I am not going to get all wise about calories, what gram-calories or kilo-calories are. You may consult wikipedia provided that you need such information. Instead, I am going to simply explain what the calories stand for. The food we eat every day is being used by our body. All the nutrients are being burnt, releasing some amount of heat. It is heating our body, providing it with the energy needed for its proper functioning. What is of great importance is that not all the calories are the same.

We shall start from the so-called empty calories. These calories do not have any additional value for our body. By this I mean that they do not provide us with minerals, amino acids, fibers, vitamins, etc. The best example of these calories are calories from sugar. You may get energy from them, but without getting any nutrients.

Secondly, there are hidden calories. Let’s have a look at the example of making a vegetable soup. You know how much vegetables you put in it, so that you may calculate the exact number of calories entered. But what happens if you also put some sore cream for cooking, butter, olive oil or similar. You simply added up the calories. This shall not be considered a problem by a person that is not familiar with

The topic we are discussing here. How a vegetable soup may possibly be bad? When it comes to dieting, it is necessary to know that all the calories are equally important. If we exclude some food, it does not necessarily mean that the diet is going to work. I have heard hundreds of times people saying, ‘I shall exclude bread, soda drinks and sweets and I shall lose weight’. Perhaps you will, but that kind of torture for your organism won’t bring any good. In most cases, you may only lose water, resulting in losing few kilos, whereas your body composition and fats are going to be the same. Remember that all the diets are based on the calorie deficit. Excess calories lead to weight gains (or to the muscle gains, if we know how). The calorie deficit leads to losing weight (or elimination of body fats, if we act smart). How do we know the number of calories we need daily? Well, it depends on many factors, including gender, age, activities during the day, etc.

How do we know the number of calories we need on daily basis? Well, it depends on many factors, including gender, age, activities during the day, etc. Here’s a formula you can use to calculate it roughly. 

We will use Mifflin-St. Jeor Formula for Calculating Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR)

  • 10 x your weight in kg + 6.25 x your height in cm – 5 x your age + 5. For example, this would look like this BMR-10×80 (kg) + 6.25×178 cm – 5×22 + 5 = 1808
  • Once we have calculated our BMR, the next step would be to add up daily activities.
  • x 1.2 = Sitting activity, office, desk and light workout at the gym 1-2 times a week.
  • x1.3 = Light work activities and light exercise at the gym up to 3 times a week.
  • x1.5 = Medium heavy activities during the day and medium heavy workouts at the gym 4-5 times a week.
  • x1.7 = Strong activities, physical exertion at work and heavy exercise at the gym, 6-7 times a week.
  • x1.9 = Extreme activities. I would advise this only to professional athletes or individuals who are involved in physically demanding jobs.
  • If we take medium heavy activities and exercising at the gym 4-5 times a week as an example, it would look like this.
  • 1808 (BMR) x 1.5 = 2.711 calories for weight maintenance. Now that we have that magic figure, we can make a calorie deficit or surplus. It depends on your needs, that is, whether you want to lose fats or increase muscle mass.

If we want to lose some weight in the esiest possible way, we should decrease the calorie input per 25%. It looks like this: 2.711 x 0.75 = 2.033 calories per day. How can we define the percentage of protein, carbohydrates and fats that we are going to take? I will put it briefly and explain further in one of my future posts. My advice is to try this ratio:

  • Protein = 30%
  • Carbohydrates = 50%
  • Fats = 20%

I assume that you are familiar with the percentage calculation. These are some basic information you should certainly begin with,getting to know your body in time.