Why is 1,400 cals per day the minimum target you set?

Our system sets 1,400 calories as the lowest ongoing daily target on the expert advice of our consultant Dr Campbell. In his experience, trying to stick to a lower target for any length of time results in a higher drop out rate – your diet becomes much more restrictive and therefore harder to sustain. The secret of success is to maintain a reduced calorie intake over a period of time. This approach is far more likely to result in weight loss success – and importantly long term maintenance.

Very low calorie regimes and crash diets may initially result in a big weight drop, but initial weight loss will be largely water (especially in low carb regimes), and you will also risk losing lean muscle mass, sometimes even from areas such as heart muscle which has a potentially hazardous effect on health. Losing muscle also increases the proportion of fat in the body – which has a negative effect on metabolic rate (muscle being a more metabolically active tissue than fat).

Plus drastic food reduction causes the body to go into 'preserve' mode and become more efficient about calorie usage. Your weight loss won't ever go into reverse if you lower your calorie intake drastically, but you will get into a situation of ever decreasing returns in which your weight loss becomes less efficient. In other words the extra pain involved in terms of hunger / risk of nutritional deficiency etc is not worth it matched against the only small benefit you get in terms of extra weight lost. And when you do return to eating normally, your body will want to grab hold of the extra food and store it in case of another lean period! So the overall effect is a slowing of metabolic rate, increase in overall percentage body fat and less efficiency at losing weight!

That said, there may be members with certain circumstances who need a target lower than 1,400 calories in order to achieve their goal. The Set My Own option will let you reduce down to our minimum 1,200 calories. To do this:

In the app

Tap the blue menu button to the right of the search bar in your diary, select Nutrient Goals > Set My Own Goal. Now tap on the calorie figure to override it with your own number, scroll down and tap Apply Changes.

On the website

Click the Settings link above your diary. Select the Set a nutrient goal link then Set My Own Goal. Click on the calorie target to override it with your own figure, then scroll down and click Apply Changes.