Garmin connect calorie calculations

emawbey

Hi everyone! I am looking for some help with exercise calories, apologies if this is already covered elsewhere in the forum I have a little look but nothing seemed to specifically answer my question. So I am moving into maintenance at the moment but also running quite a bit which I guess means I should start to eat back some of my exercise calories. My mfp allowance is 1920 and I am currently moving towards that increasing weekly, I'm at 1675 (min) -1920 (max) at the moment and haven't really lost the last couple weeks.

Anyway on to the actual question! I went for a 10K run yesterday and the Garmin calculated calories for this were 821 which just seems too high? does anyone have an opinion on this? I just feel like if I start to eat back these cals and the full mfp allowance I will gain back?

Any advice greatly appreciated :-)

MeanderingMammal

I generally work on:

cals per mile = 0.6*wt in lbs

So at 160 lbs about 100 cals/ mile giving about 600 for a 10K, assuming flat and a hard surface. It increases with elevation and on trails.

The practical issue for you probably involves eating a proportion, and seeing what effect it has. Test and adjust.

emawbey

Thank you meandering! I think the test and adjust methodology is best for sure, I just wondered how Garmin comes up with such a high number, I find it annoying because it has my weight details etc.....

sijomial

emawbey wrote: »

I just feel like if I start to eat back these cals and the full mfp allowance I will gain back?

The accuracy of your base calorie setting and food logging will have a far greater impact than worrying too much about the accuracy of your running calorie estimates. Say you do that run x3 a week and the estimates are 200 too high - that's just 600 a week and it will take six weeks to make a difference of 1lb.

Consistency and making adjustments based on actual results over an extended period of time will let you find your maintenance allowance.

If you do want to try and get the estimates closer.......
Not sure if Garmin Connect works on gross calories or net calories. I'm sure it will use a fairly standard formula so maybe that's the difference? Might be worth investigating. (You would then take a set number per hour off rather than a proportion/percentage.)

One way to fiddle the numbers on Garmin if you feel they are significantly wrong is to adjust your weight setting on there. I use it for cycling and its calorie estimates are really low for me. I've set my weight +30lbs to try and bring it closer.

emawbey

Hi Sijomial, thanks for that input, I get what you are saying I'm not too worried about it, I just work in science so am a bit of a data pendant lol! Again I think monitoring and making adjustments is the key to this, someone said on another forum that it is like keeping a ship on course with variable tides which I think is a fab analogy!

sijomial

It's more complex than I realised! Seems that different Garmin devices work in very different ways.....

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2010/11/how-calorie-measurement-works-on-garmin.html

emawbey

Thanks, this is a great article, will read it in more detail but seems like it might be a good idea to get my HR monitor strap out of the back of the cupboard!

powered85

I have a garmin. Did you have a heart rate monitor attached to your device when you recorded the activity? Most agree that they tend to give a better estimate on calories. I did a 10k yesterday and it said 630calories burned with a heart rate monitor attached. I run a lot and am around 170lbs male.

If I don't use a heart rate monitor, generally it'll say I burned at least 100-200 more calories depending on the distance. I trust the hrm more because it accounts for how good of condition you are in. As you get in better shape, generally the hr goes down as does your calorie burned. Same with losing weight. I burn a lot less now per run than I did when I was heavier.

emawbey

Hi powdered, yeah previously I have not been using it with my HRM so I am going to give that a go, good to hear it helped in your situation gives me hope I can get more accurate data.