Finding my cutting daily calorie intake

[snikez]

Ok so I found that at 2,500 calories a day, I gain a pound a week. I want to experiment to find how many calories I should eat to lose a pound a week. The thing is, I don't want to decrease my daily intake too fast or I'll lose muscle. I was thinking that I should just decrease my calorie intake by 100 a week until I start to lose a pound a week-then just stick with that amount until where I want to be at. Does this sound good?

[Tom Mutaffis]

Assuming that your figures are accurate, one pound is equal to 3,500 calories - so you would have to eat 1,500 calories per day in order to lose one pound per week, or 2,000 per day to maintain.

[snikez]

1,500 calories seems like such a little amount... I'll give it a try though. thanks

[Athos]

I use one of those complex formulas that factor in your activity rate, effects of food energy, bodyfat, etc., without going through it, I can tell you that for me, when I weighed 199 the formula said I could eat around 2200 calories a day and lose .5 to 1 pound each week without losing muscle. The lowest I could go was 1900 calories a day and I could lose closer to 1.5 pounds, anymore less would cost me muscle. It seemed to work well, I lost over 20 pounds and my strength stayed the same, although I didn't lose 1.5 pounds a week, it was more like .75 pounds per week. Doing it so slowly, over all those weeks was good for not losing muscle. I took care to ensure I still took in my protein quota. But it was VERY difficult for me the first four or five weeks to keep my calories that low without being hungry constantly, I had to really tighten my diet up. It's hard to feel satisfied on that little bit of calories.