Energy used in HIIT/strength training

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Lovefastball99
Lovefastball99 Posts: 53 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I've read people say HRM are not used for strength training calorie tracking. But what if the weightlifting is... Well, fast paced. No breaks. Supersets. I feel my heart rate is extremely elevated during these exercises. And I'm uncertain that the amount of calories MFP assigns to strength training under cardio is accurate in this case. Any ideas?

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  • dougii
    dougii Posts: 679 Member
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    That sounds about the same as how I workout in the gym; no breaks, constant sets using different muscle groups. I do not track this as strength training but rather as circuit training. I believe the calorie burn is a lot more accurate this way.
  • esjones12
    esjones12 Posts: 1,363 Member
    edited March 2015
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    I log those type of workouts as circuit training and it is usually fairly close to what my HRM says. I have yet for anyone to tell me how to calculate in intensity based on their non-HRM calculations.

    Always use the Relative Rule (I totally just made up that name). If you are reaching your goal but are hungry and tired all the time, you should probably be eating more. If you aren't reaching your goal you are eating too much by not weighing properly and/or over estimating your burns. Kind of a guess-and-check if you will.
  • Lovefastball99
    Lovefastball99 Posts: 53 Member
    edited March 2015
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    esjones12 wrote: »
    I log those type of workouts as circuit training and it is usually fairly close to what my HRM says. I have yet for anyone to tell me how to calculate in intensity based on their non-HRM calculations.

    Always use the Relative Rule (I totally just made up that name). If you are reaching your goal but are hungry and tired all the time, you should probably be eating more. If you aren't reaching your goal you are eating too much by not weighing properly and/or over estimating your burns. Kind of a guess-and-check if you will.

    Thanks! And since we've never met, let me introduce myself. Last name- Hungry. First name- Always. Pleased to meet you.
  • AllanMisner
    AllanMisner Posts: 4,140 Member
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    Calorie burn is always going to be an estimate. So don’t kill yourself trying to come up with some exact figure. Plug in something that seems reasonable to you based on your perceived effort and go with it. After a few weeks, if you find you’re not getting the results you want, tweak your estimates.

  • 3dogsrunning
    3dogsrunning Posts: 27,167 Member
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    This may be helpful to you
    http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1044313/this-is-why-hrms-have-limited-use-for-tracking-calories/p1
  • Sam_I_Am77
    Sam_I_Am77 Posts: 2,093 Member
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    That's why I'm not a big fan of MFP's calculation method; it requires the use of 3 variables and 2 of which are definitely highly skewed.

    1. Calorie requirements is a swag
    2. Calories in food are more consistent but definitely not exact
    3. Calorie expenditure from exercise is a huge swag.

    You're much better off using a TDEE method, approximating energy expenditure with a variable, similar to Mifflin St. Jeor method, and not worrying about your calorie burn.
  • maxit
    maxit Posts: 880 Member
    edited March 2015
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    I log all exercise through fitbit and enter separately "interval training" and "Weight lifting (free, nautilus or universal-type), light or moderate effort, light workout, general" for the lifting through fit bit, even though I feel like the workout is not "light" or "moderate." Then I look at the trend over several weeks in term of CICO and also whether I am feeling strong or puny (adequate energy to complete my workout) at the gym. So far, I am on track -- so while the actual numbers may be "swag" overall I am meeting my goals. My advice is to settle on some method, and then see what the data say over 4-6 weeks - adjust accordingly.

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