Daily Caloric Intake

C

colby2152

New Member
There is a lot to be said for your metabolism adjusting to how many calories you put into your body. Recomendations for entering a bulk or a cut is to add a 100 or so calories every week.

I write down everything I eat day by day, yet I analyze it week by week. Let's say my goal for a cut is 2500 calories per day. It's tough to eat 2500 every day. Sometimes there is a big day when you are partying and eating a lot / drinking the booze. Then you must have a day or two of extreme cutting. For ex:

2490
2018
2917
3743
1735
2540
2054

Seven days averaged out to 2500 yet there were great changes in the amount of calories day to day. Is this bad for my metabolism when it comes to cutting?

That's the basis of my question... constant intake of 2500 or a weekly average, does it make a difference or does the variable intake hurt my muscle gains or fat losses?
 
It makes a huge difference.

The larger the deviation, the bigger the difference.



Even if weight gain and weight loss somehow evens out, the problem remains with the partitioning.
(where the extra energy goes / where the energy in shortage comes from)

I believe the way your calories are divided into meals throughout the day is crucial, so of course dividing them differently over days will make a difference...
 
Sorry Hammer your explanation was a bit unclear, are recommending eating diff calories on diff days, or same calories every day? Also a few reasons for this if you could.
 
Your weekly total balance is what matters most as long as you aren't doing anything totally retarded, like eating 800 calories one day, then 4000 the next. Try to keep each day as consistent as possible but don't sweat it if you miss your mark every once in a while.
Remember that calorie information is all just an estimation anyway and won't be exact, so if you are just in the general area of what your goal is, you should be fine. When I'm cutting, it isn't very often that I hit my goal right on, but I try to stay within 100 calories or so.

BTW, dividing your food up into a million meals to increase metabolism and improve partitioning was shown to be bunk a long time ago. It may have some effect, but it definitely isn't crucial. It has been clearly demonstrated that it has no real difference over someone getting the same amount of calories in just three meals. The weight loss will be about the same.
The best thing you can do for partitioning is not eating seventeen tiny meals a day - It's exercising. That's the biggest variable you can control. Obviously if you cut calories and don't work out, you will lose some fat and plenty of muscle, whereas if you workout, then more of the weight lost will be fat than muscle.
 
There seems to be support for each side of the argument with good reasoning for both. Toten, I am with you, but why? Hammer, if that' so - then where are the facts, research, studies, numbers, etc?? Anyone else got an idea?
 
i actually buy into both hammer and totz points on this one.

as totz stated its the overall balance that is key (on a weekly basis) as long as your not letting the daily cal swings get too out of hand. even on a daily basis i see no advantage to 6 meals or 3 its just a matter of what works best for you.

as hammer stated the larger the deviation the bigger the differance.

i just think some of the cal diff between days is quite signifigant. the closest you come one day to the next is @500 cals. youve got 1 day with 1000cal diff and 1 with a 2000cal diff.! im no expert but dropping 1-2k in a day every couple days doesnt sound very muscle sparring to me.

like totz (and others im sure) i try and hit certain number when cutting (and bulking for that matter) but i dont worry about it as long as im within@100-300cals of a goal. usually i dont even try to "make it up" as there are already so many gray areas in diet/training why bother.

the real question is if your having success with the cut and are happy with your results so far(fat loss,musc maint.)? if yes then your fine. if no then maybe the cal swings are too great. it sure seems like youve put a lot of work into a sound training prog (from other posts) and diet tracking and analysis but signifigantly less effort into actually being "on" your diet except on a weekly basis. boy that sounds harsh, certainly isnt intended that way.
 
<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">the real question is if your having success with the cut and are happy with your results so far(fat loss,musc maint.)? if yes then your fine. if no then maybe the cal swings are too great. it sure seems like youve put a lot of work into a sound training prog (from other posts) and diet tracking and analysis but signifigantly less effort into actually being &quot;on&quot; your diet except on a weekly basis. boy that sounds harsh, certainly isnt intended that way.</div>

The cut went okay the past cycle and not good the previous one and a half due since I thought I was burning a lot more calories than I was.

The ideas are sound.

So the suggestion is to watch it weekly as I already do, but also try and keep the standard deviation low? I think a better watch on my diet and doing cardio on days that I drink may be a good solution to this. Thanks for the tips. Aaron, Dan, or anyone else have good ideas?
 
I agree Totentanz, like he said, as long as it's not retarded I don't see where it would make much of a difference when looking beyond single day acute responses.
 
<div>
(quadancer @ Aug. 31 2006,11:40)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">Quit drinking.</div>
Such a simple idea, yet something I can't do. I'm a Senior at PSU - #2 (used to be first
mad.gif
) party school in the nation. My time to do something like that hasn't come.
 
i used to work out of harrisburg PA back in the early 90s but had an office in state college. i spent a fair amount of time (after hours) at the rathskellor (sp?) so i can sympathize. of course i think most college towns have a &quot;rat&quot; in them.
 
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