Calculate the calories of the diet

If you've been following my posts, and know that the first step to dieting is knowing the calories we expend daily. These calories we include a term of the GET or total energy expenditure. To find out, we calculate the three factors that influence our energy expenditure:

• The GMB or Basal Metabolic expenditure: is the energy required to maintain vital functions of our body in a state of absolute rest, doing nothing. We must never lower our calories below this figure, it would be giving our body fewer calories than you need to maintain our vital functions.
• Expenditure of Physical Activity and Physical Activity Factor (AF on): the energy we spend during the day, where we included everything we do, from brushing our teeth, watching television, to go to the gym to spinning .
• The TID or Diet Induced Thermogenesis: is the energy released as heat product of the metabolism or digestion of the foods we eat. Usually represent 10% of total calories.

Well, with these three factors GET or find out the total energy expenditure, and what we do with these three simple steps. Therefore:

GET = AF + GMB + TID

Started!

1. The first thing is to find out what our body expends at absolute rest, the GMB. For this there are several ways, but the most used is the Harris-Benedict formula. As you can see, there is a distinction between men and women. Make no mistake!.


Men GMB = 66.4730 + (13.7516 x W) + (5.0033 x H) - (6.7550 x A)
Women GMB = 655.0955 + (9.5634 x W) + (1.8496 x H) - (4.6756 x A)

Where:
W: Weight in kg
H: Height (height) in cm.
A: Age in years.

One time you have the result of the formula, I give you a figure. That figure is calories, calories that your body spends just to survive. Remember that underneath those calories should never lose, it's your health.

2. The second step is to multiply this figure by the factor of physical activity, ie add to the previous calories, calories we spend in our work, our hobbies, going to class, etc..

This will be somewhat approximate, since there would be assessed on an individual basis our activity during the day using tables daily activities, calculate, take half, and finally evaluate the exact value. Anyway, I made a very simple guideline table to somehow solve this problem and, as I say, is widespread.

Click to enlarge

The rows marked in green are the most common values ​​(Sedentary lifestyle - unfortunately-, normal and active). Thus, by way of example, if our GMB is 1500Kcal and our Physical Activity factor is 1.3, we multiply these figures.

1500Kcal (GMB) x 1.3 (AF) = 1950Kcalorías

3. Finally, we can only add that 10% of calories for the TID, ie the Diet Induced Thermogenesis. Continuing the previous example:

1950Kcal (GMB x AF) * 1.1 (10% of TID) = 2145 Kcalories

Now we have our GET (Total Energy Expenditure) throughout the day. By knowing the calories our body daily spends approximately, we can make our diet!, Either a diet to lose weight, a diet to gain weight, or a maintenance diet!

I hope to serve you, and if you have any doubt, ask me to help you delighted.