Does calorie counting work? Or is it all one big nonsense?

Many athletes today cannot do without calorie counting. By knowing how many calories they need to take in and how many they need to expend during the day, they can set their diet and training plan precisely. It doesn't have to be just for strength athletes. Anyone who is serious about their fitness will appreciate the information about their calorie intake and expenditure. In short, calorie counting helps people to achieve their sporting goals.

But counting your calories correctly is not just a matter of counting them. In fact, there are a number of problems associated with this process that people often overlook. As a result, sometimes they may even end up hurting themselves by counting calories. Why is that? What to look out for when counting calories? And does it make sense to count calories at all? Find out in our article today.

Why do athletes count their calories?

The main benefit of counting calories is quite simple. Knowing how many calories your body burns during the day allows you to plan your mealsso that he can take in the ideal amount of calories during the day to achieve his desired goal. For example, if you want to lose weight, you must take in fewer calories than you consume (calorie deficit). In this case, your body will be forced to draw the remaining calories from your fat stores. Conversely, if you want to gain muscle, you must supply the body with enough energy to build it. Your daily calorie intake must therefore be higher than your calorie expenditure (calorie surplus). But if you don't know how many calories you burn during the day, and you also have no idea how many calories your diet contains, you're going to have a really hard time planning.

Therefore, people who don't count calories at all tend to either overshoot their diet extremely (restrict food to the bare minimum), which is not only ineffective but also quite dangerous in the long run. The other extreme is that they feel they have restricted their diet enough, but in reality they are still in a calorie surplus. Theoretically, they can also achieve caloric balance, but this is also not enough to lose weight.

There is no doubt that calorie counting has huge benefits, especially for athletes. However, limiting oneself to blindly tracking some numbers on a mobile phone or computer screen is not ideal. There are several major problems with calorie counting.

Not all calories are the same

If you tell a newbie at the gym that in order to put on muscle, they'll need to increase their calorie intake. their calorie intake, their eyes will most likely light up with excitement. In fact, many people see the need for a caloric surplus as an excuse for eating sugary foods, fast food and the like. But this is, of course, wrong. You won't grow muscles from chips and cakes. Although quantitatively you will meet the required calorie intake in such a case, qualitatively it will not be so shiny. While one calorie of good quality meat contains the same amount of energy as one calorie of chocolate cake, in terms of health and macronutrient content, the two sources of calories are quite different.

If you limit your calorie counting to numbers, you may well you'll get the calorie surplus (or deficit) you need, but it won't help you reach your goals. In addition to the calories themselves, you always need to look at the content and ratio ofr of macronutrients (protein, carbohydrates and fat) and the composition of the food. Taking in calories from poor quality sources will not help your body.

Calorie counting is not always accurate

I'm sure you've read the calorie chart on the packaging of a food item in the store. But did you know that this information is not 100% accurate and is largely an estimate? Fortunately, the variations in this regard are not staggering and don't pose any serious problem for standard calorie counting. It's much worse when you want to cook something at home. This is because there is no calorie chart and you have to calculate the ingredients you used separately. To do this, however, you need to weigh them accurately and recalculate the figures on the table. However, this is extremely impractical and time-consuming, so most peopleprefer special apps that contain nutritional information for different foods.

But the problem is that when you find, for example, fried chicken breast on such an app, it doesn't haveno information on how much fat the breast was fried in and what fat was actually used. The information from the app may therefore be quite different from how many calories your fried chicken breast contains, as the preparation method may have been quite different in both cases. Not to mention that often the app won't find exactly what you cooked at home. Another problem is the fact that people tend to underestimate the amount of food they eat at home. So unless you weigh everything to the gram, your calculations can be quite inaccurate.

However, the problems with calorie calculation accuracy also apply to output. If you use a smartwatch or wristband to measure calories burned, the readings will certainly be too high.than an estimate based on the average number of calories burned during each physical activity. But even these readings won't be 100% accurate, which is especially true for cheaper models. Ultimately, therefore, measured calorie expenditure and calculated calorie intake should be taken with a grain of salt.

Just don't go crazy

The main reason why many people don't take too long to count calories is the mental and time-consuming nature of the process. Pulling out your phone at every meal and punching in numbers just gets old after a while. But if you tell yourself that you'll record everything at once until sometime in the evening, you'll be less accurate in your calorie counting. Over time, this leads to not recording some meals at all, and before you know it, all the information you've gathered will be pretty inaccurate. This is obviously not the case for everyone and some people can no doubt manage to record all their meals honestly over a long period of time. But the question is whether it's worth it to a person.

Indeed, in the pursuit of achieving set goals, people tend to overlook the needs of their own bodies. Are you hungry after a hard workout, but have you taken in too many calories during the day? What do you do in such a situation? Will you listen to your body or will you prioritise your strict diet? And what if it was the other way around? In the evening, you find that you should take in some more calories to meet your daily plan, but you don't feel like eating at all. Will you force yourself to eat in the evening, or will you accept that you won't reach your goal today?

How to deal with calorie counting?

So the question arises, how should one count calories so as to be as accurate as possible and not go crazy after a while. Personally, I think the most important thing is to be able to work with the calories you take in without having to constantly count them via an app. In the beginning it's good to try to measure everything as accurately as possible. If you can keep it up for 2 weeks to a month, you will have a very good idea of your energy intake and expenditure. This information will not be 100% accurate, but it will be plenty for this purpose.

If you find that you should increase or decrease your calorie intake, choose from yourand replace them with a more suitable alternative. But before you do, record your weight and ideally take photos of what your body looks like. It also doesn't hurt to write down how you feel somewhere (it's a problem for you for longerlonger physical activity, feel less mobile, feel a lack of energy after working for longer, etc.). If you are not going to make any major changes to your diet, there is no need to continue to write everything down accurately. After a month, compare your weight, the visual impression of your figure and your feelings from the previous month. If there has been a positive change, you are on the right track. If not, something needs to change.

With this approach, you'll have a decent idea of what your approximate calorie intake and expenditure is, but you won't have to write everything down all the time. By making targeted changes to your diet, you'll be able to easily adjust your intake to suit your needs. What's more, this system will last you a long time because it's not demanding. It may not be 100% accurate, but as long as you see positive results on yourself, it doesn't matter.

Summary in conclusion

Counting calories in and calories burned will help you set your ideal diet and workout plan. However, you also need to be aware of some of the problems associated with it. In particular, it is worth remembering that all calories are not qualitatively the same and that it is not good to focus only on some numbers on a screen. It is important to listen to your body and respond to its needs. In the long term, it is therefore advisable to learn to keep an eye on your calorie intake without having to write everything down all the time. It's not an exact method, but if you manage to take in as many calories as you need in this way, that's absolutely enough.

If you have any questions about this topic, feel free to contact us in the comments.