Eating what I lose in Exercise

I am not always able to eat all back that day but I almost always go over on the days I don't exercise. It all seems to average out.

So is it a good idea to eat the calories you burn during exercise? For instance, If my Calorie goal is 1500 / day, and I exercise, I gain 700 calories from exercising, do I need to eat the extra It tells me I gained?

Yes, eat all the calories back.
MFP calculates our total daily calorie intake WITHOUT exercise to lose 1 pound or so per week.
And after we log exercises, our daily calorie limit increases.
Why?
Because MFP telling us to eat our exercise calories.
Large deficits are unhealthy, because while you will lose weight, what's the quality of the weight loss?
In many cases you'll lose lean body mass - MUSCLE - which LOWERS your metabolic rate, making weight loss harder.
These crash diets work well for a season -- and sure enough, the pounds melt away. But when you eat so
few calories, you train your metabolism to slow down. Once the diet is over, you have a body that burns calories
more slowly -- and you gain weight.
Be smart.
Exercise well both cardio and resistance, and eat back the calories.
The exercise will RAISE your metabolism and burn more fat at rest.

You are absolutely correct.

My personal opinion is that you should NOT eat those calories you burn. But i do think you should eat something small like a cereal bar or a special K bar something with high fiber or high protein bar. When you burn calories and then eat them what is the point of working out. Like I said its my opnion I am not a fitness trainer or professional. I feel guilty when I eat what I just worked off. Hope that helps.

If you are going to offer advice on whether to eat your exercise calories or not, please be sure first that you know how MFP is set up to work.

When you entered your goals (lose .5, 1, or 2 pounds a week), MFP deducted the appropriate calories from your daily goal in order for you to achieve this.

NO exercise is expected or included in the calculation. It is healthy, however, to exercise and keep your muscles active, but you are not required to do so on MFP in order to lose weight.

So, if you do, indeed, exercise, then you need to eat those calories in order to keep the original deficit per your goal. Eating too little is not healthy.

If this does not work for you, it is likely that one or more of the following has occurred: 1 ) you aren't as active as you think you are, so the activity level selected in your settings is inaccurate or 2 ) you aren't actually burning as many calories during exercise as you think you are or 3 ) you are eating more than you are logging due to estimation errors/logging ommissions. A combination of these is usually at fault.

Here is the formula: (Using close to my own personal figures)

BMR - 1400 (Minimum calories needed to keep organs functioning)
Sedentary lifestyle adds factor of 1.2 - 1680 (Total burned normally without exercise)
Weight loss desired 1 pound per week - 3500 calorie deficit required = 500 deficit needed per day
1680 - 400 - 1280 daily calorie goal
Zumba class exercise calories - 400 extra calories

1280 + 400 extra burned - 400 extra eaten = 1280 calorie goal

So I still have my 500 daily calorie deficit (since my normal burn is 1680).

Wiping out a deficit is extremely easy - forgot the olive oil you cooked with (-140), eat 5 fries off your kids plate (-50), guessed at the size of your chicken - (-50), just guessed at how many chips you had (-100), didn't measure your salad dressing (-100), didn't measure peanut butter (-70), didn't count almonds-just had a heaping handful-(-75). By this time, you not only do not have a deficit, you are eating at a surplus!!

Another suggestion is to be sure the exercise you count is purposeful, fitness related exercise and not lifestyle activities (as those are included in the lifestyle factor mentioned above).

Good luck!

all I am saying is my husband went to the DR and was told in NO WAY should he eat back his calories... which is what I have believed all along. When you are maintaining that is another story......

This topic is posted almost daily..with the same disagreements

well for me I eat as much of them as possible .. not always all ..

like I earned 800 more calories from excercise but just wasn't that hungry so I ate 550!

Has anybody thought there is no "one size fits all" answer to the question.

The rate of weight loss that is suitable varies person to person, situation to situation. For those who are massively overweight why should they limit themselves to 2lb/week?

If you 200+ lbs to lose you can safely lose more than 2lbs/week, but there are a few reasons why slow weight loss is preferred:
The slower you lose weight the more likely you are to keep it off.
The slower you lose the less excess skin you will have (skin may tighten along with your loss if it is slow enough).
Losing slow will help set you up for maintenance so you don't just jump your calories up.
Losing slower will give you more energy while losing making exercise easier.
etc.

I think your body will let you know if you listen to it.

If you feel energetic and you aren't starting to dread working out and if you aren't running out of gas part way through your workout, you are probably eating enough even if MFP says you need to eat more.

This topic is posted almost daily..with the same disagreements

Yeah, I'm relatively new here and I NEED to stop reading them. It makes me want to bang my head into my desk...repeatedly. I guess on tuesdays when I teach an hour long fitness class (650 cals burned) then do my half marathon training run (800 calories burned) then play volleyball (250 cals burned) at 1650 total burned, I'll be just fine eating my daily goal of 1220 calories...makes sense to me... ::banging head against desk:: I won't pass out at all...

duh obviously..if u can have ur body run on negative calories, you're doing it right! snort..:laugh:

This topic is posted almost daily..with the same disagreements

Yeah, I'm relatively new here and I NEED to stop reading them. It makes me want to bang my head into my desk...repeatedly. I guess on tuesdays when I teach an hour long fitness class (650 cals burned) then do my half marathon training run (800 calories burned) then play volleyball (250 cals burned) at 1650 total burned, I'll be just fine eating my daily goal of 1220 calories...makes sense to me... ::banging head against desk:: I won't pass out at all...

duh obviously..if u can have ur body run on negative calories, you're doing it right! snort..:laugh:

Sweet! I figured it was all good...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

But seriously, some days I eat them all back, some days I don't. But I TRY to eat them back. It's really, really hard to get your mind into that mode when you have been losing weight or trying to lose weight, but we have to fuel our bodies!