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TDEE Calculation and Active/Resting Calorie Discrepancy

Former Member over 7 years ago

Disclosure: I posted this in the Vivove subforum a couple days back but it got very few views/no replies, and it’s of some concern to me.

I have a few questions about my new Vivomove HR, all of which have to do with figuring out how to get an accurate calculation of my TDEE so that I can gauge my intake accordingly.

So TL;DR: How can I figure out my TDEE/maintenance calories from my Vivomove HR data?

This sounds like it would be fairly straightforward [(active calories - the number of calories I would have burned while at rest anyhow) + resting calories], aside from the following:

1. Garmin seems to be using RMR, or sedentary metabolic rate, rather than BMR for its 'resting calorie' calculation. According to standard formulas, my BMR should be around 1300 and really shouldn't change all that much from day to day. However, on my Garmin my resting calories are at 1532. That's about what I get when I enter my stats into different RMR/Sedentary calculators.

[So if I were in a coma, I'd burn about 1300 kcal/day; if I weren't in a coma but wasn't doing much apart from sitting around, getting up to go to the bathroom, and whatnot, I'd burn around 1530.]

I'm concerned that Garmin is then adding my 'active' calories on TOP of the sedentary number, which would then give me a higher-than-accurate TDEE reading. No?

2. These two photos. Keep in mind I'm very new at this. These were taken mid-day, but at the same time. The first screen is telling me that I burned 574 active calories, whereas the second says that I burned 750. What's up with that discrepancy? I'm guessing this ISN'T a system glitch but is instead some kind of net vs. gross calorie issue, but as a n00b it's leaving me in the dark as to my proper target intake. [~200 calories is a pretty big discrepancy if you scale it for a week.]

Obviously I know these are all estimates, but again, I'm trying to be as precise as possible, and certainly don't want to be off by as many as 1400 calories a week.

TL;DR redux: [1] What data should I consult to get the most accurate sense of my TDEE, and [2] re: the photos in question, would that day's maintenance calories be closer to the 2100 or 2300 mark?

Many thanks. ciq.forums.garmin.com/.../1335862.png ciq.forums.garmin.com/.../1335863.png

0 heybales over 7 years ago

1 - It does start out with BMR, probably Mifflin or similar (hope not the ancient Harris), but then adds on food processing calories they say. That's where they lose me, because the simple math they give of Total daily calories less stated Active calories does not result in the same RMR figure day to day. Now, perhaps they are correctly doing 10% of what you eat as general average for food processing to add to calculated BMR. But they have a figure for RMR that doesn't change once I sync MFP food totals across either, so I can't figure it out, and not useful.
With the math they express it, Total burn less active calories - there is no adding on top of sedentary. They are getting an Active figure based on steps or HR or anything - it's result is purely from subtraction.
You have a burn that exceeded sedentary (super-sedentary to me) - they are merely giving you an expression of how active beyond that - no addition with the Active figure is happening.

2 - One is a weekly view, one is daily - that's the only thing I can see is a potential math issue.
But more likely, I've observed that after I've added in a workout, or it's synced over from other Garmin 310, GC won't update the total daily burn figure immediately on the Summary or Dashboard screen.
Was the burn of the run perhaps 176 calories?

Also - hope your device is figuring out when NOT to use HR-based calories, as that leads to bad inflated values during the non-aerobic non-exercise normal-daily-activity part of the day.
Steps resulting in distance should be used then, along with that BMR figure. And actually for actually, TEF should be added they claim to add (Thermic Effect of Food processing)

That's where having an accurate stride length value for your average daily pace is good, since that's the majority of time. Not exercise level pace length.