How Many Calories Do You Eat? (Weight Loss)

[espirit]

Hi Everyone

I am a personal trainer and this is the formula I use to work out BMR and then the total amount of calories a person should consume. I find it works really well.

To work out BMR
-Men: BMR= 66 + (13.7 x weight in kg) + (5 x height in cm) – (6.8 x age in years)
-Women: BMR= 655 + (9.6 x weight in kg) + (1.8 x height in cm) – (4.7 x age in years)


Eg. Kelli is 36 years old, is 171.5cm tall and weighs 70kg
BMR = 655 + (9.6 x 70) + (1.8 x 171.5) – (4.7 x 36)
= 655 + 672 + 308.7 - 169.2 = 1805 calories per day

Then to work out how many calories to add to that number based on your activity you multiply your BMR by;
1.2 if you are sedentary (little or no exercise, desk job) or
1.375 if you are lightly active (light exercise or sports 1-3 times per week) or
1.55 if you are moderately active (moderate exercise or sports 3-5 days per week) or
1.725 if you are very active (hard exercise or sports 6-7 days per week) or
1.9 if you are extremely active (hard daily exercise, sports & physical job or marathon/ultraendurance events)

So if Kelli in the above example was moderately active we would multiply her BMR of 1805 by 1.55 to get 2798 calories per day. That’s what she needs to consume to maintain her current weight… if she wants to lose weight we would reduce that by a maximum of 20% which equates to 80% of 2798 = 0.8 x 2798 = 2238.

[PinkBike]

darcy et al,

i just found this thread accidentally looking for something else.
i'm glad i did, because i have concerns that i dont know where to turn to for answers. i've gained over 20 pounds in the last couple years. i was 127 pounds, then i quit smoking, then i quit chewing nicorette a year ago, then i went thru menopause, then i was hypothyroid so now i'm on levoxyl, and voila! now i'm 150 (pounds not years!). it just feels like overnight i got love handles from nowhere.

i've been riding for 10 years. i've been eating lo-fat for about a hundred years now but it suddenly stopped working. i looked into south beach but the first two weeks would have been impossible with the riding i'm doing. so i tried a "modified" south beach based on the glycemioc index, and FIVE WEEKS LATER i had lost nothing. zero. what a letdown! so i joined weight watchers 2 weeks ago.

my concerns are this: our riding season has started, the first major race is the tour de scottsdale oct.14, i've upped my mileage to like 150-220 miles a week. so when we do our 70+ mile rides i need to increase my calorie intake to sustain me, but to what? can i carb load? on WW there's "activity points" that are swapped for "food points" but the numbers are really high, like i am allowed way more food than i think i should to still lose weight. i know from recent experience that i just cant lose the weight. also, all my weight gain seems to be in my waist.

so i'm frustrated that i cant lose the weight and waaaaaaay upset about the way i look now. i had to find a new doctor and i've brought it up to her every time i've seen her and she either doesn't understand or doesn't care. i would love to find a nutritionist or personal trainer but that is so not financially possible.

so has anyone had any successes at all? at my 1 week weigh-in at WW wednesday i had lost 2.2 pounds. i'll give this WW a try. thanks for letting me vent! i'll be back!

[Zen]

You can either eat as you should to fuel long rides or you can do WW and ride shorter and with more intensity.Pick one.

Weight loss takes time and it's not easy You might be able to eat for fuel but you'd have to do it to the decimal. Weigh and measure everything.
WW probably would be good since the points system has you do this anyway. but your activity level is off their charts. You may have to give yourself a couple of extra points.

Also keep track of how you feel and how your performance is.
How's your thyroid?

[VeloVT]

This is a timely topic for me too. Last year from Thanksgiving to New Years I gained 5 or 6 pounds which I vowed to lose over the summer. Although I rode a decent amount (less than I wanted due to schedule and life events), I didn't lose a bit this summer. (Last summer I got my bike and the pounds just melted off, I expected a repeat...). Then school started, and suddenly I found myself having a really hard time fitting in exercise (this won't be a lasting phenomenon, it's just because the first few weeks can be like that) -- and looking another Thanksgiving in the face, I don't want to add another five pounds this winter and wake up in 2008 ten pounds heavier. I've realized that, in addition to starting to train regularly again, I need to diet if I'm going to take the weight off (I'd like to lose about 10lbs, then I'd really feel like I was down to fighting weight).

Here's a website I found that has a pretty good piece of software for tracking diet and exercise. I'm doing the free trial right now but I'm seriously considering buying it, it makes calculating net calories very easy & much less tedious than the old-fashioned way:

http://www.calorieking.com/software/ckdietdiarymac.php

Of course, it still doesn't answer the math question in any kind of definitive way...

[kelownagirl]

Liza - some people love it and some people hate but here's the link to http://www.sparkpeople.com. You can track your calories and much much more. And it's free...

Pinkbike - I've tried everything but the only thing that has consistently worked for me was exercise AND cutting back or getting rid of white starches. If I eat mainly veggies, fruit, a little fat, and lean protein, I feel great and I lose weight. Of course I adore bread and could live on bread and butter, or rice and butter, or potatoes and butter...

I went from 141 to 120 in about a year. I eventually was content to lose 2-3 lbs a month and I didn't "diet" consistently because I didn't think it was realistic to deny myself all the time. I would eat out at least once a week and didn't even try to diet at Christmas break or during the summer.

However, everyone is different and YMMV....

Good luck!

[Tuckervill]

The weight around the middle is because of menopause. It REALLY sucks!

Karen

[mcoleman]

Has anyone tried the Chris Carmichael eating plans? I read his Food for Fitness book a few years ago, but I had a hard time applying it (it's my non-mathematical, lazy brain). I went on his website, trainright.com, and bought a meal plan a few weeks ago. It is a 9 week plan for $20, which seemed like an inexpensive way to start eating better. Although I do need to loose 5-7 lbs, eating healthy is more of a priority for me. I have lost 2-3 lbs and I am on week 4. I also was so tired of eating the same things every week, so this has been a nice change.
I would love to hear if anyone else has tried this.

[glamgurl36]

i have been keeping my calories at 1500..but i think sometimes that its too little...you have to look up your weight/height...so you can figure out your personal intake

[PinkBike]

five weeks on a modified south beach diet and i lost nothing. then my first week on WW (flex) i lost 2.2 pounds, since then i've gained .4 the third week and .6 this week. i'm at 145. we rode 75 tough miles sunday, and i watched my points intake the whole week. i just think something is wrong. like do i need to jumpstart my metabolism? how? do i need to eliminate something specific from my diet? maybe i'm gaining muscle but i still have the love handles i never had before, and actually i was always kinda muscular, even when i weighed 127. how do i get rid of The Flab? do i need a nutritionist and how do i find one?

[Torrilin]

five weeks on a modified south beach diet and i lost nothing. then my first week on WW (flex) i lost 2.2 pounds, since then i've gained .4 the third week and .6 this week. i'm at 145. we rode 75 tough miles sunday, and i watched my points intake the whole week. i just think something is wrong. like do i need to jumpstart my metabolism? how? do i need to eliminate something specific from my diet? maybe i'm gaining muscle but i still have the love handles i never had before, and actually i was always kinda muscular, even when i weighed 127. how do i get rid of The Flab? do i need a nutritionist and how do i find one?

A nutritionist is not a bad idea. They generally work with you and a food diary to help you find the problems in your particular way of eating. No one way of eating is good for everyone.

I've been spending a lot of time terrified that I'd tip over into a diabetic weight range because of the family history of type 2 diabetes. Healthy for me is 120-135, and I'd gotten up to 168lbs. Finally, after weeks of both of us paying attention to what I was eating my partner figured out the problem. The extra calories from wine with dinner (an average of a glass a night) and from fruit juice were what was doing it. My brain doesn't treat them as food, so they're as bad for me as soda if I don't watch the portions and how often I have them. Milk, my usual tea with a spoonful of sugar and Gatorade all seem to be fine for me to drink as much as I want.

So I've stopped the wine and fruit juice, and so far it's having a measurable effect. I'm down by about 8 lbs over the last 3 weeks. That's much faster than is healthy, so if the weight loss does not slow down over the next week or two, I'll have to figure something out. I may have dropped below a sensible caloric intake by cutting them out cold turkey.

[michelem]

do i need a nutritionist and how do i find one?

PinkBike -

See post #10 here: http://forums.teamestrogen.com/showthread.php?t=18815

I can't recommend Monika enough, and she's right in your neck of the woods--she comes to you.