How to know when to stop a calorie deficit
How To Calculate A Calorie Deficit For Weight Loss | Nutritionist Explains | Myprotein
Timecodes:
you just need a calorie deficit mate
well true it's also one of the most
reductive things you can tell someone
who's trying to lose body fat that said
understanding how to calculate one is
useful so let's talk about that
how's it going guys my name is richie
kerwin and today we're going to talk
about what a calorie deficit is why it's
important for weight loss and also why
knowing how to calculate one isn't all
that helpful on its own
let's get started every single diet that
has helped people to lose body fat in
the history of humankind works on the
exact same principle by helping you eat
fewer calories than you burn this is
what's known as a calorie deficit
so if you eat 2000 calories a day and
your weight stays the same that means
you're burning 2000 calories too
that's calorie balance on the other hand
if you eat only 1 500 calories and you
keep burning 2000 calories a day that
means you're in a 500 calorie deficit
and will start losing weight while you
can technically increase how many
calories you burn with exercise this
isn't effective long term as your body
adjusts to the extra exercise by
reducing how much it burns in other ways
why that happens is a topic for another
video that means that the most effective
way to get into a calorie deficit is to
control the amount of food and therefore
calories that you eat
and there are many different ways to do
that so even if the diets seem very
different the principle is always the
same
keto diets work because fewer
carbohydrates mean fewer calories
vegan diets work because fewer animal
products mean fewer calories
low fat diets work because low fat means
fewer calories
the principle is exactly the same
restrict a food or food group to reduce
calories and lose weight
but you're better than some restrictive
diet because you're watching this video
and now you know the principle of fat
loss and don't have to try some stupid
diet just to lose weight you're welcome
advance so how do you actually figure
out how much to eat in order to lose
body fat i'm going to talk about two
methods today firstly you can calculate
your maintenance calories that's how
many calories you need to maintain your
body weight you do this by knowing your
basal metabolic rate and multiplying it
by an activity factor for your basal
metabolic rate or bmr there are a lot of
formulas available and one that i really
like to use is the harris benedict
equation which looks a little like this
just enter in your details for weight
age and height and it'll give you your
bmr
once you have that you need to multiply
it by an activity factor
this accounts for the added energy that
you burn by being active typically for
someone who doesn't walk much and has a
desk job an activity factor of 1.1 or
1.2 is okay if someone is moderately
active with exercise a few days a week
and walks a little bit more an activity
factor of 1.3 to 1.6 might be okay or
for someone with an active job like
manual labor and a lot of exercise daily
an activity factor of 1.7 to even 2 plus
could be useful activity factors are
notoriously inaccurate so don't worry
about picking the right one you'll need
to adjust later anyway so once you pick
an activity multiplier multiply it by
your bmr and that will give you a rough
idea of your total daily energy
expenditure or tdee
alternatively you can search for a
calorie calculator online put your
details in there and it'll calculate
your calories for you you can check out
the my protein calorie calculator by
clicking on the link in the description
below now you may think that i haven't
given a very detailed description of how
to calculate calories and the reason is
after working with hundreds of clients
with different body composition goals i
know for a fact that calculating their
energy expenditure with a formula just
isn't that important here's the thing
you probably don't even need to use a
calorie calculator because they're just
estimations of what you should eat
the best way to calculate your calories
is to actually monitor your body weight
and track your calories and just reduce
your calories a little until your weight
starts to go down
that way is far better than any online
calculator it helps you adjust your
calories over time once you know how
many calories you burn to maintain
weight if you want to lose weight you
need to eat fewer calories than that
now the only way you can eat less is by
knowing how much you're eating at the
moment now again you can do that in two
ways you can use a calorie or macro
tracker literally any of them is fine
and use that to eat your calories or you
can just keep a rough food diary of what
you eat daily and just reduce your
portion sizes the advantage of the
calorie tracker is it gives you details
on macronutrients like protein carbs and
fats which we'll talk about in a moment
you'll also need to measure your
progress and the easiest way to do that
is by weighing yourself daily without
monitoring your progress you have no
idea if what you're doing with your diet
is working
there are plenty of other ways to
measure your progress taking
measurements around your hips and waist
or taking progress photos but the scale
is probably the easiest
i'm not saying it's the best but it's
the easiest i say measure it daily
because your scale weight can change a
lot from day to day so if you measure it
daily and then get a weekly average
that's probably a much better measure of
your progress one thing to bear in mind
when you're in a calorie deficit is that
your weight loss will eventually slow
down and stop
even if you're still eating what was a
calorie deficit for you before
this is totally normal and happens
because when you lose weight well
lighter bodies need less energy and
there's also some metabolic adaptation
to dieting this just means that your
metabolism slows down a little to
compensate for the reduced calories the
only thing you can do at this point is
drop calories further to get back into a
deficit again
it sucks but that's just the way
metabolism works now i haven't said how
much you should drop your calories by
because that depends on how fast you
want to lose weight if you have a bigger
calorie deficit you'll lose weight
faster and while some people like that
because it can help keep them motivated
personally i think a slower rate of
weight loss is a little bit better it's
easier to manage because you're not
dropping your calories crazy low for
some people a hard deficit or a big
deficit is easy to get sick of leading
them to give up and end up robbing a
bakery
slower weight loss will help you
maintain more muscle mass too
so depending on how fast you want to
lose weight you could consider a deficit
of 200 to 500 calories that means 200 to
500 calories below your total daily
energy expenditure now the principle of
weight loss is very simple but putting
it all into practice is not easy at all
especially when we haven't even spoken
about other factors like protein fats
and carbs or motivation for dieting
habit change and just by losing weight
is so hard
these are all really important topics
and i've spoken about them before in
previous videos so please check those
out so what do you think do you think
you know how to work at a calorie
deficit as always if you have any
questions let me know in the comments
below and remember to like and subscribe
to my protein youtube channel for more
great evidence-based nutrition
information
[Music]
Related queries:
how to stop a calorie deficit
when should you stop a calorie deficit
how long should a calorie deficit last
