Now, I'm not going to tackle what you should eat yet but rather how much. My dad doesn't know anything about nutrition other than the four basic food groups but even he grasps the idea that if you want to loose weight you have to burn more calories than you take in. So, how do you know how many calories you burn?
That's where your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) comes into play. The BMR is the number of calories your body would burn if you did absolutely nothing all day. I mean, if we lived the dream of being able to say in bed all day and watch tv and even had someone to operate the remote for us the BMR would be the number of calories you'd burn during that glorious day.
Ok, time for some math people. Here's how you calculate your BMR:
Men:
BMR = 66 + (6.23 x weight in pounds) + (12.7 x height in inches) - (6.8 x age in years)
Women:
BMR = 655 + (4.35 x weight in pounds) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x age in years)
Here's a link to a calculator if you don't want to break out the paper and pencil.
BMR Calculator
So, my BMR is 1,899. I would burn 1,899 calories a day if I did nothing but stay in bed. Unfortunately I don't get to do that so to figure out about how many calories a day my body actually needs I have to multiply my BMR by some kind of activity factor between 1.2 (you're a lazy bastard that does nothing) and 1.9 (you're not reading this blog because you're training with your buddy Lance Armstrong).
I workout about 3 times a week so I'll go with 1.5 which means that I burn about 2,848 calories a day.
So if I'm happy with my weight then I'll eat 2,848 calories a day, workout 3 times a week and I'll maintain my weight. Of course this is just an estimate. Other factors include what you eat (which we'll cover later), genetics, how hard you exercise, etc...
You want to loose weight then you want to do it by dropping body fat. The safest way to do this and doing it without sacrificing lean muscle is slowly. About 1 pound a week for people that have body fat percentages in the lower teens. The more body fat you have the more weight you'll be able to drop without it being muscle.
Take a scientific approach. Subtract about 200 calories a day from your diet and keep everything else constant. If you've lost more than a pound after a week add some calories back on, if its less then take away some more.
Next in the series: Macronutrients
8 comments:
My BMR is only 1202.32. Suck it bitch! I can burn what I need on a Nintendo Wii. I actually did a hula hoop exercise on it tonight. It was a little embarrasing, but I'm better off for it. I know where you ate this weekend, so I expect some good workouts from you. You had a lot of Mexican food. Don't lie. Work it!
I did a bitch'n chest workout on Saturday, took Sunday off and got up at 5:30 this morning to do cardio. Tonight I'll do a legs workout so intense I'll have to sit and drink scotch the rest of the night!
Boys i gave up the booze and the sodas.. That alone is enough of a calorie decrease to turn myself into an Ethiopian.
I went back and re-worked the math. You were right, it's wrong, but in a good way. My BMR is actually 2,038.66. I multiplied it by 1.5 since I run so much and that came out to 3,057.99. Makes me want to go get a bacon, egg, and cheese bagel and not feel guilty this time.
I've told you how much you can eat, next blog (if I'll ever get to writing it) will be what to eat.
Forget the bagel loaded with simple carbs, but the bacon is alright as long as it's turkey bacon, and the cheese as long as it's fat free or made from skim milk and the eggs should just be the whites...enjoy!
Back to cereal then. Thanks a lot.
Programmer, hack thy self
I found this Hacker's diet, which may be of interest to any scientist/engineer looking to diet - no money or ads involved.
Well I do love eating. Somehow, swallowing a complete-meal pill won't be the same.
Oh, and by the way, you're tagged :)
Post a Comment