Whats the point to exercise then?

It provides oxygen to your muscles
It burns fat
It builds muscle
It makes you stronger
It gives you energy
It makes your bones stronger
It soothes achiness

Why would you NOT want to? I didn't work out this week for three days straight and my neck was aching, my back was stiff. As soon as I worked out again, I felt so much better. If you want to be skinny, don't exercise. If you want to be HEALTHY and FIT, exercise.

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I don't know how I feel about eating my calories back either, but here's why it can't hurt; the calorie goal that myfitnesspal gives you, is the amount of calories you should eat in order to lose weight, from diet alone. If you wanted to only maintain, myfitnesspal would give you a MUCH higher calorie goal. For example; I want to lose 2 lbs a week, so my calorie goal is 1610. When I changed that goal to 1.5 lbs a week, my calorie goal became 1860, because that's how much I would need to eat in order to lose 1.5 lbs a week as opposed to 2. So see, if you burn, say... 500 calories, and your calorie goal is 1600, and lets say you ate your 1600 calories already. You have now depleted your body of 500 calories. So you can eat 500 back, to bring you back up to a total of 1600. Therefore, if your goal is to lose 2 lbs a week, you'll still lose 2 lbs a week.

So if you DON'T eat your exercise calories back, it would stand to reason you would lose weight faster. So if your goal is to lose 2 lbs a week, and your calorie goal is 1600, and everyday you burn 500 calories WITHOUT eating it back, you'll lose MORE than 2 lbs a week. At least at first, and that's the concern about not eating your exercise calories back; your body needs to maintain a certain amount of calories. Your metabolism uses calories as fuel, and if your metabolism isn't being provided with enough calories to burn, it will eventually slow down, and usually sooner rather than later. So you COULD lose faster if you DON'T eat your exercise calories back, but it won't be long before your metabolism starts slowing down as it's not being provided with sufficient fuel. That's very often the cause of frequent plateaus.

I hope that made sense, and I hope that helped. I'm not the best at explaining things. I personally only like to eat half my exercise calories back because I never feel hungry enough to eat it ALL back. To a point, I think eating some of the exercise calories back is a good thing, however, I also believe in listening to my body. I'll eat extra if I work out but I'm not going to force myself to eat more if I don't feel hungry. Anyway, none of this is an exact science, find what works for you.

I'd love to know that too! I have a really low resting heart rate (35-40 bpm) due to distance running for the past 3 years. I often wondering if I'm ever going to lose this last 10-15 lbs even though I burn 5000+ calories per week!

(I meant to quote, sorry!)

Endurance athletes have lower RHR, but their RMR's aren't as high because of lower lean muscle tissue. Endurance training usually catabolizes lean muscle and that intern lowers RMR.


A.C.E. Certified Personal Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 28+ years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

I am glad I posted this question. I have been exercising so its not that I don't think I don't need it for my muscles or anything like that. I have noticed that there are a lot of people who think they should not eat back their exercise calories because they think they are defeating the purpose. 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. I use a heart rate monitor when I exercise and since I am a bigger person I burn a lot of calories with just walking. Its hard to eat back all of those calories with healthy eating.

Thank you to everyone who replied with polite educational responses. That's why we are all here right? To support everyone on this journey and not making them feel stupid. I do still love that quote that exercise is to look good naked! Love it!

Most of the work of reducing your weight and size is how you eat, and how much you eat. Exercise is the icing on the cake of looking good, feeling good, being healthier, avoiding disease, and being able to eat more of things you like.

I personally always eat back my exercise calories (almost always anyway). Keep in mind MFP will automatically set you up with a 500 calorie deficit, so even you are eating them back if you stay under your target calorie goal you are still creating a calorie deficit.

How does that actually work?