Eating back exercise calories? Do I need to do this?
Replies
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YES!!!! eat them back! they give them to you for a reason...the more you burn the more fuel your body needs.
I recommend getting New Rules of Lifting for Women to everyone...it's a great read with great facts about what people assume or think they know and what's actually correct.
I'm not saying force yourself to eat back 1000 calories if you've burned them on a great workout...but if you're hungry eat!! listen to your body but eat clean
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So if the deficit is built into your daily goal .... why exercise for say 500 calories only to eat them back? I understand most people here will tell you that you need to eat them but if I'm going to eat them back and net the same as if I hadn't exercised then I see no point in exercising.
Exercise, particularly strength training, helps preserve your muscle mass. If you lose weight by cutting calories alone you will lose muscle in addition to fat, and you will end up with a higher body fat percentage than you probably want.
Ok, I know i'm going to get hammered here and usually stay away from these threads, but what the hell, I can't take it...lol.
Before I start, I want to say that I believe in exercise and do so myself. Now, with that said, PROTEIN preserves muscle mass and with exercise can build it. No, you do not have to eat back exercise calories if you do not want to. Yes, your body will go into starvation mode if the deficit is too great, BUT, that is temporary. You will start losing again if you remain the same, especially if you remain active. To keep energy and remain active, keep the protein up and eat some at every meal and snack throughout the day. I'm not saying everyone should starve themselves, just stating a fact. A deficit will only cause you to stall for a short while, you have to lose weight, intake vs output. I have been in deficit for a while. The last 36 weeks I have averaged 3.5 lbs per week loss and I have tons of energy and have lost no muscle. In fact, according to my Body Composition Analysis, I have added just a bit. It can be done, just sayin... My meals are closelytracked, measured and spread out throughout the day. My protein, fat and carbs monitored closely with my protein at around 95-100g per day. Ok, that should be enough, here comes the bashing... Oh, I forgot to say, my bloodwork is perfect now as well. I take a daily bariatric vitamin as well.
Out of interest - what device was used for your Body Composition Analysis?0 -
Way to much complication on these forums!
Let me make it really easy for you, forget mfp calculator.
Multiply your bodyweight by 15
If your very overweight, multiply your "Goal" Body weight by 15. The resulting figure will be your estimated maintenance
calories. Now subtract 500 calories from this figure, eat this amount everyday for a 2 weeks.
If you don't lose any weight drop 200kcals from that figure and try again. Keep doing this until your losing a pound a week,
Be sensible if your losing too much increase them. its as simple as that.
Forget the eating back of exercise calories you wont need to worry about that.
Still use mfp to log your cals food and "drink"!
By your calculations, I should be eating 2500 cals/day. That's even more than MFP says to eat. If I eat 2500 cals/day for two weeks, I'm going to GAIN weight!!! That's ridiculous!!! Even if I subtracted 700 cals from the number, I'd still be eating 2300 per day!
No no no no nooooo.
Anyone else have advice/suggestion/insight?
Please, no more telling me I need to eat the caloric equivalent for a teenaged football player. It doesn't help.
You should start your own thread.0 -
if ur already eating in a caloric defecit then there is no point to do cardio for weight loss purposes.no it defeats the point of doing cardio if you eat back the calories you burn.
Not if you're already eating at a calorie deficit.
Some people can't lose based on caloric deficit alone. Some people need exercise in order for their bodies to burn fat.
I'm one of them. Before I started here I was eating 400-700 net calories a day for months. (Without realizing how little I was eating.) I didn't lose a single pound for 6 months. I started eating 1500 net calories and went to the gym 5 days a week. I started losing immediately.0 -
YES. Is the best way to lose wheight in a healty way. It's clearly explained in the topics for news members. I'm also new. Read banks topic.
I'm adapting to this concept right now.
If your balance is below the minimun recomended, you are not going to loose weight.0 -
I started following Bob Harper on Twitter and asked him this very question today in a live chat. He replied, "If your goal is weight loss, do not eat the calories you burn. You will need that deficit."
He does not understand that a deficit is already set up in the base number MFP gives you (unless that was made clear to him)
That would explain it.0 -
Some of you are missing the point. You THINK you understand, but you don't. What many of you are saying is true for normal people, but for the really heavy, lifelong weight carriers, it's different. Our bodies change, the same rules don't apply and before some of you skinny minnies who think you know better, save it, you don't. Not everyone is the same and you have to find YOUR way. If this poor woman is staying on track and still struggling (and yes, it can happen) then PLEASE don't jump in and tell her to eat more to lose weight. Unless you've been there, don't assume you know what she needs. It is virtually impossible for some to lose weight without these deficits! There are so many hormonal and metabolic factors that affect us. Our bodies adapt and evolve over time and the rules change. In fact, did you know that even for gastric by-pass patients that after a year or two, the body compensates for the malabsorption of calories by evolving. Tiny hairlike structures called villi intestanes line the small intestine and are responsible for absorption, in order to fight the malabsorption of calories, these grow longer and absorb more. It is interesting to note that while this happens, the body never compensates for the nutrient malabsorption, hence the need for lifetime vitamin and nutrient monitoring. The bodies main focus in this case if gaining weight, because it has been heavy and wants to be again. There's also a hormone called Grehin, which tells your brain you are hungry and need to eat. When we are big the body produces more of this hormone, when we lose, you would think that production would go down, but no. It stays the same, the bodies way to try and gain the weight back. So you see, there's WAY more to it than some of you light weights know. Take it from someone who does know.0
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I like this analogy, great way to put it!Someone asked this awhile back (it baffles all of us) Here's the reply I wrote that seemed to make sense to them.
Nope! Think of it like money. Say you want to save $3,000 this month. You get $1,300 a day, but for some crazy reason you HAVE to spend $1,200 each day (Say for rent and bills) Now, if you only spend that 1200 a day, you will still save your $3000 by the end of the month. But you also can work for extra money. So one day, you work really hard and made an extra $500! Woohoo! But, you spent a lot of gas getting to work that day and need some more. There are a few things you can do. 1.) Ignore that you used gas, and save all $500. This will lead to an empty tank and you'll run out of fuel. 2.) You can get all the gas you want, and hey, why not get premium and spoil yourself. After all, you earned that extra $500. Might as well spend it all! Of course, nothing really happens this way. You will reach your goal in one month still. 3.) You can spend a little bit to make sure you don't run out of fuel and save the rest. This results in you having enough gas to get through the day, and at the end of the month, you'll have extra money saved!!
Hope that makes sense. I was worried to eat the exercise calories back until one day i was STARVING. I remembered to add my exercise for the day and got an extra 900 calories. I ate until I was no longer hungry, and actually ate 900 calories when I totaled it up. I try to save some if I can, but it's ok to eat them back.0 -
I'm a little divided on the whole subject, but this article made me realise that you probably don't need to stress too much about eating the calories. It is an interview with Olympic swimmer Rebecca Adlington, and she only eats 2,500 calories a day, and I am sure she is burning more than us mere mortals!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2147800/Olympic-swimmer-Rebecca-Adlington-Im-afraid-sea-believe-it.html0 -
Someone asked this awhile back (it baffles all of us) Here's the reply I wrote that seemed to make sense to them.
Nope! Think of it like money. Say you want to save $3,000 this month. You get $1,300 a day, but for some crazy reason you HAVE to spend $1,200 each day (Say for rent and bills) Now, if you only spend that 1200 a day, you will still save your $3000 by the end of the month. But you also can work for extra money. So one day, you work really hard and made an extra $500! Woohoo! But, you spent a lot of gas getting to work that day and need some more. There are a few things you can do. 1.) Ignore that you used gas, and save all $500. This will lead to an empty tank and you'll run out of fuel. 2.) You can get all the gas you want, and hey, why not get premium and spoil yourself. After all, you earned that extra $500. Might as well spend it all! Of course, nothing really happens this way. You will reach your goal in one month still. 3.) You can spend a little bit to make sure you don't run out of fuel and save the rest. This results in you having enough gas to get through the day, and at the end of the month, you'll have extra money saved!!
Hope that makes sense. I was worried to eat the exercise calories back until one day i was STARVING. I remembered to add my exercise for the day and got an extra 900 calories. I ate until I was no longer hungry, and actually ate 900 calories when I totaled it up. I try to save some if I can, but it's ok to eat them back.
^THIS is brilliant^
I am slowly getting my head around EM2LW in addition to increasing my exercise... and this is really clear as to how and why it works.0 -
To be honest, I don't really pay much attention to everything that's written on the site, I just stick to what works for me. I exercise pretty much every day and aim for my 1200 calories. If I'm hungry, I'll eat more than that and know that I "earned" them. But some days I'm just not hungry so I'm not going to struggle to eat more, to the point of feeling nauseous, just because someone else who doesn't know my body told me to.0
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Interested.. Trying to understand the concept.0
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Ill finish this ... not eating your exercise calories will GENERALLY cause you to lose weight faster. It has for ME it may not for YOU as I am an individual snowflake.0
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if ur already eating in a caloric defecit then there is no point to do cardio for weight loss purposes.no it defeats the point of doing cardio if you eat back the calories you burn.
Not if you're already eating at a calorie deficit.
Some people can't lose based on caloric deficit alone. Some people need exercise in order for their bodies to burn fat.
I'm one of them. Before I started here I was eating 400-700 net calories a day for months. (Without realizing how little I was eating.) I didn't lose a single pound for 6 months. I started eating 1500 net calories and went to the gym 5 days a week. I started losing immediately.
thats because you werent in a caloric defecit, and when you started exercising you werent eating back all of the calories you burned.. there are also other factors of hormones that contribute which is probably the case for you.. but since you were not eating sensibly before with a 500 calorie diet the body will refuse to lose weight under lots of stress.0 -
Well technically you should be eating your exercise calories back, and a lot of people on here have told you why, and it is definitely the truth. The only thing though, is that it works differently depending on how overweight you actually are. If you have a very high fat % then not eating back your calories is going to make you lose weight a lot quicker, but eventually that is going to catcj up with you, and once you are getting closer to your goal weight you are going to notice that the weight loss is going to slow down a lot, and might even stop, until you up your calorie amount. You will notice that the people on here who are saying that it has worked fine for them either have a lot of weight to lose, or have lost a lot of weight, and the people that it doesn't work for are the people that only have to lose a small amount, and are already in good shape for the most part.0
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I've read every single entry in this thread, and my brain is about to explode. =/ I am so confused. I adjusted my settings to be "lose 1 lb/week" with "semi-active lifestyle" working out 7 days/week, 30 min/day - and now it says I'm supposed to eat 2050 calories per day?! I'm so so SO confused. This is up from before I adjusted it, when I was supposed to eat 1760 cals/day.
I understand the concept of MFP having the deficit built-in, the concepts of eating or not eating your exercise calories, but what I cannot understand is why I'm NOT losing weight! I've been at this %&*# for 42 days and I've only lost 6 lbs! I did lose 9, but I gained three back. WTF?!
I just saw that 42 days = 6 weeks = 6lbs. Nice, self, nice.
That being said, 2050 seems like an awful lot of calories to me. It's hard for me to hit 15-1700 GROSS unless I hit up the taco bell or eat a few grilled cheeses. Sure there are some days when I can put down 2000+, but it's only maybe 2-3 times per month.
The exercise is also realistic - if anything I undercut myself - I ride my bike every day, also go to the COSI at least once per week and walk around for 3-5 hours, and do 90% of the house/yard work. Sometimes I just feel really fat and I get on the Wii Fit Plus for 30-45 minutes.
Anyway, I'm starting to feel very very discouraged, as I think I am working very hard and yet I have nothing to show for it. I've seen some people say that they see a difference in their clothing but I, on the other hand, feel that my pants are tighter than ever. I am eating my recommended calories, drinking a gallon of water every day, exercising every day, and... nothin'.
Advice? What to do?!
Everybody has a different metabolism (if thyroid issues run in your family, I would suggest going to your doctor) You should not HAVE to eat junk food to make your calories for the day. I would suggest putting it back down to sedimentary life style. That's what mine is set at. I find that 1200 is a pretty fair amount. Some days I eat pretty close to that, some days I eat more. I add in my exercise seperately. My husband is at semi-active. He also just about hits his suggested calories every day just by eating when he's hungry. He's in the Army and has A LOT of muscle and is active most of the day, every day. I work out a couple of hours a day, but I don't have the muscle mass to burn extra calories, and I'm not super active in between work-outs to keep my heart rate up.
No automated computer program is going to know your body better than yourself. Don't be discouraged if the pounds don't come off all the time. You could be adding muscle, but if after a month, your clothes feel tighter, I think it's time to re-evaluate what you're doing. (Or if you're not happy with 1 pound a week, change it to 2)0 -
THISif you are following MFP's guidelines you should be eating your exercise calories... Otherwise you are undereating! MFP does not take in to account your exercise goals when calculating your daily calorie goals, I've been adjusting my exercise goals and it has no impact because of your calorie goal being NET calorie goal NOT gross calorie goal! Therefore anyone that is at a plateau should consider trying to eat their exercise calories and see if you aren't plateauing just because your body is in starvation mode and has cut back on burning fat to make up for it. I'm switching modes and see what happens because currently MFP is showing me at a 990 calorie per day defecit to lose 2 lbs a week, when really I've been trying to eat under 1600 calories which means on the days I'm exercising I'm really at about a 1200-1300 calorie defecit, that means I'm only eating about 50% of my calories needed on my exercise days... your body will adjust to the lack of calories and will STOP burning fat and go in to preservation mode because you are starving yourself (EVEN IF YOU DON'T FEEL HUNGRY, YOU STILL AREN'T GIVING YOUR BODY WHAT IT NEEDS!). There are a lot of people who will disagree with me and that's fine, I'm just telling you what I was told a couple years back when I was working with a physical trainer and a dietician... and through following what they said I was able to lose 30lbs over a 3 month period... then I quit keeping track of my food and quit working out and put it all back on. So you can do what you want, just keep in mind that MFP is setting your NET calorie goal, so if you are plateauing or hungry know that you can, and should be eating your exercise calories (look at professional athletes, Michael Phelps when training for the olympics had to eat 8,000+ calories a day because of how many calories he would burn working out... you should be eating whatever you burn to stay healthy as MFP already set your defecit with the goal of 2lbs per week... you can try to lose more than that, but anyone in the health industry will caution you that 2lbs a week is the max recommended for healthy weight loss, and if you're eating too few it will actually cause you not to lose anything....)0
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Ok, someone help me understand this...
I exercise at least 5-6x/wk...
MFP says my calorie intake should be 1200/day
I burn about 600-800 calorie/ night.... my calorie intake is about 900-1000/day
but if i factor in what i burned my intake is only 300-500 calorie/day
so my body is going in starvation mode correct?
I can't seem to eat enough it feels like, I'm not hungry and a little bit of food makes me stuff already
So I am confused on whether I need to eat more or eat less...0
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