Question regarding BMR vs Calorie Consumption

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illicitdos

New member
I'm a male, 5'10", 220 lbs, and I'm 18 years old. I've used the different calculators/theories for discovering my BMR and just took the lowest one and used it as my guideline (just to be safe).

I'm having trouble understanding what exactly BMR and RMR do, is it that it's your body's calorie expenditure while at rest throughout the day (disregarding all excess physical activity such as running/weight lifting)?

If so, here is my question to nutritionists or individuals who have experienced great weight loss success. My BMR and RMR are in the 2200-2400 range, as stated, I've used the lowest (2200). I've also put myself on a 1000 calorie a day diet (i understand it could be unsafe, pleas edon't post to tell me so even though I appreciate all concerns). In addition to this 1000 calorie a day diet, I've decided to also burn 1000+ calories a day in excess activity, mostly vigorous running and aerobic exercise.

It's known that there are 3500 calories in a fat lb. To break it down as simply as possible, I eat 1000 calories a day, but lose 2200 without doing extra exercise, that leaves me with 1200 calories left over. But, now add my exercise into play, I manually expel 1000+ calories a day so that returns me to 2200 extra calories burned. I plan on doing this everyday 7 days a week, for a month. 2200 x 7 = 15400 excess calories burned per week. 15400/3500 calories in a lb = 4.4 lbs. In theory, I should be losing around 4.4 lbs per week.

I realize this post is long, but for those who stuck it out, I greatly greatly appreciate it. Now for my question.

Is my theory correct? Can it Work?
 
(i understand it could be unsafe, pleas edon't post to tell me so even though I appreciate all concerns).
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This is a support forum - part of support is to tell a person where they are going horribly wrong.

1000 calories a day for your age and current size is terribly unhealthy...

Use some common sense please..
 
Even though I asked not for a reply like that. I appreciate the concern. Tell me of some of the side effects then?
 
Stupid plan.

And it's also assuming metabolism is a static thing.

Hint: It's not.
 
illicitdos said:
Tell me of some of the side effects then?
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Part of the problem with setting your calories so low - other than the fact that your body is still maturing and growing and changing, and it needs calories to do that - when your calories are that low... you've got no where to adjust downwards when your weight loss stalls... and it will...

a healthy weight loss is about 1 percent of your body weight a week - but that doesn't always happen...

Why the rush?
 
Of course it isn't, which is why BMR is based on a completely strict set of rules. From what I've read, BMR is stating that your body is in 100% doing nothing mode. Of course other things are going to effect the number, that's why it's a guide line. Whether or not I walk up and down the stairs in my house 1 or 4 times today will change that number, it won't blow it out of the water, but again...it's a guideline.

Thanks for your reply,
 
Well the rush is that I need to get down to size because I'm joining the US AirForce. I've seen and read and heard and had friends who've lost 5 lbs a week with no real issue to their health. It's not a long term thing, I'm not thinking anorexia or anything along those lines. I'm not going on a fad diet, I'm testing science....testing math. I want to see what other believe about this idea before I take the complete plunge.
 
illicitdos said:
Of course it isn't, which is why BMR is based on a completely strict set of rules. From what I've read, BMR is stating that your body is in 100% doing nothing mode. Of course other things are going to effect the number, that's why it's a guide line. Whether or not I walk up and down the stairs in my house 1 or 4 times today will change that number, it won't blow it out of the water, but again...it's a guideline.

Thanks for your reply,
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Me = confused
 
the problem with 1000 calories a day is that you will loose lots of your muscle mass too since you put your body in starvation mode it tries to save up all your food intake into fat. Since you are 18 years old your body is still energetic,growing and burns more calories in resting than for someone who is lets say 30. Don't get me wrong you will loose weight with 1000 but when you loose all the fat you will be way too skinny and you wont have muscle mass you once had. If you don't exercise during the day like me I would try to go 1500 calories as a min. Anything higher than 1500 will give you a healthy fat loss. So its up to you, if you want to loose weight fast and be skinny stay at 1000 but if you want to keep your fit side of body go 1500 min or higher.
 
1500, you mean consume no more then 1500 calories a day? I thought about that, the math I've done for my calorie loss as well says to do around there. But I wanted to push myself. I understand I'll lose muscle mass as well, but the whole point is to get to Airforce standard. At 71 inches tall I have to be 197 lbs. Anything more then that and they won't accept me, as far as I know. I wanted to get it done within a month and a week. I started today, put out 630 calories this morning, and so far have only eaten 165. I'm going back to the gym in an hour to burn another 670. I would LOVE to keep my muscle and look fit instead of skinny. But the problem is that I only have a limited amount of time. If you have more information I would appreciate it. And thanks for your support and reply.
 
Something is seriously fucked up if this is what our military promotes... 'get in at a certain weight no matter the cost.'

I've got plenty of friends in the military, god bless them, especially those over in the desert.

But the last thing I want protecting me is some weakened runt who dieting himself to an unhealthy state just so he could qualify as a candidate for entry.

No offense to the OP.

If I were you man, and this goes against every intuition I have b/c of your age... I'd try something like a PSMF (protein sparing modified fast).

It's very simple.

You basically eat only protein. Something like 1.5 grams per pound. Get in some fish oils, maybe 6 grams per day. And eat lots of fibrous veggies.

I'm simply saying this.... not really recommending it. It actually goes against what I'd recommend to you, but it sounds like you are going to act retardedly one way or the other so you might as well go about it as sanely as possible.

FYI, get ready for a nasty rebound of fat gain once/if you are accepted into th military and start eating regularly again.
 
I don't truly understand how to go about it. Is there any way you can give me a more detailed explanation. Some examples or something?
 
no I ment to say consume a min of 1500 calories per day. Since I see that you need to loose weight really fast for only a purpose of joining the military than you probably came to the wrong place. I had a friend who lost whole bunch of weight in a short period of time but he was in the gym 6 days/week and stayed in there for about 2.5hr and did only cardio and some situps. I would agree with Steve, watch for quick gain in weight when you go back to your normal eating habits. Good luck.
 
thats me, gym 7 days a week and only cardio. How did he turn out? Also, if this is the wrong place for this, where should I go for it. Was this long ago or recent for your friend? Maybe I could contact him?
 
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Hey Illicitdos,

Good Luck with getting into the military.
I understand and know u r just doing this for a quick fix as you are on a time constraint thing. It's only for a short period.


Steve - why would he gain a ton of wt.? Are you saying that because his body has adjusted it's metabolism? If so, how long does it take the body to adjust it's metabolism?
 
Loseit88 said:
Hey Illicitdos,

Good Luck with getting into the military.
I understand and know u r just doing this for a quick fix as you are on a time constraint thing. It's only for a short period.


Steve - why would he gain a ton of wt.? Are you saying that because his body has adjusted it's metabolism? If so, how long does it take the body to adjust it's metabolism?
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Depends.

But starve yourself and you better believe things are going to change. Even the decrease in muscle will have an effect. Hormones will go bonkers. Think thyroid, leptin, gherlin.

Not only will your body be sending all the signals making want/need to eat.... you'll also be primed for putting on fat.

How long?

Again, it depends.
 
Okay, help me with the "depends." I know there are factors but are we saying after a week of eating a 1000 cals that the body readjust, a month, 2 months, ???

One time I read the body for life book and then found a website that was based on it.

Two things that were mentioned about, metabolism and epoc.

Tricking your metabolism. This guy gradually had most people that were "starving" or someone like me that wasn't, eat a certain ratio of p/c/f to get themselves go up to about 2800 cals for woman(all depended on ht, other factors) and men as much as 3400 cals a day.
But he did it gradually(seems min. amt of time was 4 wks up to 12wks for some) , so they wouldn't gain wt while increasing their calories eating a healthy diet.

His point was that if you increase slowly from a 1000 cal diet to the 2800 diet, you may not necessarily gain any wt as it lets the body adjust.

Then their wt. loss was based on tricking your metabolism. So, now that you adjusted the body to 2800 cals a day, you would eat on the first wk. wt. loss, day1 2800, day 2 2600, day 3 2400, day 4 2700, etc..
by wk 2, maybe day 1 was 2700 cals, day 2 2000, day 3 2600, etc..
but he would keep you in the 2000 cal zone for as many wks as possible w/ no exercise.
Then the exercise.

Now his "after burn" theory on cardio was that you metabolism was raised for up to 8 hrs after doing 20 minutes of cardio. So, instead of doing 40 minutes, he'd actually have you do 20 mins. in the morning & 20 minutes during the evening.

Didn't complete this program as my computer ended up w/ a nasty virus for about 2 wks before I could straighten it out. Can't say for sure, but yeh, there were all these testimonies and did seem very interesting.
 
Loseit88 said:
Okay, help me with the "depends." I know there are factors but are we saying after a week of eating a 1000 cals that the body readjust, a month, 2 months, ???
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Depends, haha.

For me, could be a couple of weeks.

For the obese guy down the street, could be months.

It depends on a bunch of individual, biological factors.

But he did it gradually(seems min. amt of time was 4 wks up to 12wks for some) , so they wouldn't gain wt while increasing their calories eating a healthy diet.
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Gradual or rapid increases above maintenance will both lead to the same result; weight gain.

His point was that if you increase slowly from a 1000 cal diet to the 2800 diet, you may not necessarily gain any wt as it lets the body adjust.
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Certainly, I've said this time and time again on here. However..... as I said above, if you go into an energetic surplus, you're going to gain weight.

Then their wt. loss was based on tricking your metabolism. So, now that you adjusted the body to 2800 cals a day, you would eat on the first wk. wt. loss, day1 2800, day 2 2600, day 3 2400, day 4 2700, etc..
by wk 2, maybe day 1 was 2700 cals, day 2 2000, day 3 2600, etc..
but he would keep you in the 2000 cal zone for as many wks as possible w/ no exercise.
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This approach can be used if *needed*. For most, they won't need it.

And not being rude, but what's this have to do with this thread?

Now his "after burn" theory on cardio was that you metabolism was raised for up to 8 hrs after doing 20 minutes of cardio. So, instead of doing 40 minutes, he'd actually have you do 20 mins. in the morning & 20 minutes during the evening.
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I'd stop reading this guy, lol.

Does he give specifics on how to do said cardio.

EPOC contributes very little to overall metabolism. Especially with low/moderate intensity cardio.
 
I appreciate all the luck and help everyone has given me. I started yesterday with this "training" but didn't take any pictures. I've decided to "start over" today and count my weeks from Sat Jan, 5.

As stated for all who read this thread, I'm only doing this for a month to attempt at getting a 4-5 a week scale loss. Muscle or Fat, it doesn't matter, the goal is to qualify for US Air Force Entry (71 inches at 197lbs). All support/opinions are 100% welcome now, I'm curious as to what everyone has to say about this idea.

Unfortunately, I forgot a couple of pictures on my first day. However, I won't forget tomorrow. The pictures I will be taking will include the following:

- Scale shot in the morning undergarments only (t-shirt/boxers)
- Concepts of Shangri-la diet
- Morning Gym display shots that include Calorie Loss/Distance/Time Spent
- Everything eaten throughout the day
- Afternoon Gym display shots that include Calorie Loss/Distance/Time Spent
- Scale shot at the end of the day undergarments only (t-shirt/boxers)

I've created a Flickr account and am going to upload all my pictures to that account at the end of every day. For anyone who is interested in viewing my progress, my account link is
 
The BMI/weight is not the absolute judgement and never has been. If you fail the BMI, they then check body fat % with a 2 measurement index. Specifically, natural waist circumference - neck circumference. For someone 71 inches, the difference must be under 20.5 inches. In other words, the smallest point of your waist (about halfway between navel & lower end of sternum) can be no larger around than your neck + 20.5 inches.

Look at: if you want to double check the details yourself.

Secondly, while something like this can work, you're likely to sabotage yourself in the future when you come off this diet because your body will shut down your metabolism because you're in starvation mode. I know because I did a similar thing once long ago. Sure, I lost 30 lbs. in 10 weeks, but I gained it all back and then some in the next 6 weeks when I couldn't maintain what I had been doing before.
 
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