This is the most important question you must ask yourself when it comes to starting any health \/ fitness routine, and is an important number to know regardless of your lifestyle. How many calories do you need? \u00a0Well, there are many different answers to this single question, and it all starts with two formulas that calculate you BMR. \u00a0“What’s a BMR,” you ask? Well, BMR stands for “Basal Metabolic Rate,” and it is the amount of calories your body burns simply by existing over a 24 hour period. \u00a0After you’ve figured out your BMR, you then multiply that number by an “Activity Multiplier,” which will tell you how many calories your body burns in a given day. \u00a0More on this later, though. . . \u00a0On with the formulas:<\/p>\n
The Harris – Benedict Formula<\/strong><\/p>\n This is the most widely used equation for calculating BMR, as it relies on information that people typically know. \u00a0While it is very accurate, it can be completely inaccurate for the overly muscular, and the overly obese. \u00a0The equation is:<\/p>\n Men: 66 + 13.7x + 5y -6.8z | Women: 655 + 9.6x +2.8y – 4.7z<\/strong><\/p>\n Where “x” is your weight in kilograms, “y” is your height in centimeters, and “z” is your age. As an example, let’s say you’re a 24 year old, 6 foot tall male weighing 180 pounds; \u00a0The equation would read as follows: 66 + 13.7(81.81) + 5(182.88) – 6.8(24) | After you’ve run the equation, you’re left with 1,938 calories. \u00a0Remember that number– \u00a0We’ll be back.<\/p>\n The Katch – McArdle Formula<\/strong><\/p>\n This is a lesser known formula for calculating your BMR, but it also happens to be the most accurate, because it only relies on your lean body mass (LBM), which is what requires fuel in your body. This equation is not used as often because most people are completely unaware of their body fat percentage, and thus, they do not know their LBM. \u00a0So, how do you find out your LBM? \u00a0Buy some calipers, or ask a personal trainer to find out your body fat percentage (In the case of our hypothetical 180 lb. man, 11%); \u00a0Multiply your weight by the percentage (180*.11), and you will know how many pounds of fat are on your body. \u00a0Then, subtract that from your weight, and you have an LBM. \u00a0Covert that to metric, and then plug it into the following formula:<\/p>\n Men & Women: \u00a0370 + 21.6w<\/strong>, where “w” is your LBM in kilograms. \u00a0According to this, our 180 lb. man has a BMR of 1,943 calories.<\/p>\n Now, comparing the two, 1,938 to 1,943, you can see that they’re both similar, which is why the Harris – Benedict Formula is a perfectly acceptable for you to start– \u00a0But now, we need an activity multiplier. . . \u00a0After all, a BMR is the amount of calories your body burns existing, not moving.<\/p>\n By default, you have to multiply your BMR by 1.2 to get your “Total Daily Energy Expenditure” (TDEE), because getting out of bed, using the restroom, and eating all require calories. \u00a0If you’re more active than a couch potato, though, you use the following guideline to determine your activity multiplier:<\/p>\n Default \/ Sedentary<\/em> = BMR * 1.2 (Little to no exercise, nor activity)<\/p>\n Lightly Active<\/em> = BMR * 1.375 (Light exercise 1 – 3 days per week; Active job)<\/p>\n Moderately Active<\/em> = BMR * 1.55 (Moderate exercise \/ sports 3 – 5 days per week)<\/p>\n Very Active<\/em> = BMR * 1.725 (Hard exercise \/ sports 6 – 7 days per week)<\/p>\n Extremely Active<\/em> = BMR * 1.9 (You’ll know if this is you.)<\/p>\n Our 180 lb. man that we have been using in this experiment works out 6 days per week, doing 3 days of hard weight lifting and 3 days of light cardio– \u00a0This would put him in the “Moderately Active” group, which brings his TDEE to 3,012 calories.<\/p>\n So why do we use an activity multiplier? \u00a0This is done to take the guess work out of your calorie counting– \u00a0Rather than guess how many calories you burned weight lifting, and the calories burned standing on your feet at work, this tried and true method does the work for you. \u00a0From there, you determine how many calories you need in relation to your goals, which will come in part 2 of this blog!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This is the most important question you must ask yourself when it comes to starting any health \/ fitness routine, and is an important number to know regardless of your lifestyle. How many calories do you need? \u00a0Well, there are many different answers to this single question, and it all starts with two formulas that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health","category-nutrition"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3DfsS-y","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":987,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34\/revisions\/987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devinephysiques.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}