SparkPoints: (152,202)
Fitness Minutes: (148,152)
Posts: 29,536
3/7/10 8:02 P

SparkPeople does not factor in activity level - you are absolutely correct. However, you can and should enter the amount of calories you burn weekly in your Fitness Goals. This will actually put you in a good range for losing weight most of the time.

Yes, I hit a plateau just before this team was started and I went to the Expert's Message Board for Fitness and Exercise
www.sparkpeople.com/myspark/messageboard_t
opics.asp?imboard=6
and I posted there asking what they thought my activity level was and how many calories I should be eating. They came back with Moderately Active and told me to start eating 1600 calories daily. I took "a leap of faith" and increased my calories immediately and yes, my plateau broke by me eating an extra 400 calories daily.

Then I joined this team and started using the BTN chart and I continue to use it daily ever since.

When I learned about Calorie Deficit I learned from another team and calculated the CDE manually at
www.caloriesperhour.com/index_burn.php
but the Chart is just easier for me to use.

I have no answer why SparkPeople refuses to account for the activity level. Really it needs to be factored in.

Good luck to you! You can do this!

current weight: 122.0

210 187.5 165 142.5

120

Posts: 202
3/7/10 11:18 A

Hi everyone, this has me so stumped, so many differing opinions, so I'm going to throw it out there and see what is working for all of you. I know the Harris Benedict equation takes into account activity level on top of BMR but in most other weightloss tracking sites the calorie deficit is factored into your base calories and then you are supposed to "eat back" your exercise calories (the daily plate, lose it, etc.) Sparkpeople doesn't do this, why do things differ so much between programs? Which is the best way to go? If you exercise alot (like 6 days a week and burning 4000+ calories a week) how many calories do you eat and have you hit any plateaus? If so, how did you get over the hump? More exercise = more calories? If so how much? Or did you go the less exercise and less calories route to get over the plateau? Enquiring minds want to know! (p.s. I also posted this in the Fitness and Exercise forum) Thanks all :)