Active Low-Carber Forums - View Single Post - How to calculate calorie needs?

Quote:

Originally Posted by 2thinchix

And then here is the next question - there are about 3500 calories in a pound. If my BMR really IS 2000-ish, then if I cut back to 1500 I'm saving 500 calories a day - exactly 1 pound a week. How on earth does anyone lose 2 or 3 pounds a week?

When they have a high lean body mass, eat plenty and exercise even more. Typically large young men can do this - and did you know that young men are hugely the basis of the data sets behind calorie calculators? They told us that in fitness school. It's because that early research was done at universities and they had LOTS of young men to be tested (ie cheaply).

If you like considering calories, I like Tom Venuto's "The New Rules of Cutting Calories"

http://www.burnthefatinnercircle.com/members/449.cfm

He's got a ton of stuff in there, including:

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For example, if you are a large and highly active male with a 3400 calorie per day maintenance level, then a 1000 calorie deficit means a daily caloric intake of 2400 calories per day, a 30% deficit (aggressive, but well within reason). If you are a petite, inactive female with a caloric maintenance level of 1900 calories per day, then a 1000 calorie deficit means a caloric intake of 900 calories per day, a 53% deficit (semi starvation, and potentially unhealthy). As Einstein would say, that's relativity for you.

The fix is simple, instead of using 500 or 1000 calorie per day deficits as fixed standards, use a percentage, and set up a sliding scale that accounts for your goals, your desired rate of rate of weight loss and your starting body fat percentage.

15-20% below maintenance calories = conservative deficit
20-25% below maintenance calories = moderate deficit
25-30% below maintenance calories = aggressive deficit
31-40% below maintenance calories = very aggressive deficit (risky)
50%+ below maintenance calories = semi starvation/starvation (potentially dangerous and unhealthy if not medically supervised)

What Tom Venuto doesn't include is that the calorie needs themselves change if you have a fat-based diet instead of a carb-based diet. I take 15% off the calculators to account for that.

Like if Miffin St Jour says I need 2100 calories, I assume that's for a carb eater, and I use 1800 for me. And then use Venuto's percent deficit from there.