So you’ve put some effort in calculating your macro nutrient requirement (macros) and you know how much you are burning in your workouts. Chances are you are looking to generate a small daily deficit in order to shift a few pounds, or you are aiming to avoid over eating. If you want help or more advice with this step please call any of our Brighton and Hove personal trainers

Your workouts will give you a few hundred calories per day to hypothetically consume (assuming they were not part of the initial calories in/out calculation). This would hold your calorie deficit at the same level that you calculated…. meaning that you could eat these calories back and still reach your goals in the same period of time.

Reasons that you should eat these calories back:

• If your calculated macro deficit is close to 500kcals/day. Adding this deficit to the ones lost during your workout multiple times per week could put you at risk of reducing your metabolic rate (when the body senses it does not have sufficient fuel it makes changes to conserve energy such as a reduction in metabolic rate)
• If you are hungry. All hunger is not the same! But all hunger is generated because your body is warning you its low on fuel. Hunger can be a useful tool to manipulate hormone levels that perceive levels of satiety (a key tool used in intermittent fasting), however assuming you are not fasting you should respond to your hunger signals and eat something.

On the other hand…..you may want to reconsider not eating workout calories back because studies have shown that it is common to overestimate calorie burn and underestimate calorie consumption so your calculated deficit may not be accurate.

It really comes down to what your goal is, how hard and long you are exercising for and how good your macro calculation is.