Calories Maintien
Exactement ce qu'il faut pour garder son poids.
Understanding Maintenance Calories
What Are Maintenance Calories?
Maintenance calories (also known as your Total Daily Energy Expenditure or TDEE) represent the exact number of calories you need to consume each day to maintain your current body weight. When you eat at maintenance, you are in energy balance — the energy you consume equals the energy you expend. This is the starting point for any nutritional plan. To lose weight, you eat below maintenance. To gain weight, you eat above it. Knowing your true maintenance calories is arguably the single most important piece of nutritional information for achieving any body composition goal.
Why Eating at Maintenance Matters
Many people think of maintenance as “not making progress,” but eating at maintenance calories has significant benefits. It can support body recomposition (building muscle while losing fat) especially in beginners and those returning from a break. It helps reset metabolic adaptations after extended dieting. It supports optimal training performance and recovery. And it provides a psychological break from the stress of calorie restriction. Periodically returning to maintenance (called a “diet break”) for 1–2 weeks every 8–12 weeks of dieting is a research-backed strategy for long-term fat loss success.
Finding Your True Maintenance
Calculator estimates are useful starting points, but your true maintenance can only be determined through self-tracking. Eat the estimated calories for 2–3 weeks while weighing yourself daily (at the same time, in the same conditions). Take the weekly average of your weight. If your average weight stays within 0.5% of your starting weight, you have found your maintenance. If you are gaining or losing weight, adjust by 100–200 calories per day and test again. Body weight naturally fluctuates by 1–3 pounds daily due to water retention, food volume, and sodium intake, which is why the weekly average is more reliable than any single weigh-in.