The Mathematical Diet

I’ve just downloaded this spread sheet and added my figures. Thanks @Vahan, great work. I’m not going 100% Huel but I also use My Fitness Pal so am counting the calories carefully each day. According to your spreadsheet I’ll be a lean mean fighting machine around October if I follow the calorie control religiously :slight_smile:

@RDW that sounds… difficult. I would say try drinking less coffee because cutting it out completely might make things worse. Maybe even try increasing your calorie intake a little. Changing a lot of things at once to fix the problem means that if the problem is fixed, you won’t know which thing fixed it, so try a few things. If it persists, don’t be shy, talk to your gp. It could be early signs of something serious.

@Mattyou you’re welcome :slight_smile:

@Tubby_Graver you’re also welcome. You have a good plan :slight_smile:

Oh yes, love the spreadsheet!

It’s so interesting to play with the figures, it’s come as a bit of a surprise to me just how much variation there is in calorie intake at different weights. For instance, for me now at 123kg it says i need 1389 calories to lose 0.9kg a week (close to 2lbs which is my target). Yet to carry on losing 2lbs a week when i weigh 75kg i have to eat a measly 827 calories. Now, i know i can just about manage on 1389 calories (but would be more comfortable at 1500 and a slightly slower weight loss perhaps), but later on down the line i definitely can’t see me coping on under 1000 calories. Which explains exactly why i dump a lot of weight in the beginning and hit an unbreakable wall later on after a few stone down, and hence why i give up.

It is all very obvious of course, and i knew that at a lower weight less calories are required, but seeing it all laid out on a spreadsheet has really hit home with me and made me realise that a better way of managing weight loss is to lose 2lbs a week in the early days while my calorie intake can be fairly high, and then later on slow the pace down to 1lb a week or less.

Feel kinda stupid only just putting it together properly after years of yo-yo dieting, gaining and losing 5 stone over and over.

So, thank you, what a big help this is!

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I’m on my first day of Huel & it’s just brilliant to log on to the forum, see threads like yours & be able to download the spreadsheet.
Thank you very much - you’ve really helped a newbie!

Another newbie here, and another fan of your spreadsheet - thank you @Vahan!

@donnalouise - I similarly struggle with very low calorie intake - I get too hungry! One way to address that would be to increase your activity level, which means you get a larger ‘allowance’ of calories per day - I’ve found that works for me. Plus, when I’ve lost a bit of weight and I’m feeling good about myself, I find it easier to motivate myself into the gym…

Just an update. Using the sheet and been losing exactly the amount expected based on intake etc. However this mornings two weekly weigh in shows a marked additional weight loss. Instead of my steady 1 kilo per week, 2 per fortnight - I’ve dropped 4.6 Kilo over the two weeks (probably more if I’d been to the toilet :blush:). Not sure why, been following the plan, lowering the intake to account for the new weight. Even got seriously drunk and ate barbeque food middle weekend. So very happy, slightly worried (but happy wins out). Which means my end plan is brought forward about 5 weeks in total.

As to why this is happening I cannot tell, perhaps the fact the sheet lowers intake based on weight doesn’t really work in real world situations as I’m the same person, lighter but still spending most of my time sat on my arse so probably burning roughly what I was before. Based on the static column weight I should be on 104g/meal which is roughly what I’ve been having three times a day (the gruel is getting thin :slight_smile:).

Little worried I may be losing muscle mass as my legs are now a lot thinner than they were before and they weren’t where my fat lay anyway. Still feel OK, low in energy but well, skin good etc etc, so pressing on - one month to go and I can start backing off the Huel a little and start watching my intake instead.

Just realized that’s only 1320 cals/day - do have the occasional apple or blast of frozen fruit so probably a bit higher than that :smile:

Thanks for the sheet @Vahan!

There is one bug in it, something like a y2k, only it is 2017 to 2018.
When I put a starting date in 2017 in, the numbers of the week jump up 3 instead of 2 at the turn of the year.
Changing the number of weeks from 53 to 52 in the formula fixes it.

Thanks for the great work!

Thanks for this. I’ll definitely be giving this a go.