Charge HR and Cycling

dan_the_man0904

Hello all!

My wife and I just recently outfitted ourselves to get into cycling and we have gone out on a couple of trips so far this season. I have been switching my Charge HR to exercise mode at the beginning of the trip and tracking our distance and speed with MapMyRide. I do not have the two linked. I have a question about logging. My Charge HR said that during our last trip, I burned 567 calories. When I said that it was cycling, Fitbit dashboard didn't change anything. It asked me for my mileage, and I put in that we rode 4.61 miles. Fitbit then dropped me from 567 calories to 261! Which one do I believe? I would think the Charge HR would be most accurate because it's tracking my heart rate, but I want to make sure I'm not crediting myself with something I didn't earn.

heybales

What you did when it asked for distance was enter in a manual workout with calorie burn based on database and speed - which replaces the calories that Fitbit came up with, based on HR.

No need for that.

You can edit the activity record that was created by pushing the button, and include the miles in the name of the activity for easy review later.

Then again - MMR is likely to be your better exercise app for reviewing stats and performance improvements, I'd just leave Fitbit stuff alone. Activity record is there if curious what it saw for calorie burn.

Now, if early in the exercise game, that HR for riding may have been badly elevated for just being out of shape, and you didn't burn that many calories, as evidenced by the fact the database entry had you at 1/2 the calories.
I'd use the database maybe, or MMR estimate, until the HR amount is closer, then just leave it alone.
Make sure MMR is bike weight, and your clothed weight - I doubt you bike naked, but you do carry around the weight of clothes, which Fitbit wouldn't know either of those stats.

That's where the HRM could be even now more accurate.
12 mph on 40 lb mountain bike with noisy tires burns much more than 12 mph on 15 lb road bike with skinny tires.

dan_the_man0904

Well I forgot to mention/take into account that I was also pulling 60 extra pounds behind me in the form of a child trailer and a two year old in tow. I don't think I can get either app to account for that.

sarahmichelef

dan_the_man0904 wrote: »

Well I forgot to mention/take into account that I was also pulling 60 extra pounds behind me in the form of a child trailer and a two year old in tow. I don't think I can get either app to account for that.

You'd think the extra effort would be reflected in your heart rate, wouldn't you? (Just guessing... I use a Flex...)

heybales

You are correct, HRM is way to go then, nothing else will estimate the extra road resistance, the extra parachute effort when the wind is right, and the extra weight, for calculating a calorie burn.