Here are my questions (which I sent in a message to heybales already, but thought to share here):

First, this makes a lot of sense. What doesn't make sense is how people on here really are losing pounds of weight using MFP's calorie tracker if it doesn't properly account for BMR. I'm lost somewhere in the logic of it all, lol. Are they starving themselves? Is that what causes "plateaus"? Why does eating at a calorie deficit not work properly?

Does gaining lean muscle (which I think I'm doing given I'm working out at least 5-6 days a week, and never really have before) replace lost fat? Or - if I'm eating that far under my BMR (MFP has me eating 1200 + exercise) - am I really just losing muscle and retaining the fat?

I know the calculations on the sheet are based on averaging values over a week. Should I really just be logging calories burned and eating a base 1315 + whatever I burned that day? If I don't have a HRM on constantly, how can I account for regular daily activity which is non-exercise? - and isn't this also "eating back exercise calories" plus regular activity calories?

Last, how do I transition from a recommended 1200 calorie diet back up to 1877? My body has started to get used to the idea of having less food and I actually cannot eat larger portion sizes anymore.

Thank you!!! :drinker: and cheers.

I hope this isn't a alternative to deficit eating, because it is! The biggest deficit you can take while feeding your exercise and not netting under your BMR.

Why can you lose undercutting your BMR, sometimes to a big level, as many on MFP seem to do, at first? First the folks that do eat back exercise calories, and poor estimates of them, are probably protecting themselves accidentally and luckily.

Then, there is a lag time to your BMR dropping. Some studies have seen 3 days to drop, some on here report 3-6 weeks. And you can still lose weight on slower BMR, just takes longer. The amount of time to drop depends on previous yo-yo dieting, how big of a difference eating now, how big a dip under the BMR, genetics, ect.

So frequent case scenario - a lady finally decides to stop current eating level, say 2400 cal, and that maintained her at 220 lbs for 30 yr F at 5'6", lightly active. (so this effect would be more drawn out at lighter overweight level of course)
Her healthy BMR is 1735.
She tells MFP Sedentary.
MFP shows daily non-exercise maintenance as 1735 x 1.25 = 2169
She selects 2 lb/wk goal.
MFP does math 2169 - 1000 = 1169, oops, for safety show 1200.

So our lady was eating at 2400, true maintenance level (notice MFP estimate was wrong because of bad selection by lady).
Now eating at 1200.
1200 cal true deficit per day from maintenance cals. No exercise involved yet.
That's 2.4 lbs / wk. For perhaps the first week.
Then metabolism must slow down, not enough cals. BMR now at 1500 for second week on avg, true maintenance would be 2062.
Still 800 cal true deficit, 1.6 lb / wk.
Now metabolism at 1300., true maintain 1788.
True deficit 588, 1.2 lb / wk.
Now at 1100 (not all food is available to BMR), true maintain 1513.
True deficit 313, 0.6 lb / wk.

At this point our lady wonders what is going on. Perhaps eats even less now, or exercises without eating cals (avg 200/day), both have the same effect, less cals for BMR so it lowers.

Now at 900, true maintain 1238.
True deficit 238, 0.5 lb / wk.

At this point, any splurge is easily stored as fat to hold on to, as well as any inaccurate calorei count. All exercise is easily depleting glucose stores and muscle must be broken down to provide it. (eating 50% carbs on 1000 cal diet is only 500 carb calories).
Our lady weighs 210, lost mostly water weight the first week and that 2.4 lbs fat hopefully.
And seems to stall.
Exercise intense cardio and it just hastens the set point to here.
So still losing fat possible, any more weight is most likely muscle. And since a lb of muscle has 600 cal in it, that energy provided can burn up a lot of weight of muscle. Of course more than 3500 for lb of fat.

You can not gain muscle at this level. The body is forced to decide, repair muscle, build new muscle, grow hair/skin, deal with cellular fluid levels required for life, fight off infection, ect. Muscle does not win in that decision.

You can gain muscle if your BMR is fed, and a little bit more. And you eat good amount of protein. But you can still be at deficit, just not as much. It's a fine line for the fat to provide so much energy, and you not to use up glucose so muscle isn't broken down in the first place.
Existing muscle can get stronger though. (I'll comment many progress reports on this method are on inches dropping not weight, so many are gaining muscle)

And fat is burned all the time. About 70% of energy needs at rest is fat, about 60% when moving around normal, low end of exercise is at 50% and quickly goes to 0% when you reach anaerobic. Carbs is the other side of that ratio. Plus a little protein for long sustained efforts.
Most exercise starts out higher ratio carbs, then settles to expected after 30 min. If you just ate bunch of carbs and insulin therefore turned on fat storage mode, it can take longer.
So you can do the math on your own workouts here. Probably 60% carb usage at least, from your total calorie burn. So 500 burn is 300 carb cal, JUST for that activity. Are all the other hrs in the day covered by your carb intake of 180 carb calories? Your limited glucose stores are empty, you are burning muscle.

If you like logging and eating back exercise calories, and have accurate estimate of that, the MFP method is just fine for you, though you would still benefit NETing above your BMR. Let me know if you want MFP tweaked for still being automatic. Will need your height, you forgot that stat.

If you don't know what the accurate exercise estimate is, don't like the big differences on some days, want constant, want a single number to work to, and want to maximize your deficit, then this may work better for you.

Your questions about eating at 1315 plus calories, eating all daily, ect, is better answered by what is really going on here.

Your goal weight daily maintenance calories for ALL activities is underestimated in that calculator, and the current you is too for that matter. Especially exercise levels.

But, in every case I've seen, when you subtract your best HRM estimate current exercise calories from that future goal figure, on a weekly avg basis, you NET above your BMR.
So in essence, you are indeed eating back your exercise calories. You are just spreading them out through the week, and getting to eat the exact same everyday until you reach goal weight.
Then where does the deficit come from?
ALL your other daily activity that is not exercise and not sleeping creates the deficit. Your cleaning, your shopping, your sitting (compared to rest at BMR level, that is burning something, like almost 400 for your full day) ect.
And since it's the non-exercise daily activity that pulls mainly from fat stores, no need to feed it.

Using that spreadsheet, you can get underestimated calc of non-exercise daily activity.
Section at the bottom.

So how to raise the level safely, so the body knows it can raise metabolism and not just store the extra food as fat in case the insanity continues?

Since you don't appear to have been eating back exercise calories, your BMR is very suppressed.

First week, add a 200 cal snack daily, I suggest Zone or Balance bar before or after workout because it won't spike insulin, in case that is an issue for you.
Second week, increase the size of 2 meals by 100 each, while still doing the snack. Should be at 1600, perhaps about current potential BMR level.
Do NOT workout the second week. All time scheduled for workout, just walk, nothing faster than 3mph. This amounts to increased daily activity burning mostly fat, while eating right about your BMR level.
Your body needs a major reset from where it was. Hopefully this will kick start it by seeing there is some relief. Your glucose stores with attached water will be topped off finally - there will be good weight gain from this. Your muscles will get a chance to recover and repair and perhaps build, there will be a good weight gain from this. Your fat burning will go up, a loss. Your metabolism will hopefully be going up, a loss.
You may have a wash this week, who knows.
Third week, final 277 cals added, and normal full blown workout. You'll find yourself stronger and faster - go for it!

Now just eat like you would at maintenance.
If you miss a workout, skip the workout snack.
If you add a workout, add a snack.
If you have special dinner Sat night, drop 200 cal on Fri and Sun, and exercise extra 15 min one of those 3 days.
With glucose stores always topped off, you won't see weight fluctuations of just water. You'll have more energy, muscle will grow easier, fat will burn easier.

And only time you need to change that goal, is if your routine changes in some major permanent way, then rerun the calc with new routine, and change goal again.

Otherwise, set it and forget it.

Hope that answered all the questions. Lot's of info here, but great place to explain it.

OK ran my numbers with the most accuaracy I could have with the various workouts and activities on a daily/weekly basis. I got a number that confirmed what I thought. I have reduced my workouts because I was overdoing it. I have been eating at what I thought was maintenance based on the fat2fit site but I was using the wrong activity level! So I have been eating MORE than maintenance!! I was eating maintenance to reset my metabolism after months of undereating below BMR and over exercising on top of that. My question in the my goal TDEE and current TDEE is the same for the Katch! Is this correct? The other versions vary SLIGHTLY but I thought that was odd. My stats are:

Female 5'6.5 26 years old. 30.7% BF Current weight 145 Goal Weight 135. Run 3 times 30 minutes, Cardio/Strength DVD 3 times 30 minutes. On the weekend I do one extra 30 minute DVD. I counted 15 minutes of walking 6 days for my warm up cool down and random walking to and from work and 1 hour cleaning 2 days per week. Katch BMR 1913 Mifflin 1945 at goal. Katch 1913 Mifflin 2009 at current.

Did you use the Excel or Google spreadsheet? I sadly haven't kept Excel improvements matching Google. So much easier to do on Google one first.

Well, since the Katch BMR estimate is based on body composition, Lean Body Mass specifically, the guess is at goal weight you may have the same LBM as you do now.
Hence the warning on the personal stat section at top, that may not work out.
So the BMR for that is the same currently as at goal weight, and in the Total's area, 2 goal's are shown, the lower is used though. Because sometimes, very large folks have a decent amount of LBM, and may not be realistic to keep it all or could not, at goal weight.

In your case, the Katch is lower than Mifflin at goal weight with your current LBM being retained, which means you actually would have a higher % of fat to LBM than avg healthy person. So hopefully you can retain the LBM you have as you drop weight, and perhaps put on a tad more since under avg. It's likely you burned some muscle eating so low and exercising so much, it just makes it so much easier to do that.
So good job backing off the workouts if fat loss is your focus, though we can talk about good varied workouts too.

So the daily goal calories would be 1913. Do not eat back exercise calories.

But if you ran the weekly spot check with current weight at start and end of week, ate that much every day, and plugged in your actual exercise calorie burn based on HRM, you'd find, usually, your current BMR, which happens to be used for future too, is NET'd over on weekly avg. Hopefully by about 100-200.

So where does the deficit come from you may ask?
First, when you have less to lose, the deficit should be less, so this is doing that automatically.
Second, the goal weight activity burns less than current weight, no matter what the BMR is. Takes more energy to move more.
Third, the calculator underestimates (usually), the effect of all activity, but more so on exercise.
So, despite what the numbers may appear to be saying, your weight loss potential is basically all your daily non-exercise activity you do not feed, and some of your exercise activity you are not feeding. So hard to nail down, but you are trying to protect your metabolism, and let the loss being whatever it may be.

I could not duplicate the exact figures you reached because Rest was unknown, but I used 9x7, and not sure where you put the DVD's. I'd suggest if mix of cardio/strength, with your lower than expected LBM, focus on the strength part. Have heavier weights, and don't make the cardio so intense on those sections, so you have more energy to lift heavier.
In which case I put it under Moderate level.
You have nice routine, so you can go intense on those DVD's for strength part.
Walking as warmup/cooldown, wasn't sure the speed, so put it under Light level.

I got 1929 current and future of course.
So depending on which spreadsheet, the Google one would use the lower Total figure as daily goal, 1913 in your setup.

And then after several weeks, you see where things sit. Perhaps the BF% estimate was off (unless you did BodPod or something accurate), or your workout routines are not so intense as to deserve the level they are in.

Either way, with metabolism running full steam, you can cut 250 a day for a week and see what you get, then go back to level.
But if already suppressed and tried that, body could just slow down real quick and not get much out of it.

So sounds like you did repair part already, so that's good, you could slip into this level right now, and couple weeks should tell you how accurate it is.

Thanks for the detailed response! I used the Excel spreadsheet and counted my DVDs as heavy. They are Jillian Michaels usually and they kick my butt! As far as body fat I used the Military Calculator on the Fat2Fit website. I am sure it is probably not precise (hopefully it is less!) :0) but I do not have a body fat scale. I know that I am jiggly in the middle so I am sure that it is higher than it should be!! If I am understanding correctly eat at 1913 for a few more weeks and see what the progress is and I may safely cut up to 250 calories. I also do not own a HRM, I am really looking into getting one but they are quite an investement. Could you recommend a good one that won't totally break the bank. I am running my 2nd 5K memorial day weekend and I think that I am going to get one to reward myself for all of my hard work! Thank you again for your assistance. Your advice has really made sense to me and it is much appreciated.

Ok, I don't recall if I enhanced the spreadsheet to select the lower of the 2 goals. In your case, the Katch BMR Total is indeed lower, so that is fine.

If the DVD's are kicking you because of aerobic intensity being high throughout, then indeed Heavy.
If because of use of weights or intervals and anaerobic intensity, like you have to stop to get a breather before continuing on, that should actually go under Medium, less cal's burned during session on anaerobic, but more fat later. We don't need to replace the fat burned.

The BF% measurement is close enough, anything within 5% isn't going to change the calorie values more than 30 cal usually. And scale is great for determining direction, but not an outright accurate figure anyway. Just log those measurements so something to keep progress on. Sadly no ticker on that!

You can actually get great calorie burn estimates based on running and don't need HRM, though it can make for better training if you want to run faster and farther. You can then also apply that level of effort to your DVD's.
So if running flat at say 6 mph feels the same as the DVD workout, same breathing and heart rate pounding, then about same calories. And with this method, you don't need exact anyway. If you use treadmill, even easier, do a little stretch changing the speed until you feel the same way, and then enter that into the calculator here.
For walking/running - http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/WalkRunMETs.html
If done on a treadmill, you'll know the details exactly. Use the gross figure. That is very accurate figure, because vast majority of physical testing takes place on treadmill, the formula's are right on.
So for instance, 6mph at 1% incline for 30 min - 367 cal's.
(And so you know where the deficit is coming from, in the activity calculator, than run would only get credit for 155 cal's, so there is deficit of 212 between real and accounted for that is eaten.)

I'd skip the HRM until you know how you'll use it. The cheapest ones with decent accuracy for calorie burns, have fewer real training features on them, and $60-80 still may be a lot for the cheapest Polar or Suunto or Garmin.
Sadly those brands seem to be excluded from most coupons I've seen, so wait until you can get free shipping from somewhere, or just find great lowest price.
But if you wait, you may discover you really want to do the running more seriously, and would appreciate better training functions, which the cheapest don't have.
Plus, at this point, it doesn't totally matter. You have nice balanced routine that isn't over-stressing you such you need to balance hard days with easy days.
And if you do increase time on anything, you can redo the activity calculator, and get new daily goal, and feed the workout correctly.
That can help immensely. You can of course still overtrain even when eating enough, shoot, pro's do it all the time, and eating at maintenance and feeding workouts correctly. But that shouldn't be a problem yet.

So 30 min runs, you are doing 5K's already 3 days a week, right?

Belay my last...I missed the body fat %...I do NOT have 55% body fat.....that made a big change. (oops) :blushing:

I bet it did.