t forget , your calorie deficit should be made with food not exercise
That's literally self-contradictory.
If you don't eat back exercise calories, you are not fueling the exercise activity, which is making your deficit (or part of it) with exercise. It's increasing your deficit beyond the deficit you may be creating by eating less food.
If you use an outside TDEE calculator (not MFP) correctly to estimate calories, and set your calorie goal manually based on that data (i.e., don't let MFP calculate your goal), then you're eating back your exercise (except for whatever deficit you've figured in), it's just that the calculator averaged your planned exercise over the course of the week, and included it in your calorie needs. (<= There's a risk in there, if the planned exercise doesn't happen.) It's all estimates, of course.
If you use MFP correctly (as many have said), you set activity level based on your life not including intentional exercise, let it set your calorie goal to include your requested weight loss rate, then you log exercise and eat it back, which keeps the deficit the same. It's still all estimates, of course, just doing the accounting for those estimates a little differently.
Either method, correctly used, accounts for exercise calories. On MFP, using MFP's method, setting an aggressive weight loss rate goal, then not eating back a reasonable proportion of exercise calories is a recipe for increasing health risks and risks of unsustainability (i.e., failure to reach goal because it becomes too hard to stick with the calorie level).
The whole "eat back exercise calories" idea makes people confused. In one sense, exercise calories are no different from any other calorie expenditure. I eat back my tooth-brushing calories, I eat back my getting-the-mail calories, I eat back my doing-stuff-at-work calories (different for a bricklayer than a call-center phone worker), and I eat back my exercise calories. If I'm trying to lose weight, I take a reasonable number or percentage off the top of what I burn each day, that's my calorie deficit, and it's how I lose weight. MFP's NEAT method, and the TDEE method, just juggle the numbers in a different way.
It doesn't really matter where the deficit calories come from: Technically, it's not possible to say. The calories "come from" exercise (or don't) only in the sense that our calorie needs increase when we exercise. They also increase when I go from my call-center job to being a bricklayer, but we (using the MFP method, which some of us prefer), excercise can be more variable than most daily-life things, which tend to average out to similar numbers over the course of a normal week/month.
No matter where we think of the calorie deficit coming from, eating too few calories (trying to lose weight too fast), creates higher levels of risk, to health, and to eventual success. Actual weight loss rate, after many weeks of experience, is the best way to see how big our deficit is, in a practical sense. Everything else is just estimates, and a starting point for our personal experiment.6
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