Inspired by Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle by Tom Venuto
Warning: the article below can be quite technical, but I can recommend you go through it nevertheless. You will learn a lot about your calorie needs, which has a direct effect on how your body reacts to nutrition and training!
Do you want to lose weight? Or do you want to gain weight? Where do you start?
In fact, it is a lot easier than you might think:
When you want to lose weight, you have to eat less calories than you burn during the day. When you want to gain weight, you would have to eat more calories than you burn.
Okay, there is a tiny problem…
How Do You Know How Many Calories You Burn?
Let’s start at the beginning; there are six factors that all influence your daily calorie needs:
1. Basal Metabolic Rate or BMRYour BMR is the number of calories your body burns to perform its normal bodily functions, like your blood circulation, temperature regulation, digestion and every other metabolic process in your body. Your BMR does not take into account your activity level.
The BMR accounts for the largest part of your daily calorie needs, about two thirds of the total number of calories. The BMR differs greatly from person to person, depending on genetic factors (some people get fat when they eat a sandwich, others can eat pizza and stay lean).
2. Activity Level
Next to your BMR, your activity level is the second largest factor influencing your daily calorie needs. The more active you are, the more calories you burn; it’s simple, really.
3. Body Weight
Your total bodyweight and build also greatly influence your calorie needs. The bigger you are, the more calories you need to move around.
4. Lean Body Mass or LBM
Your total body weight influences your calorie needs, but when you divide that weight into its lean and fatty parts, you can get an even more accurate approximation of your calorie needs. The more lean body mass (LBM) you have, the higher your BMR.
This also means that when you build up more muscle mass, you will burn more calories, even when resting. Muscle mass needs a lot of energy to sustain itself, so the best way to up your BMR is to enlarge your LBM. As you can see, weight training really does – indirectly – help to burn body fat .
5. Age
Your age is also important for your calorie needs. When you get older, your metabolism slows down and subsequently your burn less calories. When you are active, you can largely stop this metabolism slowdown by engaging in weight training and eating healthy nutrients!
6. Gender
Men mostly need more calories to function than women do. On average, a man needs 2800 calories per day whereas women can get by on 2000 calories. This has not much to do with gender differences, but more with the way the body is build up. Men sport, on average, a lot more muscle mass than women, which means they also need more calories to burn.
Calculating your Calorie Needs
So how do you know how many calories you need?
There are many formulas helping you to calculate the number of calories you need on a daily basis, taking the six factors above into account. Remember, when you throw your LBM into the equation, the outcome will always be more accurate.
There is however a formula that only takes your body weight into account: the 'quick' method.
Quick Method
The quick - and dirty - method only takes into account your total body weight in its calculation. It does not take into account whether you are 200 lbs of muscle or 200 lbs of fat. This makes this calculation very inaccurate!
The Quick Method calculation is as follows:
BMR = body weight in lbs x 15 to 16 calories
Lose Weight = body weight in lbs x 12 to 13 calories
Gain Weight = body weight in lbs x 18 to 20+ calories
The calculator below uses 13 calories to lose weight, 16 calories for your BMR and 20 calories for
gaining weight. Fill in your Weight in pounds and click on the Calculate BMR button:
As said, this method is very inaccurate. It is easy to get a result that is way too high. The quick method is only usable for people with a normal fat percentage level.
To get a more accurate calculation, you can use the Harris-Benedict Formula.
Harris-Benedict Formula
The Harris-Benedict Formula calculates your BMR using your body weight, height and age. The only variable not being used is your LBM.
The Harris-Benedict Formula calculation is as follows:
Men: BMR= 66 + (6.23 x weight in pounds) + (12.7 x height in inches) - (6.8 x age)
Women: BMR= 655 + (4.35 x weight in pounds) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x age)
Using the activity levels below, you can also calculate your maintenance calorie needs, which is the number of calories you can eat with your BMR and your activity level so you do not gain or lose weight.
1: Sedentary: little or no exercise, desk job --- x 1.2
2: Lightly Active: light exercise, sports 1-3 days per week --- x 1.375
3: Moderately Active: moderate exercise, sports 3-5 days per week --- x 1.55
4: Very Active: hard exercise, sports 6-7 days per week --- x 1.725
5: Extra Active: hard daily exercise, sports & physical job or twice day training (marathon, contest, etc) --- x 1.9
In the calculator below, you can enter your body weight, height, age and the number of your activity level (see above). Then press the BMR button corresponding with your gender:
If you want to get an even more accurate calculation of your BMR, you have to include your LBM in the equation. This is being done in the Katch-McArdle Formula.
Katch-McArdle Formula
The Katch-McArdle Formula does not distinguish between men and women.
Why is that?
It is quite simple, actually: the main difference between men and women is the difference in the amount of
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| Simple Caliper |
Your LBM is calculated using your weight and body fat percentage. Of course, you need to know your fat percentage! How do get that number?
The best way to determine your body fat percentage is by measuring it using a skin fold caliper. Even though you can best have this done by your physician or sports instructor, you can also buy a simple one for home use and do the measuring yourself.
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| Electronic caliper |
The Katch-McArdle Formula calculation is as follows:
BMR = 370 + (9.79759519 x lean mass in pounds)
You can also use this calculator to calculate your maintenance calorie needs. You can use the activity list above with the Harris-Benedict Formula.
In the calculator below, you can enter your body weight, body fat percentage and the number of your activity level (see above). Then press the Calculate BMR button:
| LBM (lean body mass) is your lean body weight, so your weight without the fat. BMR (basal metabolic rate) is the number of calories your body burns to ensure the basic bodily functions are taken care of. Maintenance is the number of calories you need to hold on to your current weight. |
Activity Level 1: Little or no training, office work 2: Light training/sports 1-3 days per week 3: Average training/sports 3-5 days per week 4: Heavy training/sports 6-7 days per week 5: Heavy daily training/sports plus physical labor, or two workouts per day |
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There is no other method to get a more accurate calculation yourself! The only way to get even more precise, you will have to go to a laboratory, but there is no need for that.
Using the data you have calculated, you can determine exactly how many calories you need to lose weight or gain weight. A good starter is you maintenance level and subtract 500 calories from that number (lose weight) or add 500 calories (gain weight).
Good luck!
If you want to read more about losing weight while gaining muscle, check out Tom Venuto's Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle, the nutritional bible for many athletes!
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