It's getting harder and harder to burn calories
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I was about to write the same thing. Do a season of strength training. If you include (properly done) kettlebell swings you can burn more calories in less time.0
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If the HR is slower because of training and adaptation, you need more intensity to burn the same number of calories regardless of weight. Of course you burn less if you weigh less, but it's more complex than that.Ok so basically my body is working more efficiently because I've lost weight and I'm in better shape. As I continue to work out with different programs I will have to keep working harder. When I started this I hadn't worked out for a few years but I have worked out most of my life. I have medical issues and medication that also may also affect how I burn calories. I don't really sweat.
I appreciate everyone's input. I'm looking forward to starting Les Mills in a few weeks and continuing to lose weight and inches.
No - it's not efficiency.
You weigh less, it takes less energy (calories) to move a smaller weight. That's why your estimates are falling.
Nothing more complex than that.
Remember your estimate is simply "General aerobics" and time - it does not and cannot know if you are getting fitter or trying harder.
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@Witchdoctor58Witchdoctor58 wrote: »
If the HR is slower because of training and adaptation, you need more intensity to burn the same number of calories regardless of weight. Of course you burn less if you weigh less, but it's more complex than that.Ok so basically my body is working more efficiently because I've lost weight and I'm in better shape. As I continue to work out with different programs I will have to keep working harder. When I started this I hadn't worked out for a few years but I have worked out most of my life. I have medical issues and medication that also may also affect how I burn calories. I don't really sweat.
I appreciate everyone's input. I'm looking forward to starting Les Mills in a few weeks and continuing to lose weight and inches.
No - it's not efficiency.
You weigh less, it takes less energy (calories) to move a smaller weight. That's why your estimates are falling.
Nothing more complex than that.
Remember your estimate is simply "General aerobics" and time - it does not and cannot know if you are getting fitter or trying harder.
But she isn't measuring HR.
She is just picking an exercise category and logging duration. Because her weight is lower she gets a lower estimated number of calories - simple.
Yes it becomes more complicated as fitness levels change and HR only has a little to do with it. HRMs are not calorie counters, most don't even estimate your fitness level. Mass, distance, power, duration are the real factors.
For a non-weight bearing exercise (cycling) I produce more power and therefore burn more calories at a lower HR than before I got fit or conversely same intensity more calories burned despite being lighter. A basic HRM wouldn't measure that. A basic estimate using MFP categories wouldn't get that either.
All of which is irrelevant to the OP!
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Witchdoctor58 wrote: »
If the HR is slower because of training and adaptation, you need more intensity to burn the same number of calories regardless of weight. Of course you burn less if you weigh less, but it's more complex than that.Ok so basically my body is working more efficiently because I've lost weight and I'm in better shape. As I continue to work out with different programs I will have to keep working harder. When I started this I hadn't worked out for a few years but I have worked out most of my life. I have medical issues and medication that also may also affect how I burn calories. I don't really sweat.
I appreciate everyone's input. I'm looking forward to starting Les Mills in a few weeks and continuing to lose weight and inches.
No - it's not efficiency.
You weigh less, it takes less energy (calories) to move a smaller weight. That's why your estimates are falling.
Nothing more complex than that.
Remember your estimate is simply "General aerobics" and time - it does not and cannot know if you are getting fitter or trying harder.
Let me also chime in to say that "lower HR" does NOT equal "lower calorie burn" if the aerobic workload is the same (or greater) with aerobic steady state exercise. Calorie burn is based primarily on aerobic workload (e.g. METs or watts). Heart rate reflects the percentage of one's Max HR during exercise.
An 80kg untrained person working at 7 METs will burn approx 560 calories/hour. If that 7 METs represents 80% of their aerobic max, then heart rate will be fairly high. If that 80 kg person increases their aerobic max with training and doesn't lose weight, they will still burn 560 calories/hour if working at 7 METs. However, since aerobic max has increased, that 7 METs may now represent only 65% of max. So heart rate will be lower, but since MET value and weight are the same, calories burned will be the same as well.
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70% of your calorie burn is from your resting metabolic rate. It is calculated using your fat free body mass. Muscle up and burn more fat 24/7, even when you are asleep, not just while you are doing steady state cardio. Here is a workout that might be what you are looking for (a bit of both worlds).0
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@sijomial I was using the General Aerobics category. I've been using my Fitbit's calories since February. The category shows way more calories than my Fitbit does but I figured going with the lower number was safer.
And I created a separate entry for CIZE and always used my Fitbit calories.
I added weights to my workout several months ago, every other day, and my Zumba workout has light weights, that I do weekly.
The new workout I'll be starting uses weights regularly which is why I thought it would be a great next step. It incorporates HIIT, plyo, weights cardio and martial arts.
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70% of your calorie burn is from your resting metabolic rate. It is calculated using your fat free body mass. Muscle up and burn more fat 24/7, even when you are asleep, not just while you are doing steady state cardio. Here is a workout that might be what you are looking for (a bit of both worlds).
The one problem with this line of thinking is that you can only build muscle while eating in a surplus. If one is losing fat, one is eating in a deficit.
Lifting weights while cutting is to help retain muscle, not add muscle.
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@sijomial I was using the General Aerobics category. I've been using my Fitbit's calories since February. The category shows way more calories than my Fitbit does but I figured going with the lower number was safer.
And I created a separate entry for CIZE and always used my Fitbit calories.
I added weights to my workout several months ago, every other day, and my Zumba workout has light weights, that I do weekly.
The new workout I'll be starting uses weights regularly which is why I thought it would be a great next step. It incorporates HIIT, plyo, weights cardio and martial arts.
Good - it sounds like you have a plan. Nice mix.
In the end if you are getting fitter, stronger, healthier and your weight loss is running to schedule then it's working.
It's the results that matter, not agonising over the detail of if the MFP categories or Fitbit are right.
I did almost 13 hours of exercise this week using a whole variety of estimating methods some of which were precise measurements of power, some HRM based, some from GPS tracking apps, some random finger in the air guesstimates!
As long as my weight does what I want (maintenance) then the accuracy is of little importance.2 -
The one problem with this line of thinking is that you can only build muscle while eating in a surplus. If one is losing fat, one is eating in a deficit.
Lifting weights while cutting is to help retain muscle, not add muscle.
I was thinking long term. Periodicity. Sometimes it's not a bad idea to change focus for a season, especially if you are stalling.0 -
70% of your calorie burn is from your resting metabolic rate. It is calculated using your fat free body mass. Muscle up and burn more fat 24/7, even when you are asleep, not just while you are doing steady state cardio. Here is a workout that might be what you are looking for (a bit of both worlds).
The one problem with this line of thinking is that you can only build muscle while eating in a surplus. If one is losing fat, one is eating in a deficit.
Lifting weights while cutting is to help retain muscle, not add muscle.
If you're cutting and lifting to not lose muscle, and you're losing weight but gaining strength, then aren't you adding muscle? I've been losing three pounds a week but my lifts have improved.
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OP if you want to challenge yourself, go for Body Attack, over combat. I used to easily finish the combat classes, but rarely finished the whole hour of Attack!0
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Christine_72 wrote: »OP if you want to challenge yourself, go for Body Attack, over combat. I used to easily finish the combat classes, but rarely finished the whole hour of Attack!
I didn't realize you took Les Mills classes!
It seems the OP was planning on doing the home version of combat, though
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Christine_72 wrote: »OP if you want to challenge yourself, go for Body Attack, over combat. I used to easily finish the combat classes, but rarely finished the whole hour of Attack!
I didn't realize you took Les Mills classes!
It seems the OP was planning on doing the home version of combat, though
I used to when i went to the gym. I dreaded those body attack classes, they were brutal!
I wonder if the home dvd versions are the same as the gym classes.. I would think so??
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Christine_72 wrote: »Christine_72 wrote: »OP if you want to challenge yourself, go for Body Attack, over combat. I used to easily finish the combat classes, but rarely finished the whole hour of Attack!
I didn't realize you took Les Mills classes!
It seems the OP was planning on doing the home version of combat, though
I used to when i went to the gym. I dreaded those body attack classes, they were brutal!
I wonder if the home dvd versions are the same as the gym classes.. I would think so??
I know they released a home version for combat, but I wasn't sure they did so for BodyAttack. For the benefit of anyone else reading, BodyAttack classes have options and you don't always have to do the most difficult level
. But I kinda like it for that reason - there's always some way to go higher, it seems 0 -
Christine_72 wrote: »OP if you want to challenge yourself, go for Body Attack, over combat. I used to easily finish the combat classes, but rarely finished the whole hour of Attack!Christine_72 wrote: »OP if you want to challenge yourself, go for Body Attack, over combat. I used to easily finish the combat classes, but rarely finished the whole hour of Attack!
I didn't realize you took Les Mills classes!
It seems the OP was planning on doing the home version of combat, though
Yes, I am going to do the home version. They have various calendars, so typically I start with the easiest one and work my way through each one, or do that program and then an extra workout with it. Some of the Les Mills videos are only 30 minutes for the whole day so I'd definitely want to do another workout on top of that.0 -
I have a question no one has asked... When you say "Fitbit," is it one of the ones that measures HR? Or one that's just a pedometer? Maybe that's a stupid question, but I thought it was worth throwing out there.0
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michelleepotter wrote: »I have a question no one has asked... When you say "Fitbit," is it one of the ones that measures HR? Or one that's just a pedometer? Maybe that's a stupid question, but I thought it was worth throwing out there.
It's a charge hr. It measures hr, steps, calories, sleep... I wear it 24/7 except for showering and while it's charging.
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rankinsect wrote: »One thing to know about calorie estimation from heart rate monitors - if you're in low cardiovascular fitness, they tend to overestimate calories burned, and if you're in high cardiovascular fitness, they tend to underestimate.
The reason is that it's doing an estimate without having any way to measure one key variable. Calorie burn does correlate pretty well with oxygen consumption, and oxygen consumption does correlate pretty well with cardiac output, but cardiac output is the product of two things: your heart rate (easily measured) and the stroke volume, the amount of blood moved in each beat. Stroke volume isn't measurable at home, not until someone invents a wearable echocardiogram.
As your cardiac fitness goes up, your stroke volume goes up; your heart gets stronger and moves more blood per beat. This means that a very fit person will have a lower fitbit reading than a very unfit person, even if both do the same actual calorie burn, because the unfit person's heart needs to beat more times to move the same amount of blood.
Hmm. I wonder what's proportional to this stroke volume per beat that we could indeed measure! Or when they'll come out with wearable echocardiograms
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3dogsrunning wrote: »It has a lot to do with BMI as well. I can attest to that personally. When I started my weight loss journey I could burn 1,300 calories in about 10 miles of bike riding. And just today I went on a 30 mile ride and burned less than 1,100 miles.
As your weight goes down, the more effective it becomes at burning calories.
One of the biggest reasons I HATE those "It takes this many miles of walking to burn of this [fill in the blank] memes you see on facebook. Everyone's BMI and metabolic rate is different.
It has nothing to do with BMI and metabolic rate. It takes less energy to move less mass. So the lower your weight, the fewer calories it requires to do the same work. See sijominal's post above.
Less BMI equals less mass to move around. BMI = body mass index....1 -
If you ask your body to keep doing the same things, you will get fitter and burn fewer doing the same workouts. We need to add intensity or duration or both in some measured way. 10% a week is the suggestion for both, 3 weeks build, then a week of recovery at 50%. We get stronger on our rest days when we let the body repair the muscles from workouts. Cross-training is a great idea because it keeps mixing things up. Make hard workouts hard, easy workouts easy and never two back to back hard ones. This is a science. Lots to learn. I started at about 400 pounds 10 years ago. I weight 187 now, 2X IronMan, USA Triathlon coach. Lots of great experience comes from wanting to get fit, exercising and eating right. Good luck0
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