In total I want to lose about 100lbs. I use mydailyplate.com for calorie tracking and I see that when you exercise it deducts the calories lost from the net calories eaten to give you more calories to eat within your limit. Something like, I want to eat 1700 cal a day. If I eat something that costs me 500 calories, and walk and burn off 400 calories, then I can still eat 1600 calories and lose weight. Is this correct, can you still lose weight when you count calories and give yourself back the calories you burned off to eat as long as you stay within the "limit"? 8.8
Yes, it's possible. It's not always the best solution for everyone, but it can & does work for a lot of people.
It's a fact that as we exercise & build muscle that we use up energy. I'm not sure exactly how each site works but usually the calorie totals given are for a regular day without exercise. Therefore, we can use a few more calories when we add in extra work.
It really depends on WHAT you're feeding yourself after you exercise. Protein/Veggies/Fruits? All good. A bag of chips/cookies? Not so much.
Your best bet is try it both ways for a couple weeks to see which helps you more. Or speak with your doctor and he/she will be able to guide you in the right direction.
Um... I guess... Sorta... It might wok on a slow loss method?... It really depends on how fast you want to lose, what your body really burns in a day, etc.
Ok... So here is what I know about the number of calories we burn in a day:
The average adult burns 1800 calories a day. Average being someone who is relatively active but not excessively... But typically men burn more than women so take this into account when you read an "average".
I've actually tried to look this type of thing up and found most pertained to weight training vs weight loss but here goes:
Quote:
DETERMINING BMR
An average 20-year-old, adult male who weighs 150 pounds, burns 1,800 calories a day to sustain BMR, and the average 20- year-old female who weighs 120 pounds, burns 1,320 calories a day to sustain BMR. Here is a simple formula for calculating BMR:
Adult Males: Multiply individual's weight by 10, add double the client's weight to this value. For example, for a 150-lb male:
1,500 + (2 x 150) = 1,800 cal/day BMR
Adult Females. Multiply individual's weight by 10, add the client's weight to this value. For example, for a 120-LB female:
1,200 + 120 = 1,320 cal/day BMR
AGING AND ENERGY
After age 20, BMR should be lowered by 2 percent per decade. That is, estimated BMR should be lowered by 2 percent for people in their 30s, 4 percent for those in their 40s, 6 percent for those in their 50s, and so on, because mitochondria increase without end. The energy combustion engines of our cells convert sugar to energy and heat inside our bodies.The ability to increase one's endurance in muscular activity year after year after year is a well documented fact. As you age you should ibe able to train more. Your strength may wane but your endurance should increase.
Quote:
How many calories does a person need daily?
The number of calories the body consumes in a day is different for every person. You may notice on the nutritional labels of the foods you buy that the "percent daily values" are based on a 2,000 calorie diet -- 2,000 calories is a rough average of what people eat in a day. But your body might need more or less than 2,000. Height, weight, gender, age and activity level all affect your caloric needs. There are three main factors involved in calculating how many calories your body needs per day:
Your basal metabolic rate (BMR) is the amount of energy your body needs to function at rest. This accounts for about 60 to 70 percent of calories burned in a day and includes the energy required to keep the heart beating, the lungs breathing, the eyelids blinking and the body temperature stabilized. In general, men have a higher BMR than women. One of the most accurate methods of estimating your basal metabolic rate is the Harris-Benedict formula:
Adult male: 66 + (6.3 x body weight in lbs.) + (12.9 x height in inches) - (6.8 x age in years)
Adult female: 655 + (4.3 x weight in lbs.) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x age in years)
The second factor in the equation, physical activity, consumes the next highest number of calories. Physical activity includes everything from making your bed in the morning to jogging. Walking, lifting, bending and just generally moving around burns calories, but the number of calories you burn in any given activity depends on your body weight. Click here for a great table listing the calories expended in various physical activities and for various weights.
The thermic effect of food is the final addition to the number of calories your body burns. This is the amount of energy your body uses to digest the food you eat -- it takes energy to break food down to its basic elements in order to be used by the body. To calculate the number of calories you expend in this process, multiply the total number of calories you eat in a day by 0.10, or 10 percent.
The total number of calories a body needs in a day is the sum of these three calculations.
Hope these help.
Oh and for weight loss I would go with the second calculation if I was going based on these:
2805 (top for a body building site) vs. 2202.7 (from Harris-Benedict formula)
And the reason I say that I would count that as the more accurate is this:
I was hooked to a machine by a nutritionist that measured my actual metabolic rate. *Yes they are out there... Mostly used on cancer patients but I have a friend who wanted to hook me up to find out what was going on... and she was stunned as mine was so high.*
My actual metabolic rate came back at 2346... Which is higher than average *probably why I am kicking 3.5 lbs a week now that I am back on track and not just working on maintaining*.
Last edited by Cuter w Curves; 10-26-2007 at 10:00 AM.
Reason: Wanted to add calculations and own info.
This is exactly why I use FitDay. I can't work through those calculations.
FitDay gives me a reasonable estimate of calories I burn, based on resting metabolic rate plus any exercise I add. It also totals the calories I eat. When I set up my Weight Goal, I indicated my target date, and FitDay tells me what I can eat each day (calorie-wise) based on my metabolism.
The idea for a 1 pound a week loss is that you eat 500 calories less than you burn. So if I burn 1700 calories in a day, I can eat 1200 and lose a pound a week. These are AVERAGE numbers. If I burn 1800, I can eat 1300 and still have my 500 cal deficit.
Just one quick thing to add. It's important to remember that almost all of the numbers are just estimations. It's possible to check your basal metabolic rate like Cuter w Curves, but few people do it. So, we're estimating that, estimating how many calories burned when we exercise, etc. Intake is easier to measure, but we almost all end up estimating and guessing here and there with that as well. So, if you start trying to be 100% precise about only having a 500-calorie per day deficit so you can lose exactly 1 pound a week, for example, you become vulnerable to small inaccuracies in those numbers. I personally would recommend sticking with a specific calorie goal as closely as possible, regardless of whether or not or how intensely you exercise. Of course, if you are exercising pretty intensely and becoming ravenous, you might want to adjust it up somewhat to accommodate for that. Trial and error is pretty key to figuring out what works for you. Just don't believe the numbers they give you on thedailyplate or on the exercise machines are going to be 100% accurate for your body.
Also keep in mind that it takes more energy to move a bigger body. And that the BMR calculations work just fine for normal and above-average weights, but once you get into obese territory all bets are off.
According to some of those calculations, I should be able to eat 2300 calories a day and still lose weight. It just doesn't happen.
What has worked for me is to aim for a "normal" intake of calories, since it took an "above-average" intake to make me gain weight. Most places say that for women my age, anything from 1600-2000 calories a day is enough. So I aim for the middle of that range: 1800.
With that, I sometimes exercise and sometimes don't (depending on mood, time, and pain). So far, I'm pretty consistently losing each week, so I'll stick with the 1800 goal for a while. I figure it will slow down, or even stall, at some point. And then I'll either get more active, or lower the calories, or best of all, do both. I know myself enough to know that the 1200-1500 calories some people go for just won't work for me. I've got PCOS, and I HAVE to eat regularly. But with planning, 1600 is do-able, and 1800 is fairly easy. So I'm starting with 1800 and going from there.
Here is what I do.. There is a thing at the bottom that has the days of the week. Go by total cals and dont eat over your limit. No matter what it says at the top... I make sure not to go over my limit. Even though once u put in your exercise it says you can have more calories that day.. I dont.
I don't "eat back" my exercise calories, either. I use daily plate but go by the "total" cals number rather than "net" cals. It's worked for the past 83 pounds!
I don't either. I eat the calories I am allotted and the exercise is just bonus calories burned. I don't even bother to figure out how many calories I burn.
Plus, what would scare me is the accuracy of the exercise calories. It's all just estimates and sometimes it's way off.
I think it really depends on what kind of exercise you're doing. If you're walking or doing something else fairly low-impact, you may not feel a need for extra fuel. If you're a runner, however, you probably will. When I run just a few miles, I don't necessarily add more calories, but if I'm doing a long run or a speed workout, I may simply HAVE to add more calories. If you need them, though, your body will certainly tell you that you do. There's a big difference between fueling your body for a 30-minute walk and fueling your body for a 10-mile run, which generally takes 2 hours or more and is more intense.
You do have to be careful about accuracy of course, and you have to remember the concept of "net calorie burn." If you're doing some form of exercise for 30 minutes and you burn 100 calories, for example, you have to remember that your body would have been burning SOME calories for that 30 minutes anyway, just to keep you alive. So you're not actually burning an EXTRA 100 -- the extra is whatever the net amount is. I hope that makes sense! I don't use Fitday or anything because I simply estimate everything and listen to my body as much as possible. It seems to be working!
Calorie Alotment - Whats eaten + Cals burned? = O.0
