Do you let exercise affect your calorie allowance?
 

I'm never sure how to go about this. My calorie allowance for each day is 1200, but I am wondering if I should put in whatever calories I am expected to burn in each exercise and then that would allow me to eat more (in place of the burned calories)? Or should I just eat 1200 calories and not look at how many calories I burn? I want to lose weight but don't want to mess this up with the calorie counting and don't want it to be counter productive. Any advice?

What I do is I eat a little more on days I exercise, but I don't eat back ALL of the calories. Like, say I run 5 miles. I've probably burned around 500 calories. On normal days my calorie limit is 1500, so on a day I run 5 miles, I might eat 1600-1700 if I'm hungrier than normal. If I'm fine with 1500, I just stick to that.

Personally I don't change my caloric intake no matter how much exercise I do. I would be curious to see what others do.

It depends. I use livestrong and when you record exercise they do add the burned calories to what you can eat that day. That is if your daily calories were 1200 and you had eaten 1000 it would show 200 available. But if you did 200 calories of exercise and recorded it then it would show 400 available.

Personally I try to not eat most of the calories I earn from exercise. On the other hand if I exercise hard and I am hungrier as a result -- which is common -- then I will feel OK if I eat a little more as a result (but not more than what I earned from the exercise). So -- most of the time -- I don't eat the exercise calories but if exercise makes me really hungry then I would feel free to eat some of them.

I'm kinda with the other posters, if I'm a little hungrier than normal than I eat a bit more, but I don't automatically eat extra calories.
Everyone is different though, so try a few different things and see what works for you!

I don't eat back most of my exercise calories. I try to keep my calories consumed between 1200 and 1300 and my net (after exercise) between 800 and 900. I've read that strength training and vigorous cardio burn food (whereas lighter cardio burns fat) so I eat a little more on weight lifting days.

My calorie counting app does the same thing when I add in my exercise.

I try to stick to my 1400-1600 limit regardless of how much I exercise, but if I'm really hungry and I go a little over 1600 on a heavy exercise day, I don't get too worried about it.

Well, for most of the calories counters I've seen & used, they ask what your activity level is. I put in "lightly active," and the recommended calorie count includes that level of activity. So, I eat that level. However, I do not add in any extra calories beyond that. So, even if I do two hours of exercise in a day (which is certainly beyond "lightly active") I do not increase my calorie intake for that day.

My calories are set higher - 1700, so, even though I jog approx. 20 miles a week, and have a relatively active walking lifestyle (I walk everywhere, no car), I don't up my calories.

The few exceptions where I have up'd my calories have been after jogging 8 miles in one day - I felt okay then about eating an extra 100 cal. of protein!

In general, I have the feeling from reading many posts on here that the online exercise calculators are pretty far off! Some people will say they burned 1200 calories exercising that day - and that sounds pretty extravagant to me!

If you are starting to do hardcore cardio or strength training, the only thing I'd really focus on is how you eat preceding and following the workout. I have something carb-ish before and protein after. The protein after is important because it will halt the hunger later in the day.

I eat some of them. My calorie range, from sparkpeople is 1300-1700 calories a day. Most days I'm around 1500-1600, and I bike about 10-12 miles a day (fitness not commuting) which according to sparkpeople burns about 600 calories. I don't eat these back.

On Saturday I rode 27 miles, almost 2 hours with an average speed of 14 mph. This burned about 1200 calories. I didn't eat 1200 extra calories, I ended up having about 2000 total that day. My body had worked hard and needed fuel.

Likewise, on days when I hike for 7 or 8 hours it's possible to burn 3500-4000 calories. I can't eat that much in one day, but I will eat a few hundred calories extra over the next few days (and notice that I'm extra hungry about 2-3 days after the hike.)

There are a lot of good reasons NOT to eat back your calories. Many people who exercise inadvertently move less throughout the day without even thinking about it, thus negating a bit of the calories burned through exercise. The body also adapts to exercise done frequently. A beginner may burn 300 calories running for 30 minutes, and only 270 calories running that same 30 minutes a few months later.

I don't eat back calories I burn unless it's a very hard workout- a long (1 hour+) run or lifting session, for example. Even then I only eat back 100-200 calories, nowhere close to what I burned... whatever number that may be :)

I try to listen to my body when I exercise. If I need to, I'll eat a little more calories on those days, however I generally find that I don't need more calories on exercise days.

On my two rest days I find that I'm hungrier for some reason! Usually I stick with my same calories, I just choose more filling foods and I'm fine.

Above my minimum routine, I allow myself a small healthy treat equal to about half the estimated calories of the exercise. So an extra hour of walking means that I can "earn" a tablespoon of PB (= 90 cals). I would consider other choices, but so far it's always been PB. If I go *another* hour beyond that, I can earn 2 square dark choc (= 90 cals, but I've only done that a couple times; 2 square dark choc is my usual daily treat at the end of the day, but these would be extra after lunch).

This approach gives me motivation to go the extra mile (literally) when I have time and I get a little kick out of truly having earned it.

When I was losing and sticking to 1200 cals/day, I would up them to 1400 on workout days. I was feeling faint when I didn't do that for the 1st month. So since then, that has been my trend. Add approx. 200 on workout days, and really bust it out when I do workout.

For months, that extra 200 ALWAYS came from a protein shake after the workout. That way I was replenishing my muscles and not eating junk. I ate what I did every other day, just adding in that shake right after working out. It avoided the temptation to see working out as a way to "eat more".

Now that I'm not really losing any more, I am eating 1600-1900 daily, and if I don't keep my calories up, I feel ill and can't make it through my workouts. In my opinion, it is best to feed your muscle and take care of your body after exercising, so that you build muscle and focus on a healthy body, not just a skinny one.

For me it varies. I try to eat 1500 calories or under a day. usually it ranges from 1200-1500 depending on how hungry i am. some days 1200 calories fills me up and i cant stomach anything else, other dares 1500 barely does it. Yesterday I ate 1577 so today I will aim to eat 1400 or less to counteract that. Now if I exercise and say burn off 200 calories extra I will eat at most half of those calories but only if I'm hungry. After cutting out junk and fastfood I really don't eat a lot. So I could eat only 1200 calories and burn 200 extra on some days and not be able to force any more food down, while other days im a laze arse (can i say arse?) and eat 1577. I guess it depends on what your body needs, somedays you may find you need to eat some of the exercise calories and other days you may find you can't imagine eating more than 1200.

No, but for several different reasons.

1, I'm new to calorie counting (not new to dieting). I'm still getting my cc feet wet and figuring this out. The most mind-bending notion for me is that a calorie is a calorie, no matter what it is comprised of.

I've read theories and "proof in the pudding" on it not mattering what you eat so long as you create the deficit, as well as the opposite that the macronutrients do matter.

While I've always "known" about calorie counting, I've never done it. Every diet in my past shrouded that detail in the program/plan itself. It is refreshing to get down to the basics, and I feel sometimes a little bit even like a novice dieter since this approach is, indeed, new for me.

Whew...that was a rant. Sorry.

2, since I am getting my cc feet wet, I'm still learning what my body can do and how it responds to what I feed it/don't feed it.

3, I was thrilled to discover that this old body, with metabolic issues, COULD lose weight when pushed. I feel like a walking science experiment sometimes.

4, my exercise is walking, and I don't do it all the time. I know I should do more, but am not a gym/sport type gal. I had 2 gym memberships over the years and literally wasted my money by never going. Once, I joined a volley ball team. That was ridiculous for me. I joined a dance troupe. Ridiculous for me. Walking is free...but I have to make myself do it and while I know it is possible in the winter (go to the mall/grocery store and walk the outer aisles, walk at lunch) it is a matter of doing it. So, for the bit that I exercise, I would not adjust my calories upwards to compensate.

Lastly, I don't eat exactly the same daily. Some days less, some right on, some more. Basically tho, I'm sustaining a deficit, and I'm still seeing results.

So in a nutshell, no.

Same as steph7409.. I have 1200 a day and with around 300-400 calories burned while exercising my net is 800-900. It seems very low but its worked well for me so far.

I go strictly by counting calories, I don't concern myself by how much I burn in a specific activity, I just know I do.

No, I don't. I eat what is allowed on my plan and when I am done for the day, I am done. :)

Nope, I don't either. I just stick to eating 1300-1600 calories a day, and that's it :)

Yes, I do adapt my caloric intake to accommodate exercise, but not for the reasons most people do.

Rather than adding calories to compensate for the number on the elliptical trainer, I work out with weights and add a low-carb protein shake to my diet on workout days. That way, I am building muscles and the additional calories are benefitting me in a way that just adding a bagel, or even extra fruit and veggies, do not.

i played with a lot of methods.

i started out eating back no exercise calories and only eating 1340 a day. However, i am training for various races and was feeling faint and easily fatigued.

I then decided to drop my calories down to 1300 and eat back 60% of what was burned-- it helped after the exercise but i still felt listless during runs since i was eating after the fact.

I settled on a happy medium-- i eat 1428 a day (which will also be the maintenance calories for my goal weight) and i do not eat back my exercise calories. That way, i upped my daily fuel giving me more energy during exercise, but i am still losing.

its worked so far. :)

Well it's good that you're still losing. I haven't logged exercises yet, I don't want it to affect my calorie allowance. It's good to know that I am able to eat a little more than the allowance aimed for weight loss and hopefully still lose. We'll see how it works out. I'm trying to stay away frm the scale, last time I stepped on it, I got really scared. I'm going to step on it after Finals (a week before Christmas)

It's fun reading other dieters' suggestions here.
I've played around a bit with my eating back the exercise calories.
I walk my dogs 90+ minutes a day. I am also walking up to an hour three times a week with a friend's dog. I eat back my walking calories but I do not eat back the 60-75 minute workout that I do for me everyday.

For example: today I've walked 101 minutes with dogs so far, and did a 70 minute workout for me. This evening I will walk 30 minutes with one dog, and 45 minutes or so with the other dog. I've eaten back 420 calories from this morning, will eat back 250 calories from this evening's walks, and I've banked 460 calories. These calories do not include the cleaning I did today or my very active lifestyle.
I'm losing at least one pound a week. I'm satisfied. This works for me.