Whats the point to exercise then?

I always enjoy your posts. Insightful and to the point.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<< I eat back my exercise calories!

My goal is to stay between 1200-1450 net clean calories a day... That's it!

Why so low on the net, are you still trying to lose weight, or are you in maintenance? Your ticker shows you met your goal?? Unless you are quite short or don't weigh much, a man should not net less than 1500-1600 calories.

Dieting helps you look good in clothing.

Exercise helps you look good naked.

THIS!!

All the men are saying they eat their calories back but it's different for men. It's a lot easier for men to lose. If a man and woman put in the same amount of time and effort and eat the same (according to body size) the man will most likely lose much quicker. So I think that should be taken into consideration. What works for men doesn't always work for women.

No, the gender thing is taken into account with our caloric intake and calories burned (which are higher) other than that there should be no difference. A 500 cal/day deficit should equal a 1lb/week lose regardless of gender, the difference is a man of the same weight will get to eat more calories and still have a 500 cal deficit.

bump

I think dieting helps you lose the weight and exercising helps tone your body up so it looks better. Exercising is also just really good for your overall health. I know i can lose weight just by changing my diet, but I want to be in shape, too. I want to be able to run 5 miles without stopping. Or however many.

And yes I eat back ALL of my exercise calories. When myfitnesspal tells me I earned so many extra calories by working out, I eat them all. I ALWAYS try to make the number at the bottom (remaining calories) as close to zero as I can get it, whether I go a little over or under.

Dieting helps you look good in clothing.

Exercise helps you look good naked.

^^Love this!

When I exercise I find it easier to say no to my cravings, since I already swet and worked hard

Um... to have some muscle? Maybe? Just a thought.
You seem to think that the only positive effect of exercise is burning calories.

BECAUSE MFP IS DESIGNED SO YOU WILL LOSE THIS WEIGHT WITHOUT EXERCISE.

Yes, I shouted.

So when you DO exercise you need to add this back in to keep the same calorie deficit.

You tell MFP you want to lose 2 pounds a week. MFP sets your calorie goal to 1,200. This is low, the minimum amount for health. You burn 400 calories in exercise today, so now your Net cals is 800. NOT healthy. That is why you are supposed to eat back your calories on this plan.

If however you run your own numbers and decide that 1,600 calories is the appropriate number for you because 1,200 just is not enough, then don't eat your exercise calories back. 1,600 minus the 400 you exercised still keeps you in the healthy range, netting 1,200.

This is the reason I do. Well, that and I love to eat! :laugh:

When I didn't eat back my exercise calories, weight loss stalled. I upped my calories again and started losing. I look better, feel better and get to eat more!! Win-Win-Win!!!!

MFP sets you back 500 calories from what you need to maintain if you did no exercise. If you burn 500 calories you are now 1000 calories behind what you need to maintain. Thats when you are set to lose 2 lbs a week. Its around 200 calories if you are set to 1/2 pound a week. Still set less than you need to maintain the weight.

Do yourself a favor and eat them back. You will find you will lose more weight when you eat enough. If you do this long enough you will also find that when you eat too little you might not progress like you thought, lose muscle, and feel tired, plus maybe even gain some. The closer you get to goal, the more you need to eat and the slower the weight loss is. But that is the point where if you don't eat enough you will really not see much progress. At this point I switched to 1/2 lb loss a week and saw my plateau go away.

Now the muscle factor. When I don't exercise and build muscle I can only eat a little. When I have muscle mass I can eat 200 over maintence calories and still stay at goal. This means muscles not only make you look smoother like a spandex body suit, but you also can eat more if you have them. And to get muscle you have to eat enough calories to get them in the first place. Starvation reduces more muscle than fat. Google fat % calculators. That is a better estimate of if you are losing fat than the scale. And way more important than the scale. You want to lose fat. In fact my goal weight is at the middle or higher end of BMI, but it's at the low end of body fat %. I'm densely built. But not fat. Once I starved myself thin and was not healthy, I still had a higher body fat %, but was "thin". Not as good.

For years I was told that the way to lose weight is to exercise. Well then exercise seems like a chore and everyone hates chores. Exercise takes on a whole new meaning when you are doing it because you want to for your health.

For many people, exercising to lose weight IS doing it for health. That's why I did it. Certainly not looks - losing weight won't replace my face.

I lost I don't know how much weight before I started tracking my food intake. I had to be doing something right. But now that I'm doing both, I'm doing more right.

So let's hypothisize:

So let's say your MFP calorie setting is 1500 calories. That means that if you just met that goal you'd lose a pound a week. Now let's say you add in 300 calorie burn from exercise. Even if you ate back those 300, you'd still lose a pound a week. Let's say you don't. You can lose a little more weight for a short time, however stalls and plateaus are quicker and you will definitely NOT raise you Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR) if you keep it up. RMR burns more fat than any exercise you'll do in 2 hours.

Make more sense now?

These are all very good points. I do have a question, though. What are the components of RMR? I ask because hart rate is obviously a big part of metabolism. People who are in good cardiovascular shape tend to have a lower resting heart rate than they would in poor cardiovascular condition, leading one to assume that poor cardiovascular health = higher RMR. What am I missing?

Feel free to reply by PM if this is too off-topic for the thread.