Getting Started with ProTracker Plus
ProTracker Plus helps you keep track of the calories you eat and burn through exercise. ProTracker Plus gives you the tools to stay within your calorie budget, how exercise affects your budget, what you can eat and help you achieve your weight loss or gain goals.
This is a basic rundown of what you should do to use the product:
1. Track your food
Everything you eat should get tracked into the app. Tap the + button at the bottom of the Log tab to get started with tracking. You’ll be able to quickly search through our database of over 33 million foods to find what you need.
Even if it was just a tablespoon of almond butter or a chicken nugget off your child's plate, log it!
2. Follow your calorie budget
Your calorie budget represents how much you should eat each day. If you meet your calorie budget each day, you will reach your goal weight at the rate of your weight loss plan. When you set up your account with ProTracker Plus we ask you to tell us some basic information about yourself (height, age, current weight and goal weight). This information, along with your weight loss plan per week, is how we create your calorie budget.
3. Incorporate exercise (if you want!)
If you exercise, you will burn more calories. That means you have more wiggle room, and you can choose to eat those exercise calories back. ProTracker Plus adds those exercise calories to your daily calorie budget.
You should only log intentional exercises such as walking the dog, running, cycling, or gym workouts. We already assume you’re burning calories for basic activities, like household chores and walking around.
ProTracker Plus uses your chosen activity level to estimate the number of calories you burn in a day. ProTracker Plus provides four physical activity levels that members can choose: Not Active, Somewhat Active, Highly Active, Extremely Active.
Not Active or Somewhat Active options are recommended if your occupation is in an office setting. Highly Active and Extremely Active options are recommended if your occupation is physically demanding such as a professional athlete or construction worker.
We recommend choosing the activity level that best coincides with your daily work/life routine, excluding optional exercise. Exercises outside of your daily work/life routine should be logged as exercise. However, if you’re using a fitness tracker, there’s no need to log exercise as your total calorie burn will be used to track your activity.
4. Eat what you want
You’re allowed to eat anything you want. The only requirement is to follow your calorie budget. When you add food to your log, the calories from those foods will be deducted from your budget. You can see how many calories you have left for the day as you continue to add foods.