Up my calories?

[fivemenawol]

5'9" 22 M 206 lbs

So I calculated my BMR to be about 3200 calories a day for someone whith my stats who works out "moderately." I work do about 30 minutes of cardio about 5 days a week and some weight training about 4-5 days a week. However I have ben eating more in the range of 2000 calories or a little less. I am kind of afraid to eat more, up to 3000 cals, even though the bmr says i need to take more in. Do you guys have alot of faith in the eat more to burn fat theory? I had started at 210 and was eating 200 cals. So what im thinkin is the drastic deficit in cals allowed me to drop the four pounds but now im stuck? Any insight would be great. I just erally want to get locked into a correct routine.

Also I try and eat at least five times a day, spaced out. My diet is predominately a mixture of turkey, chicken, tuna, whole grain breads and some veggies like green beans. I also try and drink about 100 oz of water a day.

 

[Kabeetz]

First up, there is a big difference between thinking and knowing how many calories you eat.. so make sure you know how much you are putting into your body. If you don't currently, track it using a site like fitday.com.

I don't think 3,200 is your BMR, your basal metabolic rate is before activity, etc. I believe your bmr would actually be somewhere between 2,100-2,200 (in other words the # of calories your body burns a day just lying in a bed).

3,200 will maintain, or allow for the slight increase in lean body mass at a relatively high activity level such as yours, which therefore will also burn a bit of fat perhaps as your composition changes.

3,200 is too much to do a "true" cut at.

On the other hand, 2,000 for an extended amount of time is too low. It is below maintenance, therefore sending your body into starvation mode which encourages to store what fat it can, slow down its metabolism, and tend to leave you lacking for energy for working out.

Do these symptoms sound like something you are experiencing?

What is your current bodyfat %?

If you are trying to lose fat, I think you should up your calories up for a couple weeks to the high 2ks, just to reinvigorate your body, then gradually cut back to 2,500 then 2,400 then 2,300. Only cut that next hundred when u sense the weightloss to be plateauing. You'll be much more pleased in the long term.

If you are looking for a caloric level where you can maintain and very gradually change your body composition, 3,200 might be perfect, but you need to work your way back up say 200 cals per day a week..dont just start eatint 1200 more calories a day you'll add on too much fat likely.

If you are looking to bulk and therefore focus on adding mass, you should consider even going beyond 3,200 using the same gradual increase manner.

Hope that helped, good luck.

5'9" 22 M 206 lbs

So I calculated my BMR to be about 3200 calories a day for someone whith my stats who works out "moderately." I work do about 30 minutes of cardio about 5 days a week and some weight training about 4-5 days a week. However I have ben eating more in the range of 2000 calories or a little less. I am kind of afraid to eat more, up to 3000 cals, even though the bmr says i need to take more in. Do you guys have alot of faith in the eat more to burn fat theory? I had started at 210 and was eating 200 cals. So what im thinkin is the drastic deficit in cals allowed me to drop the four pounds but now im stuck? Any insight would be great. I just erally want to get locked into a correct routine.

Also I try and eat at least five times a day, spaced out. My diet is predominately a mixture of turkey, chicken, tuna, whole grain breads and some veggies like green beans. I also try and drink about 100 oz of water a day.

 

[fivemenawol]

First up, there is a big difference between thinking and knowing how many calories you eat.. so make sure you know how much you are putting into your body. If you don't currently, track it using a site like fitday.com.

I don't think 3,200 is your BMR, your basal metabolic rate is before activity, etc. I believe your bmr would actually be somewhere between 2,100-2,200 (in other words the # of calories your body burns a day just lying in a bed).

3,200 will maintain, or allow for the slight increase in lean body mass at a relatively high activity level such as yours, which therefore will also burn a bit of fat perhaps as your composition changes.

3,200 is too much to do a "true" cut at.

On the other hand, 2,000 for an extended amount of time is too low. It is below maintenance, therefore sending your body into starvation mode which encourages to store what fat it can, slow down its metabolism, and tend to leave you lacking for energy for working out.

Do these symptoms sound like something you are experiencing?

What is your current bodyfat %?

If you are trying to lose fat, I think you should up your calories up for a couple weeks to the high 2ks, just to reinvigorate your body, then gradually cut back to 2,500 then 2,400 then 2,300. Only cut that next hundred when u sense the weightloss to be plateauing. You'll be much more pleased in the long term.

If you are looking for a caloric level where you can maintain and very gradually change your body composition, 3,200 might be perfect, but you need to work your way back up say 200 cals per day a week..dont just start eatint 1200 more calories a day you'll add on too much fat likely.

If you are looking to bulk and therefore focus on adding mass, you should consider even going beyond 3,200 using the same gradual increase manner.

Hope that helped, good luck.

Yeah, sorry, that 3200 I mentioned was my adjusted intake (BMR + accounting for "moderate"activity). And yeah I do count my calories, using just excel, but I track them. But yeah ok so I think that I need to up my cals then for awhile. Because over the first month and a half i dropped four pounds, butnow i have been stuck for about 2 weeks. I think I might be just creating too large of a deficit. Thanks for the advice.

 

[Kabeetz]

Yeah, sorry, that 3200 I mentioned was my adjusted intake (BMR + accounting for "moderate"activity). And yeah I do count my calories, using just excel, but I track them. But yeah ok so I think that I need to up my cals then for awhile. Because over the first month and a half i dropped four pounds, butnow i have been stuck for about 2 weeks. I think I might be just creating too large of a deficit. Thanks for the advice.

No problemo, your excel spreadsheet might be awesome, if it isn't anything special, fitday.com is great because you can enter a custom food once and then just select from your custom food list and it divides the macros and all that for ya no problemo. Kind of annoying to enter the foods in the first week or two..then after that it becomes the greatest time saver and its a great way to kill time at the office hehe

 

[Razorguns]

no way ur bmr is 3200 even with cardio. a whole army mile only burns a whopping 130 calories. weight training even less. that might be ur problem.

 

[JKurz1]

do 600 cals 5x a day