[islander]

Trying to figure out my diet and calroies. Reading so much on here about how many calories you guys are taking in most alot!.= isnt it how much you are actully going to be using during the day that should dictate how much you should be taking in? say like a 160 p guy who does 1 1/2 hour weight routine and 1/2 cardio. to a 160 p guy whos doing a 2 hour routine and 2 hour cardio. or is it a size thing? or both. so how do you figure out how many calories and from what should you be eating? thanks

[Thomas_Rivera]

Its metabolic rate + activity. Online calculators will give you rough, general numbers. The best way to gauge your intake would be to track your calories through the week, weigh your self twice, whatever the gain or loss is you average out.

Say your over .1 pound or under .1 pound thats 50 calories a day over or under your eating.

[ibanezman88]

i can't go by what the calculators online say. apparantly i only need about 2800 calories a day to gain muscle. i didn't start gaining until i went closer to 4000.
so i don't think they keep people's metabolism in mind.

[islander]

i have a slow metabolizem and im cutting. im really confused because and trying to figure it out, im eating wayy less and exercising wayy more but im staying the exact same. 2 1/2 weeks into it now. thinking this next week i should start dropping hopfully. still think my bodys not burning calories right. i might have been over doing the protein. there a awsome website my friend uses to keep track. im phoning him right now. i thought i could manage it myself but just reading labels and not eating to much carbs or sugar but obviously not working.

[ibanezman88]

how much do you weigh?

for somebody that weighs 150lbs, should diet at around 2000 calories. or maybe a bit more. maybe around 2200.

[islander]

umm im a girl and hate saying her weight so shh 192 @ 5'9". but im stonger then any other girl i know. i was asking before how it tell bf without a caliper. im not fat fat but im not skinny obviously. i can see my top two abs lol this was thomas way of telling bf. im geussing 25% but i really have no clue could be more or less.

[ibanezman88]

there's really no way to tell exactly what your bodyfat is.
if you want to loose fat, your calories should be relatively low. i'm not an expert on this but i would say somewhere in the 2000-2500 range.

our calorie intake is much higher because a lot of us are trying to add size. but when it comes time for use to shed some bodyfat to look good for the summer we consume less calories.

make sure you're eating whole grain foods or complex carbohydrates such as oatmeal, wheat bread, pasta, and brown rice. since you exersise regularly, i would try to have 1g of protein per lbs of lean body mass.

here's an example of a diet that i went on when i was trying to get into contest shape.

keep in mind that i was trying to preserve as much muscle as possible so my protein intake was very high and it was a slow process but i ended up loosing 1lbs to 2lbs a week.

7:00 - wake up
meal 1
1/2 cup of oats in 1 cup of skim milk
4 eggwhites
water
mulitvitamin
glucosamine

10:30 - meal 2
1/2 cup of oats in 1 cup of skim milk
8 eggwhites
diet juice or water

2:00 - Meal 3
1 can of tuna
3 cups of chopped brocoli
1/4 cup of almonds
water

5:30 - meal 4
2 cups of whole grain pasta
8 oz. chicken breast
diet juice or water

8:00 - Meal 5
2 cups of cooked brown rice
1 can of tuna
3 cups of chopped brocoli
1/4 cup of almonds
water

10:00 - meal 6
2 scoops of optimum nutritoin whey protien

my calorie intake was 2100 calories
my carbs were at 185g
my protein was up to 240g
my fat was up to about 45g i think

[Frag Hag]

I use FitDay to keep track of my calories, but any similar site will do as long as you record everything you eat. I think fitday tends to over-estimate the amount of calories expended, but it could be just me. I've been cutting at 1200-1500 a day, though i've hit a standstill so i'm kinda stuck as well. Not sure if i should increase or decrease my calories.

I use some online calculators for bodyfat percentage because i don't have calipers yet either, though i'd take their numbers with a grain of salt. One site i use, i call it the optimistic one, is here: Home Body Fat Test

The other one i use is this one, it's apparently based on some system they use in the navy: Body Fat Calculator I call this the pessimistic one because according to it, i've got 34% bodyfat! Compared to the first one that usually says i'm 24-25%. I'm not sure which one's more accurate, but i think i look closer to 25% than 34%. These sites might be good enough as a rough guideline, but i'm definitely getting some calipers as soon as i have the money.

[Cain Marko]

Its trying to tell me I have 25% bf, no freakin way!

[islander]

22 and 31 but how does it tell a fat thigh from a big slab of muslce thigh lol thanks frag and ibz i almost eat something like that now well i was but have been doing shakes in the places of all the oatmeal but i just made up a batch. i dunno if i can eat just eatwhites. if i do eggs is one real one wiht 2 whites. is your broc cooked or raw? and holy crap 2 scoops at 10 clock! mine as 30 g of protein that might be a little much right before bed no? and ive been looking at ww pasta and it so high in carb. i know not comparatively and the fibre knockes down the carb count but still i was surprised. soy pasta is what i normally eat and its not bad high in protein too. i try and and not eat much meat. and eat salads. sprouts, lettuce or spinach, totmato, cucumber, avocado (i know high fat) no dressing but a tin of tuna in sweet chili sauce or thai peanut. lunches are hard for me i drive alot of my job and am always on the go. reading about ketosis and atkins think i might try it.

[Frag Hag]

Yeah, i think the tests are a little biased towards either unfit people or cardio freaks, lol. I've noticed my legs have gotten much harder since i started training, even though their size hasn't changed much, so that's a good sign i guess.

High fat isn't necessarily a bad thing. Avocados are rich in good fats, omega-3 and all that. Eating right before bed is also good if what you're eating is a slow-digesting protein like meat or cottage cheese (or a protein shake with casein), because it prevents catabolism during the 8 hours you'll go without eating.

[monkeybiker]

How much you need to eat is will vary depend each person and depends on how much you weigh and how active you are. If you are bigger you will burn off more energy as you have more surface area.
Just look at the labels on the food to work out how many calories you eat. If you need to gain weight eat more if you need to loose weight eat less.