How accurate are the elliptical machines at the gym....

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goofball
goofball Posts: 12
in Fitness and Exercise
for telling you the amount of calories you have burned during your workout? I enter my age and my weight most of the time, I am just counting my calories eaten and calories burned right now, and want to know just how accurate most of these machines really are? I go to Anytime Fitness (if you've heard of that) basically a brand new anytime 24 hour gym. Anyone have any insight on this? Thanks!

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  • goofball
    goofball Posts: 12
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    for telling you the amount of calories you have burned during your workout? I enter my age and my weight most of the time, I am just counting my calories eaten and calories burned right now, and want to know just how accurate most of these machines really are? I go to Anytime Fitness (if you've heard of that) basically a brand new anytime 24 hour gym. Anyone have any insight on this? Thanks!
  • banks1850
    banks1850 Posts: 3,475 Member
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    not very. If you really want to know accuracy, pick up a Hear rate monitor.
  • lessertess
    lessertess Posts: 855 Member
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    They can be off anywhere from 10% to 30%. If the machine gets your weight and age then it probably more like 10-15% off.
  • yenn
    yenn Posts: 48 Member
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    it tells me 800 and my HRM tells me nope, sorry, you get ... 350 !!
  • banks1850
    banks1850 Posts: 3,475 Member
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    Put it this way, I wear a monitor, so my very high end machine (the one at the private gym in my office) pulls my heart rate from that, it also records my weight, and today I ran for 30 minutes, which my HRM recorded as 395 calories, but the tredmill recorded as 590. Sooooo. I'd say they aren't very accurate.
  • goofball
    goofball Posts: 12
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    lessertess, I am guessing the 10-15% would be LESS calories than the machines are telling you? This whole thing really irritates me.............OF COURSE I have been basing my calorie burning on what these stupid machines say, guessing they are not all the way accurate, but should be somewhat in the ballpark.

    Where do I pick up a heart rate monitor? Are they expensive?
  • TamTastic
    TamTastic Posts: 19,224 Member
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    What I have been doing lately while on the elliptical is entering a weight several pounds less than I am and then whatever number comes up at the end of my workout, I subtract like 150 calories for the final count. I feel this gives me a pretty accurate number. I never eat all my exercise calories anyway.

    I plan to get a heart rate monitor myself but until then, this method seems to be working pretty well.
  • KrisKabob
    KrisKabob Posts: 1,250 Member
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    Not accurate... not at all. :cry:
  • banks1850
    banks1850 Posts: 3,475 Member
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    lessertess, I am guessing the 10-15% would be LESS calories than the machines are telling you? This whole thing really irritates me.............OF COURSE I have been basing my calorie burning on what these stupid machines say, guessing they are not all the way accurate, but should be somewhat in the ballpark.

    Where do I pick up a heart rate monitor? Are they expensive?

    Most sporting goods stores have em. One note, the ones with chest straps usually give you a constant heart rate, the ones that are just wrist, many times, only give you your HR when you hit a button, which can be annoying if you are working out, also not as accurate.
    Polar makes a good one (F6, F11 are two models), so does Nike.

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