Friday, November 16, 2012

My Issue with Calorie Tracking Apps


I am using a calorie tracking app right now to make sure I am eating enough. There is a fine line between eating for fuel and over eating or under eating, both under and over eating can cause you to gain weight. Over eating because your body will store it as fat and under because your body enters into starvation mode and starts to hold onto everything you put into it. I  want to make sure I am not sabotaging my body. Because I generally eat the same thing most days (creature of habit) I know if I do this for a full week I can understand what I am eating.

Yesterday I did Nike Training Club in the morning, 95 minutes worth, at lunch I ran 4 miles and after work I did a quick Nike Kinect training. I ate a total of 2,640 calories!! Yep I apparently ate a lot. It was all clean food. However, My Fitness Pal doesn't account for your Resting Metabolic Rate and it doesn't properly track calories burned.

Last January I had my RMR tested by my dietitian. She came to my house in the morning, I had to fast for 12 hours before I did this and she plugged my nose and had me breath into this machine for 10 minutes. It told me that I have a RMR of 2,300. At rest, if I stayed in bed all day I would burn 2,300 calories doing absolutely nothing. 
Also I did a lot of activity yesterday and needed to refeed my muscles after my workouts therefore needed more food. I looked at the workout tracker on my fitness pal and I feel that is grossly over estimates how much you actually are burning. The only proper way to know exactly what you are burning calorie wise is to get your V02 max tested and wear a heart rate monitor. I refuse to use the workout tracker on there.

At the end of the night I clicked the button to end my day and it told me if I continued to eat like this every day in 5 weeks I would weight 165 pounds. I am lucky that I am at a pretty secure place with myself because if I read that before I would have freaked out and attempted to purge myself. 

People remember these are generalized trackers. They do not understand your body, your RMR or how much you are burning. No calorie tracker can tell you what to eat. Please if you eat over your calories one day, look at what you ate. Is it clean and healthy? Do you feel satisfied? Ignore what it says.

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