How to loose weight 101 - the math!

Okay you want to know the secret? its no secret! its on LOTS of websites. The problem is that those websites get buried under tons of others full of garbage.

So long as Calories in are lower than Calories out you WILL loose weight. How much is up to you!

Firstly, work out how many calories you use in a day, eating breathing, pissing etc ..

BMR
BMR stands for Basal Metabolic Rate, and is synonymous with Basal Energy Expenditure or BEE.

Okay, First you need to work out how many calories you use in a day. These are the calories you use just being alive. Not ones you use working out. This is called your BMR.

Here is how you can figure your BMR ..

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Metric BMR Formula

Women: BMR = 655 + ( 9.6 x weight in kilos ) + ( 1.8 x height in cm ) - ( 4.7 x age in years )

Men: BMR = 66 + ( 13.7 x weight in kilos ) + ( 5 x height in cm ) - ( 6.8 x age in years )

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Imperial(US) BMR Formula

Women: BMR = 655 + ( 4.35 x weight in pounds ) + ( 4.7 x height in inches ) - ( 4.7 x age in years )

Men: BMR = 66 + ( 6.23 x weight in pounds ) + ( 12.7 x height in inches ) - ( 6.8 x age in year )

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This will calculate what you require even if you were to sit on your butt all day or sleeping most of the day. Because this is roughly how many calories your body will burn as a living, breathing, eating,heart-beating, digesting etc.. being. This does not include your daily activities.

It is really easy to not eat enough, when we want to lose weight and especially when it includes exercise, which of course keeps the metabolism working efficiently. Extremes are easy aren't they? We need to find the body's "happy place" for optimal fat burn. So now we will need to determine our activity levels, which again many of us misjudge.

Harris Benedict Formula To determine your total daily calorie needs, multiply your BMR by the appropriate activity factor (BE HONEST WITH THYSELF), as follows:

1. If you are sedentary (little or no exercise) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.2
2. If you are lightly active (light exercise/sports 1-3 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.375
3. If you are moderatetely active (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.55
4. If you are very active (hard exercise/sports 6-7 days a week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.725
5. If you are extra active (very hard exercise/sports & physical job or 2x training) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.9

If you are to lazy to do all the numbers and work it out you can go here and have it automated (conversion kg to lb on http://www.convert-me.com) or http://www.fitday.com will automaticly work it out :)

This is the total number of calories you need in order to maintain your current weight. Amazing non?.

Now to make that number even larger, you can facter in any exercise you do on top of that.

20 mins of the following burns ...
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Bicycling - Actual 300-400 calories
Running - 5-6 mph 300-350 calories
Swimming laps - 350 calories
Bicycling - Stationary 250-300 calories
Stair climber - 200-250 calories
Aerobics - 200-250 calories
Walking briskly - 150-180 calories


Now Intake! Start counting! There are many databases online that count what you eat or have the calorie content of each item. As soon as you make your intake less than your outgoings - BINGO! you loose weight!
Females: Never eat less than 1200 calories unless you are under a docter.
Males: You use more calories in a day and have a faster metabolism. Keep it above 1800 calories.
If you eat less than these numbers chances are your body will go into starvation mode and you will actually stop loosing weight. Your body will slow its metabolism down and store as much as possible.

Keeping your metabolism higher
Exercise:
Regular exercise is great, but dont be fooled, 3 20 minute workouts are just as good as 1 60 minute workout! If you do it in the morning you are less likley to talk yourself out of it and arrange to be busy. Try and get that heart rate up doing bikeing, skipping, or if you are really having trouble - swimming.

Meals:
Space your meals out so you're eating 4-6 meals a day. It fools the body into thinking its eaten more than it has. Lots of water! Soup is a great low calorie way to fill up inbetween meals or you are waiting for dinner.

Another thing to remember is protein! you dont want to loose muscle! you want to loose fat! so eat plenty of protein in a day - about 1.2 grams per kg of ideal weight or more.

Muscles burn more fat! the more muscles you have the faster you burn! 1lb of muscle burns up to 60cal a day just sitting doing nothing!
If you are having trouble finding protien and keeping the calories low try taking a Whey Protein suppliment right before or after exercize. Personally I found a lot to taste like crap so opted for the Carbless Protein bars which taste like a chocolate bar but have a few more calories in them


If you are having trouble keeping track of this - try signing up to a website such as http://fitday.com or http://www.calorie-count.com/
They take into account your intake and outtake. I find Fitday is better formatted and has some nice graphs so i can see how I'm doing. You can see my fitday profile and how my stats sit here



Now we must address the caloric deficit needed to help us lose body fat

Now - for some more numbers!
4500 calories = 1 lb of fat gone
9000 calories = 1kg of fat gone
If you are 1000 calories deficient every day then in 9 days you will have lost 1kg.

Larger people use more calories to stay alive, so the larger you are the bigger the Gap between eaten and used. I usually do about 3500 calories burnt in a day (thats including exercise) and eat about 1200-1500. If i eat 1500 my maximum im still 2000 calories difference, hence why i loose about 1.5kg per week (about 3lb)
How cool and easy is that?


Okay - So now you have clicked - you can eat whatever you want - whenever you want! so long as those calories stay down. Here are a few things i like that fill me up nicely.
I allow myself about 300-400 calories per meal and make up the rest with snacks between. Some days I will eat less calories for one meal so i can eat more for another.


Spagetti - the canned type. A whole can is only about 400 calories

Yogurt - you can eat a cup full of yogurt and its only about 150-180 calories

Salad - A basic lettuce with other bits salad is a mere 17 calories per cup - thats a lot of salad! Try a chicken salad - filling and chicken is a great protein source

Soups - a cup of soup is great to take the edge of hunger between meals and is only about 50-90 calories.

Anyway I will edit this post If i notice anything missing or not described well enough :)
Be honest with yourself no matter how hard it is - you are only cheating yourself.