Is a 1000 Calorie Deficit Healthy?

[Tulweyen]

Here's the scoop:

I'm 5'10, 200 lbs. Using the BMR calculators, I figure my BMR to be roughly 2000 calories. I figure I burn about 500 a day in my usual activities. I plan on burning 500 more in cardio every day.

So if you add that up I am burning 3000 cals a day.

I plan on eating 2000 cals a day.

That will give me a 1000 calorie deficit per day, or 7000 per week, or (hopefully) 2 lbs of fat per week.

My question is, is it healthy to have a 1000 calorie deficit every day? Also, do my numbers sound right?

Thanks for the help!

[CastorTroy]

You will lose about 2 lbs a week. However, it will not be all fat. If you are okay with that, then fine. Also, it will not feel too cool, I'm doing about the same thing, lol.

[CBraver]

I would do a 500 calorie deficit, if I were you, on a 40% protein, 40% carb and 20% fat diet. 1000 calories deficit will cause you to loose weight faster, but I think you will be a lot less likely to stick with the diet. Far more importantly, with such a deficit your body will eat a lot of muscle in addition to the fat. You will loose strength and, because muscle is metabolically active, a good aid to loosing the weight and keeping it off.

Good luck to you.
-Chad

[WankerSpanker]

Yup when i started dieting for wrestling in november i made the mistake of doing even 800 calorie deficet and i noticed i was getting weaker after about 2 weeks. But then i didnt end up wrestling anyways so i was able to bulk it back

now that im cutting im doing at most 700 on days im not doing much. But typically i stay 500~600 range

[Tulweyen]

Hmm... I wonder if I'm doing my math right.

Pretty much everyone here recommends eating 10 X your body weight in calories if you want to lose weight.

So I'm eating 2000 (200 lbs X 10). All I'm really doing is throwing in 30-40 minutes of cardio most days.

Is that still too much? Or am I doing my math wrong? Should I really be eating more than 2000?

BTW, I would be able to stick to it. I've gone from 300 to 200 in the past 18 months. I just haven't done it watcing numbers. I'm just now starting to record everything, and want to do it properly now that it's getting a lot tougher to drop the pounds.

[CBraver]

That's a pretty stupid "rule of thumb" they told you. I will cut eating 2,600 calories. I weigh 180lbs with a circa 15%BF right now (I'm just starting my cutting phase). I've only been doing this for less then a year, but, what they told you is way off. You sure you just didn't understand them wrong?

Oh, and congradulations on your success! 300 to 200 is impressive! That's a great job man. Keep it up!

-Chad

[CastorTroy]

the rule of thumb is 500 cals under maintenence. the hard part is to find out what your maintenence is...

[Canadian_AF]

Originally posted by Tulweyen
Here's the scoop:

I'm 5'10, 200 lbs. Using the BMR calculators, I figure my BMR to be roughly 2000 calories. I figure I burn about 500 a day in my usual activities. I plan on burning 500 more in cardio every day.

So if you add that up I am burning 3000 cals a day.

I plan on eating 2000 cals a day.

That will give me a 1000 calorie deficit per day, or 7000 per week, or (hopefully) 2 lbs of fat per week.

My question is, is it healthy to have a 1000 calorie deficit every day? Also, do my numbers sound right?

Thanks for the help!

Not bad at all, remember to keep your protein intake high to retain as much LBM as possible.

Good Luck

[user34566548717114]

depends on genetics some peoples bodies hate fat and love muscle, they lose virtually no muscle while cutting (aka: ronnie coleman) others lose a ton of muscle while cutting as well......so I would base my calorie defect on experimentation everyone is different