Exercise calorie accuracy

nkovacs53804

I’m a 71 year old guy that bicycles 100-125 miles per week on some awesome hilly roads in SW Wisconsin.
I use an Apple Watch that syncs great with MFP but I seriously doubt the accuracy of the calories burned during my 90 minutes 12-14 mph ride.

Anyone else have this concern or how they compensate for it?

Thanks,

Nick

Retroguy2000

You didn't give any calorie numbers, or why you think it's very off.

It's probably a lot of calories. Whatever it is, the best form of tracking is knowing your input calories and your weight change. You can compute your own TDEE from that, better than any watch or online calculator.

Lietchi

If you have a power meter, I think there is a way to calculate more or less how many calories you burned. (I've only read about this - I don't cycle myself)

DiscusTank5

When I got my Coros Pace 3 watch, I was surprised to see how closely its estimated calorie burn for each of my activities was to MFP's estimate (running, biking, a little lower for swimming). I've been losing weight since January, tracking daily, and I think the calorie estimate is largely correct.

Oh, and I have not synced my watch to MFP, so each provides their own estimate independently.

nkovacs53804

thanks.

AnnPT77

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/comment/48686281#Comment_48686281

Hours X 3.6 X average watts is a reasonable estimating formula for cycling calories. The power meter would measure the average watts.

nkovacs53804

gave up the power meter a couple years ago. Now I just go ride and watch my heart rate zones

LiveOnceBeHappy

Do you "eat back" those calories? While my bike is an e-bike, I still burn between 400 and 800 calories a ride. I go fast (16 to 18 mph average when done), use as little assist as possible, and go fairly far (25 to 40 mile rides) several days per week. I don't "eat back" those calories. I may fudge 50 calories to indulge in a treat at the end of the day, but I don't put them in my diary.

I bike with a guy who is very, very overweight. His Strava profile says he's burning 1800 calories per ride or more (analog bike).

I play pickleball with several very, very overweight women. They are burning tons of calories.

My takeaway is, for me, don't count those calories. It's all about the food.

Female, 56 yo, 5'2.5", very nearly at goal at 136.5 lbs.

rsccore

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10942952/exercise-calorie-accuracy

I wore my Apple (series 10) and my Garmin (Epix Pro) at the same time for a couple weeks, one on each arm, both paired to a Garmin HR chest strap, and the Apple did poorly with estimating intensity. It did ok on flat steady state stuff, but Garmin's HRV algorithms give it an edge on measuring calories in the wild. I also double checked the results against calculators, which you might want to do, and against the scale during the diet. I did the experiment because I wanted to wear the Apple watch more because it is a better smartwatch. So at some point I need to just accept that I have enough different activities and they are sufficient, and just go with that and wear any one of my other watches.:)

age_is_just_a_number

calories IN and OUT are all, at best, estimates. There are so many factors.

I compensate by rounding calories IN UP and calories OUT DOWN.

nkovacs53804

thanks for the great comments. To answer a couple questions

No, I don’t eat back the calories. Eating enough is a challenge.

Since May 25 I have lost about 30lbs with a realistic program of clean balanced eating and both cycling and resistance exercise.

Water consumption is 10-16 glasses a day plus 2 21 ounce bottles of electrolytes when I cycle

I’ve gone from a Garmin Fenix to an Apple Watch because I’m not a data geek but do like keeping track of basic data

Retroguy2000

30 pounds in 7 weeks? That's about 4 pounds per week, suggesting a deficit of 2,000 per day.

yirara

You don't say how heavy you are, but losing 4lbs per week is crazy! The maximum mfp gives you is 2lbs per week, and for reason: losing too quickly also means you lose a lot of muscle along the way. Especially at your age having good muscles is crucial to prevent falls, keep you mobile, prevent osteoporosis. Please eat back a part of your exercise calories.

AnnPT77

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/comment/48689702#Comment_48689702

If you've been at this since May 25, you have enough personal experience data to estimate your total average calorie needs from that, including the exercise. Since you say you're not going to eat back the exercise calories, this data will tell you what you need, total calories.

As others have suggested, the rough math suggests that if you're losing around 4 pounds a week on average, you're eating 2000 calories fewer per day than you're burning.

Unless you currently weigh over 400 pounds, that's an aggressively health-risking loss rate. It risks muscle loss, gallstones, depressed immune system, and much more. Is something bad guaranteed to happen? No. But risk is greatly increased.

It doesn't matter how clean you're eating, or how balanced the macro percentages are: It's unlikely a person gets adequate nutrition on too-few calories. Since your calorie needs are extremely unusually high, there's a better chance than average at that loss rate that you're reaching adequacy, but even then unlikely it's optimal, since the exercise increases certain needs. Yes, exercise also mitigates some of the risks, but it doesn't eliminate them.

Getting enough calories - even while losing weight - is the foundation of health, performance, and robust aging. In our demographic - I'm 69 - age-related sarcopenia starts being a very real risk, plus potentially things like osteoporosis (yes, even in men). Therefore, when aging, the risks from aggressively fast weight loss - underfueling - are even higher than they are for young'uns.

You say "eating enough is a challenge". If you're actually overweight, how did you become overweight? It has to have been by eating more than you burn. Consider adding back in calorie-dense foods you can moderate. If you want to stay "clean" and didn't formerly eat that way, more frequently eat foods like fatty cold-water fish (for Omega-3s), nuts, nut butters, seeds, avocados, olive oil, and other similarly calorie-dense nutritious foods.

If you're a person whose definition of "clean" involves avoiding carbs, I hope you're aware that with your cardiovascular exercise load, you're likely burning more of them in the moment, so timing them around rides will avoid some of the effects that make people demonize carbs. Even the targeted ketogenic diet (TKD) does that, while letting the person stay in ketosis much of the time. (FWIW, I don't practice low carb as a recreational athlete, but I do prioritize veggies, fruits, no-sugar added dairy and some whole grains as my carb sources. I don't demonize carbs, either.)

I'd strongly suggest you eat more, lose slower. Five hundred calories per day is roughly a pound a week. A sensible weight loss rate - managing health risk - as a rule of thumb is something in the range of 0.5-1% of current body weight per week, with a bias toward the lower end of that unless severely obese and under medical supervision for nutritional deficiencies or health complications.

Best wishes for successful weight loss, health, and exercise performance!

J72FIT

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10942952/exercise-calorie-accuracy

I remember lot's of people on here would cut those exercise calories in half…