In place of a road map!

Thank you so much heybales:flowerforyou: . What about if I decide to switch to lifting heavy? I am debating on doing ChaLean Extreme which is a 90 day program. It is done 5 days a week and the workouts are about 35-40 minutes. I want to lose some more body fat and tone up. Would you still consider that moderately active for 1900 calories or do I need to eat more when I lift heavy?

If the amount of time is the same as the other DVD programs, then that would still apply (the activity levels are based on 1hr workouts on the days). If it's a tad more, then add a tad more, if this is the only thing done.
So 40 min * 5 = 3.3 hrs weekly, or still at bottom of Mod Active - so 1900 sounds good.

If that is truly a weight lifting type program, you should appear to burn less during the program, but you'll burn more fat for the next 4-20 hrs as body repairs. So that takes care of the needing more nutrition for lifting heavy, but you don't need to refeed the fat burn-off of course.

Just suggest getting a higher protein snack in right after the workout.

I started chalean extreme just over a week ago. I also go to the gym 3 times a week for an hour a time burning between 400 and 500 cals per gym session. I have my activity set at moderate. I estimate i burn between 2350 and 2650 cals per week just on exercise Should I go higher?

If you are doing that as a 5 day routine, and adding in 3 other good strong days at gym, that sounds like good 6 hrs a week, which would put you in the Very Active level, perhaps rounding down to nearest 100, since just barely in that level.

Make sure with that intense routine you are eating enough carbs, which should be handled by just your good realistic eating level.

More important probably, if you are intending to get the most from the lifting workout, don't make cardio kill the same muscle, especially the next day.

You are overloading the muscle with the intent of it healing and repairing stronger. If you don't allow that, you aren't getting the most from either workout.

I just came across this, and at least to me, this makes a lot more sense, and is more in line with the number of calories that MFP tells me to eat, and how much I've been eating, and consistently losing weight. (and also in line with the calculates that Weight Watchers provides witht heir points system)

...

So if I need 2019 calories/day to maintain - MINUS- 500 cal/day (1 pd per week) = 1519 cal/day to lose weight.
MFP allows me 1500 cals per day, so this is right in line with that. - I've been following this guideline and consistenly losing an average of 1 to 2 pounds per week.

And yes, this number is below my BMR, but seems to be the only number I can use to lose weight at a sedentary level.
Not only that, but the Weight Watchers system is based off of calories and other factors, which determines this is how many calories I should be eating as well. So are you then suggesting that Weight Watchers is incorrectly telling all of their members to eat below their BMR??

Last week I upped my calories to 2000/day, a little more if I needed to get up to my BMR due to a workout (a couple days I did struggle to eat that much, though previously I had only been eating 1400-1700 gross most days). On Fat 2 Fit, my numbers are as follows:

BMR - 1530 (I am 5'6", 26yrs old, and currently 158lbs)

Calories to maintain: 2372 (moderately active), 2639 (hard exercise)

Calories for goal weight of 140: 2251, 2505

That doesn't seem like much of a deficit?

My workout schedule has been 3 days heavy lifting, 4 days running (5 days/week) so I have been using the moderately active, however this week I am also adding 2 Insanity workouts in (Plyometric Cardio Circuit and Cardio Power/Resistance) for 6 days/week - would this warrant moving up to hard exercise? I have a desk job, so aside from walking the dogs I am not extremely active outside of my workouts. Do the numbers above make sense?

Thanks so much!

(edited to add: I currently burn 3000-3500 calories a week (polar hrm), but now it will be about 3500-4000)

The activity levels is based on 1 hr for those days of workouts. So add up what that total time is to see what level.
It's also based on midlevel type exercise, not as intense as you are getting.

So that's where the extra deficit comes into play the numbers don't look so good showing as weight loss.

That's why the bodyfat % is much better, your base BMR may be lower right now, could be higher for that matter. For you, probably not far off, but still...

I might also suggest another way that will be easier if you love and keep to these workouts. Look how much deficit your workouts are causing. 3500 look like familiar figure?

Suggest you set MFP to the true non-exercise activity level that applies, usually lightly active seems to apply for many, unless truly a desk job without much of anything besides exercise, then sedentary. Don't hurt your metabolism by thinking going lower helps.
Set weight loss goal to Maintain.

Now exercise, log it with HRM calories, and do NOT eat them back. And at the end of each day, MFP will inform you the deficit you just created will mean "in 5 weeks you'll weigh..."

My estimated body fat is 22-25% (calipers and online calculators), hourwise I workout about 7.5-8hrs/week. If I set MFP as you suggest, it has me eating 1990, but if I don't ever eat exercise calories I would be below my BMR most days, which is not a good idea, correct?...I guess that is where I get confused.

Does the amount below BMR on workout days get made up on the 2 rest days being 400 above BMR? Since you would eat same amount every day. So 800 extra between 5 other days is 160 deficit you could have and still be even. But you really want to be better than even to get max fat loss.

But if working out that much, the TDEE method may workout better then. Back to original plan.

Thanks for taking the time to reply
This gives me 2000 calories a day!

Well, now that is a much nicer round number than 1200, and probably better long term success too.

Though, you are hoping your lean body mass improves with exercise, so every 5 lbs lost, go revisit the site and re-measure for bodyfat %. Probably will have lost a lot, and hopefully will have more lean mass.

Which, surprise, means you get to eat even more!

Help!!

Age- 23
Height- 64 inches
Weight- 269
Goal- 175 (will change it when I get there)
BF- 60% (holy cow)

Katch-McArdle- 1430

Activity- Moderately Active (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/wk)- 2494 (i zumba 5x a week with 2 rest days)

So I should be eating 2494 when I exercise and 1430 when I don't?
Say I burn 1000 cals doing zumba, I do not eat those back because they are already in the 2494?
Say I burn 200-300 cals, do I still eat 2494 or do I just add it to the 1430?

I am so confused.

if you got the 2494 from Fat2fit, you eat the same calories every single day.