This is EXACTLY the sort of info I found useful and educational when I started tracking. Made it a lot easier to find the things I liked that actually fit my goals instead of the things I just THOUGHT fit my goals.

BB

Yeah, I just noticed that yesterday as well. Holy cow. I've discovered that the reason low-carb diets work isn't just that limiting carbs reduces cravings, but also that carby foods also back a boatload of calories. So I can eat three pieces of fruit for the same calories as a single cookie. The tradeoff, when you put it like that, is simple.

For the days I'm running late, I take a can of V8 juice (the small size) and a Kellogg's Special K Flatbread Sausage, Egg, & Cheese Breakfast Sandwich. I have a microwave at work, so at my first chance I nuke it for a minute or two and take it back to my desk and eat while I'm working. The V8 and the sandwich are 270 calories together.

That's not the only reason, but yes, ANY diet that has the effect of restricting calories will help you lose weight. It's amazing how many carbs are in bread, rice, pasta, and potatoes!

That's right, but the calories in the fruit and the calories in the cookie are both carbohydrates. The fruit comes with more fiber and a different balance of starches and sugars, but it's not inherently less "carby" than bread, cookies, and so forth. A lot of cookies and pastries actually get a significant amount of calories from fats, as well as from carbohydrates.

great thread, motivates me to try this app . . . my smart phone is terrible though.

You can always just use the website if your phone isn't up to it.

Scott

That's true, and there's a lot of variation in different fruits, but for instance, one strawberry is 6 calories; a full cup of them is about 50. One single chocolate chip cookie is 140 calories. So you can have almost 3 cups of strawberries, or one cookie. Plus, as you said, strawberries have a better mix of nutrients than sugary carby cookies.

What smart phone do you have?

If you try to use MyFitnessPal and have issues, like it doesn't want to update your gender and other info like that, try going to the MyFitnessPal.com website and setting up your account at a regular computer. Once the account is set up, the MFP app works better. I think the app asks you for info to set up your account, but it can't enter the data into the account until the account is actually created. So it keeps reverting back to the default values, whatever they are. I had that issue; once I set it up from my desktop computer it was fine.

Depends on how much whipped cream you put on them!

Personally, I think that eating a little of everything, in moderation, paying attention to total calories and the balance of macronutrients (carbohydrates, protein, and fat) is healthier than excluding certain foods categorically. But you can make better or worse choices, and it helps to accustom yourself to the better. The delicata squash I roasted as a side dish for dinner tonight tasted just as good as a baked potato with butter, except it didn't need any butter.

Totally agree. I did low carb several years ago. I'm enjoying just trying to limit calories better. More flexibility. But I've only had about a half dozen cookies in 2 months. I just can't justify the calorie count.

I've been on MFP for a while (I was on it for a year, lost 45 pounds, and started to gain when i stopped using it).

The thing I like the most is that it forces you to make choices with your calories. A lot of stuff I used to eat I walk away from now. Where I work my employees bring in cookies every single day. I always look at the calories and think to myself that for the same calories as one cookie I could have an orange and an apple. Conversely, after a metric century it's pizza time!

I find there calories for biking a little on the generous side, but I just use the calories from my heart rate monitor when I exercise.

I don't really have a goal. I'm just planning on eating this way from now on and seeing where my weight settles. For the last two weeks I've been plateau'ed around 100 down, but I only rode 20 miles like week :/ With the weather changing, I'm having to change my ride time and routine, throwing me off some. So far loose skin isn't a problem as I still have enough fat hanging around to fill it up :) Frankly, I'd love for loose skin to be my main problem :)

a scientific study could probably be designed to test this . . . just set up some criteria that defines a "yo-yo" diet, eg. >20 lb weight loss and gain for x number of time periods for y number of years, then follow them forward for health outcomes, eg. heart disease, cancer, diabetes . . . match them with "non-yo-yo" controls and . . . voila . . . science! but . . . who would fund it? drug companies only if they could make a drug to treat it and there were a market where they could make money. don't see gov funding in this budget climate.

ps--actually, this has been studied quite a bit, it's called "weight cycling" in the scientific literature (get it . . . "cycling" . . . "bike forums" it's cycling realted :) ), check out this study where they found low number of cycles (1-4) was actually associated with lower mortality (I'm guessing these were successful dieters?) and high number of cycles (>20) conferred no additional risk of death . . .

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22287640

pps--here's a summary of the state of knowledge on "weight cycling" . . . not very helpful! here's the conclusion . . . gee, thanks . . . I'll *try* to do that, doh!

http://win.niddk.nih.gov/publications/cycling.htm

Just checking back in to say down 38, but stalling out a bit with the cold weather. Cold really makes me want to eat more unfortunately...

I use map my ride on a iphone. You can enter the food you eat during the day and it keeps track of your calorie intake and what you have burned during the bike ride.

I have been using myfitnesspal for 195 days and I have lost 72 pounds. I am 196 lbs as of this morning, these things really work!

Made it to almost 42 down now since the end of June. Yup, it works!

Over the last year and a half I lost about 60 pounds using my fitness pal. Not only did it give me calorie information but it helped me to make adjustments to my diet for healthier foods. More than going on I diet, it gave me the information I needed to make fundamental changes to the way I eat. It also helped me gauge what I needed to eat to replace the calories I brined while riding my bike. Now that I have a healthy sustainable diet I am not loggingall my food and exercise on a daily basis but I still use it to track my weight. I highly reconmend this program.

227 Days using the app and I am down 75.8lbs

Impressive!

At 44 lbs now since I started logging (56 lbs from maximum density!), with a target of 16-20 more to lose.

I started using myfitnesspal.com a few weeks ago. I am only using my computer (not my iPhone) and it seems to log pretty well.
I have had great success following a nutrition plan in the past when keeping a food diary, but couldn't sustain the logging -- I didn't like carrying around the 3-ring binder and book of calorie counts EVERYWHERE.

The exercise calories vary wildly from what my Polar HRM and Garmin/Strava report. There is so much difference in exertion between cycling 14mph on hilly chipseal with stopsigns; and 12mph on smooth flat paved roads with few intersections.

I still have a challenge with some of the foods.
What was in the homemade dessert I sampled at a party? How big is "a slice"?
How much oil/butter was in the entree that a caterer provided at the same party?

It has been an eye-opener seeing where the calories are coming from.
I don't use sugar, but it is everywhere including the fresh fruit that I love. An apple uses up most of my daily allowance.
I am not a big meat eater, but I still get more protein than RDA from all the dairy and whole grains and beans in my diet.
I had been doing a workday grab+run car breakfast consisting of a Clif bar and a Starbucks coffee energy drink this past year. I am going to only do that as a pre-bikeride breakfast and switch to something less sugary/caloric before work.

Right now I am riding like crap. I have lost a few pounds but am still near my recent worst tonnage.
I can gauge my energy levels by how hard it is to climb the 30 stairs to my office with a backpack on.
When I was not minding my diet, I was able to run up the stairs most days (except the day after a hard bikeride).
Now it is a slow trudge and often a stop at the top landing.
My usual 1-hour weeknight ride I used to average 15-17mph.
I am down to 13mph and I am getting dropped on group rides if there is the slightest hint of an incline.
It is really tempting to err on the side of overfueling to be able to ride with my friends. This has been a real issue for me in the past. The group rides are my main social outlet.
So it goes. Hopefully the long-term gains (actually losses) will override the short-term pain.

Your best bet for counting calories is getting a good heart rate monitor. As you noted in your post, there are just too many variables for any of the items above to be close. For the record, when I started using a heart rate monitor, I learned that MyFitnessPal was close and MapMyRide was about 20% over in estimated calories.

When I was loosing weight, I only replaced about half the calories that I burned when exercising. This helped my weight loss without putting my body starvation mode.

I generally don't trust MFP's exercise calorie estimates; for cycling, Nordic skiing, etc., I use my HRM. Similarly, I don't always trust MFP's food database, which is user-contributed; some people are careful, but others are, shall we say, optimistic about the number of calories in food.

Still, it's a useful tool if you are aware of its limitations. I've lost 47 lbs. since January while using MFP.

I stepped on the scales this morning and found I was 9# heavier than I was 2 days earlier. Yikes.
Yep Doohickie, I was horrified looking at the chocolate+chocolate chip cookie nutrition info. At least the cookies are all gone now.
Christmas Eve calorie intake excesses were bad enough, although a good bike ride mitigated the damage so I was "only" 300kcals over goal -- supposedly a net loss.
I am not even going to log Christmas Day! I am pretty sure it was 2-3 days worth of calories on my plate and I did the lazy girl thing sitting around most of the day.
Hopefully all my muscle glycogen stores are filled up along with all the water those cells need.

Last year On January 1st I weighed 277, this morning I am 195. (was down to 193) Ok so I went up 2 pounds over the Christmas Holiday :lol: As Brian mentioned some of the MFP estimates are not realistic so what I do is I take the lowest exercise count and the highest calorie count for food and I have been taking the weight off with no problem.