| Calculators are messed up, or am I? |
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spurfy
New Member
| Joined: | 18 Jul 2011 |
| Location: | Utah |
| Posts: | 8 |
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Posted: 18 Jul 2011 05:27 pm |
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I don't get it. I used the BMR calculator and was told that my BMR is 1600; if I'm sedentary (I'm not entirely) I should be consuming around 1900 calories for maintenance. Fair enough. But I used the activity calculator to figure up an entirely sedentary day: 9 hours of sleeping, 1 hour of eating, 14 hours of sitting. It told me I'd be burning 2600 calories a day! That's completely bogus. So what do I believe? 
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 18 Jul 2011 07:38 pm |
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I agree that the 'Activity Calculator' often over-estimates. (Note that it doesn't ask you many questions - just your weight.)
Go with the RMR value (on the BMR & RMR calculator)
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JSABD
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 18 Jul 2011 08:11 pm |
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spurfy wrote: I don't get it. I used the BMR calculator and was told that my BMR is 1600; if I'm sedentary (I'm not entirely) I should be consuming around 1900 calories for maintenance. Fair enough. But I used the activity calculator to figure up an entirely sedentary day: 9 hours of sleeping, 1 hour of eating, 14 hours of sitting. It told me I'd be burning 2600 calories a day! That's completely bogus. So what do I believe?
The one my people use is spot on. http://www.stevenscreek.com/goodies/calories.shtml
BMRs vary in individuals of the same age weight and gender by 35 calories a day.
If you weigh 150 pounds and are slightly active you are burning about 2500 -2600 calories a day. There is no other way around it. Your body cannot defy the laws of physics.
If you underwent calorimetric testing you'd get the same result.
Last edited on 18 Jul 2011 08:12 pm by JSABD
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 19 Jul 2011 02:12 am |
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Be the experiment. Eat at 1600 calories.
If you lose about 0.6lb/week, my calculation is correct.
If you lose about 2lb/week, his calculation is correct.
Or you might fall somewhere in between.
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spurfy
New Member
| Joined: | 18 Jul 2011 |
| Location: | Utah |
| Posts: | 8 |
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Posted: 19 Jul 2011 02:56 am |
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I've been keeping my calories around 1600 for six weeks now and I've lost 12 pounds, but a lot of that was "beginner's luck" i.e. I've been overeating so long that I lost weight quickly. I lost seven pounds in the first week alone. On the other hand, I've been holding steady at 188 pounds for the last two weeks of the six, so it's kind of hard to tell. Think I need to go at it longer.
I have to say that the Stevens Creek calculator does not make sense to me. I don't see how I can be burning 2618 calories a day (the result it gave me) and still be as overweight as I am. I don't think I ever ate that much, even when I wasn't paying attention to it. It seems much more likely that I'm burning roughly 2100 a day (my RMR with multipliers).
I would like to believe the 2600 number...would make this whole thing a lot easier. 
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