Easy Tips for Setting Goals

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Being able to set goals is the key to measuring your success. As a trainer, I find that many times when I’m not making progress with my fitness, it’s because my focus isn’t on the big picture or my end goals. So today, I’ll share with you a few easy tips on how to use your iFit Coach membership to help you set fitness goals. Keeping track of your progress is crucial when you’re working towards better health, especially when you’re focusing on exercise. The iFit Coach app gives you a few different ways to log your exercise throughout the day.

How To Log Your Exercise

• Manual log—you can manually log your exercise on the iFit Coach app.
• Recommended workout—simply complete one of the workout recommendations from the app to automatically log your workout for the day.
• Wearable workout—complete a workout while you’re wearing your iFit wearable to automatically log your workout for the day.
• Fitness equipment—complete a workout from iFit connected fitness equipment (treadmill, elliptical, bike) to automatically log your workout.

The Importance of Nutrition

Once you have an exercise goal, the next step is to create a nutrition goal. In the iFit Coach app, you can set a nutrition goal for how many calories you want to consume each day. You also have the ability to view your daily calorie intake and nutritional information for the food you log. In order to help you reach your personal health and fitness goals, iFit will actually calculate a personal calorie intake goal for you. This specific goal is based on many factors, including your weight goal, activity, age, height, gender, etc. When you’re setting a calorie goal, it’s important to remember that the goal needs to be maintainable.

How We Calculate Your Net Calories

Calorie Intake (Food) - Total Calories Burned (BMR, Activity, Exercise) = Net Calories A few notes to remember while using the iFit Coach app:

• Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) is the number of calories your body will burn at rest. For example, if you’re lying in bed, not eating or moving. BMR is the calories you need to keep your body running without burning or adding to your energy or fat stores.
• Activity includes the calories you burn doing all of your normal, daily tasks, like walking around the grocery store, making lunch, cleaning your home, etc. Coach also takes these things into account and measures them by the number of steps you take (tracked on your iFit wearable).
• Exercise accounts for the calories your body will burn when you work out. This doesn't include the steps you take at work or home. It's specific to working out or completing an exercise for a given time frame, which is why it’s very important to track your exercise in the iFit Coach app.

How Net Calories Affect Weight Loss

It’s important to remember that if you have a weight loss goal, you'll have a net calorie deficit that’s factored into your daily calorie goal recommendations. Creating a net calorie deficit is done by eating fewer calories than you burn. For the average person, 1 pound equals about 3,500 calories. So in order to lose 1 pound a week, you have to eat 500 calories less than you burn each day.

Set Weekly Weight Loss Goals in the App

Lose .5 lb/week = -250 net calories Lose 1 lb/week = -500 net calories Lose 1.5 lbs/week = -750 net calories Lose 2 lbs/week = -1,000 net calories iFit wants you to reach your goals while keeping your body healthy and happy. How many pounds a week you can lose is based on your max calorie deficit. Our expert dietitians don’t want women consuming less than 1,200 calories per day, or men consuming less than 1,500 calories per day. It’s difficult to eat a healthy, well-balanced diet without consuming enough calories, so when you restrict yourself too much or lose weight too quickly, it's often muscle that you lose instead of fat. By losing just a little weight each week, our nutrition professionals can help you burn the fat, keep the muscle, and stay on your diet while keeping a healthy lifestyle.

How Net Calories Affect Weight Gain

If you have a weight gain goal, you’ll have a net calorie surplus that’s factored into your daily calorie goal recommendation. Creating a net calorie surplus happens when you eat more calories than you burn. For example, in order to gain 1 pound a week, you have to eat 500 calories more than you burn each day.

How Net Calories Affect Weight Maintenance

If you have a weight maintenance goal, then your net calories will be zero. That means that you’ll need to burn off the exact amount of calories you eat. For example, if you burn 1,800 calories, you’ll need to eat 1,800 calories. If you happen to eat fewer calories, you'll lose weight. And if you happen to eat more calories, you'll gain weight. Tracking everything in the iFit Coach app will help you to know where you stand with your calorie intake and burn in order to help you achieve the personal goals you’ve set for yourself. It also gives you the ability to track your activity, including your steps and distance. After that activity is tracked, you’ll be able to view your daily activity stats. The next step is to set a schedule for yourself and plan ahead. In the iFit app, you can decide how often you’re going to exercise throughout the week, which meals you’ll eat each day, and how many hours of sleep you’ll get each night. Having a set plan will help you to stay on track. Make sure you have a set time frame to achieve these goals. That’ll give you added motivation to accomplish your goals in time. Most importantly, make sure the goals you set are realistic and attainable. Too often, we want the end result without taking the proper steps to achieve them. With iFit, you’ll be able to monitor your progress, alter your goals as you go along, and finally, accomplish them! Good luck! Mecayla Ramsey iFit Trainer