Eating calories earned through exercise

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Rosegardens
Rosegardens Posts: 1 Member
in Introduce Yourself
Hi does everyone eat the calories earned from exercise please? Trying to lose weight

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  • Dogmom1978
    Dogmom1978 Posts: 1,580 Member
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    I eat some or all of mine depending on hunger. Be careful not to over estimate how many calories you are burning through said exercise though.

    And remember, when trying to lose weight, only CICO matters. Exercise is for health.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    Rosegardens wrote: »
    Hi does everyone eat the calories earned from exercise please? Trying to lose weight

    Why not - it's part of what I burned that day.

    And if I eat less than that now higher figure, I still lose weight.

    Eat way less as if my exercise didn't count, and eventually it won't count as the type of exercise I spent time and effort doing - because now my exercise sucks, my recovery is bad, sleep ends up poor.

    And no not everyone does - because they don't understand how MFP works different than every other diet site out there that I've seen.
    Or they want to lose weight too quick and suffer the consequences of the 70% that fail to reach goal weight and maintain it. Or they enjoy doing a diet year after year, sort of a hobby perhaps.
  • mermaidgirle
    mermaidgirle Posts: 27 Member
    edited November 2020
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    I rarely eat all of them. but it depends on my hunger level. but I believe MFP sets your base calories based on your projected normal activities. Adding exercise that isn't part of that routine burns extra calories that should be reasonably replenished-otherwise you run the risk of losing too much too fast in an unsafe way.
  • mnbvcxzlkjhgfdsa12
    mnbvcxzlkjhgfdsa12 Posts: 204 Member
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    I rarely eat back my exercise calories. I don’t do enough exercise to make me feel like I need to (I run 5k 3x a week) and it is so easy to over estimate how many calories you burnt exercising. My husband on the other hand competes in triathlons and on an average day he’ll cycle 30 miles or run a half marathon - he absolutely eats back his exercise calories. He is not trying to lose weight. I am.

    Whether you need to eat back your exercise calories will depend how many calories you’re eating and how many you’re burning. You mention you’re trying to lose weight so you need to burn more calories than you are eating. Keep in mind that is easy to over estimate calories burned through exercise, so some people opt to eat back half of the calories that a fitness tracker or calculator says they’ve burned. If you want to eat your exercise calories you could start there, and if you find you’re losing weight too quickly then you could work up from there.
  • derekoh1234
    derekoh1234 Posts: 14 Member
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    i generally eat half of them most days, but i also input numbers lower than what my tracker says i burnt just to be on the lower side...
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,874 Member
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    Rosegardens wrote: »
    Hi does everyone eat the calories earned from exercise please? Trying to lose weight

    When I did MFP as designed, I did...or at least a reasonable estimate of them. If you set up your profile as designed with your activity level set to that of only your day to day hum drum, your calorie target is a weight loss target without any exercise whatsoever. Using MfP as designed, exercise is unaccounted for activity in your activity level...you account for that activity by logging it and getting additional calories. This allows for people to lose weight without any exercise or to be able to eat a bit more if they exercise...it also teaches one how to properly fuel their bodies for all activity, including exercise.

    Once I became more consistent in my exercise, I started using the TDEE method which includes an estimate of your exercise and daily hum drum in your activity level...thus accounting for exercise upfront. Using the TDEE method and including an estimate of your exercise, you get a higher calorie target upfront rather than having additional calories tacked onto the back end.

    The methods are basically 6 of 1, half dozen of the other. Using MFP, my calorie target to lose 1 Lb per week was 1900 net. With regular exercise I was averaging around 2300 calories per day to lose 1 Lb per week. When I switched to TDEE and included my exercise in my activity level my calorie target to lose about 1 Lb per week was something like 2280 and in that case, didn't log exercise because it was already accounted for upfront in my calorie target...but the average consumption between the two methods was pretty much 6 of 1.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,429 Member
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    I estimate them carefully and conservatively, and then I generally eat them all. This is what I did during just under a year of weight loss, obese (where I'd been for decades!) to healthy weight, and for 5+ years of maintenance at a healthy weight since.

    I find that exercise calories taste the best. (<= joking!).

    The only exception is when I might be "calorie banking", i.e., eating a little under goal (not much, maybe 100-150) to save up some calories for some upcoming special occasion. Even then, it's not so much that I'm not eating exercise calories, as that I'm not eating all the way up to my goal that includes exercise.

    In one sense, exercise calories are no different from toothbrushing calories, or even sleeping calories. We burn them, we need to account for them. The thing that makes exercise different is that (for most of us) some days we exercise, and some days we don't; or we exercise different amounts; and the number is big enough to make a difference. Because my most beloved exercise is weather-dependent, and seasonal, it works well for me to consider exercise calories as a 'special' add on. I can lose or maintain weight whether I exercise or not. For me, that's useful.

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