Do your calories workout?

03 September 2014

Ever wondered when you are trying to lose weight or gain muscle how much you should be eating?

We all want to either make lean gains or drop body fat and maintain muscle and it can be confusing as to how much we need to eat to do this.

There are tools out there that can help you to work out how much you should be eating each day depending on your goals.

I've seen myself crash on really low calories with weight loss coming to a standstill and feeling really bad or eating too much and getting fat!

I have previously made vodcasts showing how to input your daily foods in to www.myfitnesspal.com and adjust nutrient ratios, but what should your daily calorific intake be set at based on personal factors?

We all need a certain amount of calories just to exist - thinking, breathing, sleeping, everything in the body ticking away. This is what is known as your basal metabolic rate or BMR.

The amount of calories you need each day taking in to consideration the daily activity you undertake is what is known as your Total Daily Energy Expenditure.

Below is a calculator to help you work out your BMR and TDEE based on your gender, weight, age and how active you are.

http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/

You should always have your calories above your basic metabolic rate otherwise you will be in too much of a calorie deficit and weight loss will stall and you could even cause metabolic damage.

To lose weight you need to be eating below your TDEE and to gain weight be above. It is not recommended going more than 20% below your TDEE for efficient fat loss as you want to keep a positive energy balance.

Don't go too high above your TDEE if you want to lean bulk otherwise you will also be gaining too much bodyfat. Start with a slight surplus and see how your body responds and adjust as necessary.

As far as ratios are concerned you should need between 1 and 1.5 grams of protein per day per pound of bodyweight. I find a good split in the macronutrients are 40% protein, 30% carbs, 30% fats and recently that has been working well for me. I had been running on lower carb and fat ratios than that before and I felt and looked awful!.

Give the calculations a try and see how many calories you should be consuming each day depending on your goals!