Exercise

aneary1980
aneary1980 Posts: 461 Member
edited November 21 in Health and Weight Loss
If any exercise (very limiting atm) is logged via a fitness tracker with a HR monitor will it be fairly accurate in cals out?

Replies

  • pettyone
    pettyone Posts: 9 Member
    Fitness trackers may overestimate your calorie burn from exercise. Many on MFP advise only eating a portion of those exercise calories back to be on the cautious side until you see how it impacts your rate of loss.
  • BusyRaeNOTBusty
    BusyRaeNOTBusty Posts: 7,166 Member
    The equations used to convert heart rate into calories are really only valid for steady state aerobic activity. They are less accurate / possibly not useful for things like intervals or weight lifting.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
    Sometimes. My HRM is totally wrong (over) by as much as 40% for cycling. HRMs count heart beats, not calories. Taking caffeine raises your heart rate without appreciably changing your calorie burn, so do a thousand other things.
  • jjpptt2
    jjpptt2 Posts: 5,650 Member
    Sometimes, and unfortunately there's no real good way to know for sure without some pretty consistent testing (trial and error).

    The formulas used to calculate (estimate) cals burned make some assumptions... and the closer you/your activity is to those assumption, the more reliable the numbers will be.
  • kaotik2003
    kaotik2003 Posts: 21 Member
    I configured MFP to now show calories burned with exercise. Eat normally and with no exercise and do it anyway. More weight lost.
  • BusyRaeNOTBusty
    BusyRaeNOTBusty Posts: 7,166 Member
    NorthCascades wrote: »
    Sometimes. My HRM is totally wrong (over) by as much as 40% for cycling. HRMs count heart beats, not calories. Taking caffeine raises your heart rate without appreciably changing your calorie burn, so do a thousand other things.

    Asthma inhalers are a big one too.
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