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Stop Guessing Your Way to Weight Loss

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All too often, dieters are guilty of relying on having a ‘rough idea’ about their weight loss goals and progress. But in reality, weight loss is a numbers game, and to get the results we’re after, we need to make sure we have our calculations about calories, exercise and targets correct. So we’ll take you through the numbers you need to know and how to calculate them.

Calorie Intake: Breaking weight loss down to the most simple equation we have to remember that ‘energy in’ must be less than ‘energy out’. But as well as energy expenditure, the amount of energy you should be taking in each day also depends on your height, weight, gender and age. Use this calorie calculator to plug in your own figures to understand just how many calories (and what kind s of calories) you should be taking in.

Energy Expenditure: Once you’ve got a goal for the number of calories you should aim to consume in a day, you also need to understand what impact your exercise regime is having. Are you running/walking/swimming every couple of days and just hoping that it is enough? This activity calculator will help you understand how many calories your exercise and your day-to-day activities (like sleeping!) are burning. Remember, if weight loss is the goal, we’re looking for this figure to be higher than your energy intake figure.

Targets:The other figure to consider in your journey to weight loss is which number you will use to track your progress e.g. dress size, weight, body measurements. A good figure to use to understand if your diet and exercise regime is working is your BMI. Your BMI, or Body Mass Index, calculates your weight in relation to your height and sets a scale for what range this figure puts you in, from Underweight to Obesity. You want to aim for a BMI between 19 and 25 in order to be within a ‘normal’ weight range. Calculate your BMI here .

Taking a more mathematical approach to weight loss may be a little overwhelming sometimes, but it is a much more effective way than guessing your weight loss goals and then getting frustrated when you don’t see results. Because to get the right figure, we’ve got to get the figures right.