Calculating/recording net calories for exercise

rickcobb

Hi,

I'm curious about best practices for calculating and recording NET calories burned from exercise rather than just the total calories burned? For example, last time I wore my HRM for an hour just around the house, I burned 100-200 calories/hour; shouldn't I subtract that 200 calories from the 975 calories I burned in an hour at spin class this morning for a net calorie gain of 775? Thanks.

Rick

lutzsher

When you set up your profile it asked how active you were, that already calculates "normal" activity you do on a daily basis, so you do only need to record your gross exercise calories . . . the rest is done for you.
Cheers!

edorice

Right, that around the house calories is already considered in you regular daily activity. MFP already considers this. You would have already burned about 90 calories by just sitting around. Accountant_boi wrote up a good explanation on this.

binary_jester

I have my lifestyle set to sedentary. For me that means anything I do above and beyond, i count (but I wouldn't count vacuuming or cleaning, that is just bonus calories for me). So last night for my cardio I did C25k for 34 minutes. My base metabolism rate is 1935. That means I burn roughly 1.34 calories a minute just by living ((1935/24)/60)=1.34 and if I include them in my calories burned, I am kinda double counting. So I take my 1.34 calories and multiply that by the minutes exercised. 1.34*34=45 calories. I subtract that from the calories my HRM said I burned (449). I enter 404 calories for that exercise in my log.

ginnyroxx

I have my lifestyle set to sedentary. For me that means anything I do above and beyond, i count (but I wouldn't count vacuuming or cleaning, that is just bonus calories for me). So last night for my cardio I did C25k for 34 minutes. My base metabolism rate is 1935. That means I burn roughly 1.34 calories a minute just by living ((1935/24)/60)=1.34 and if I include them in my calories burned, I am kinda double counting. So I take my 1.34 calories and multiply that by the minutes exercised. 1.34*34=45 calories. I subtract that from the calories my HRM said I burned (449). I enter 404 calories for that exercise in my log.

i do this, too, thanks to Mr. Jester.

binary_jester

I have my lifestyle set to sedentary. For me that means anything I do above and beyond, i count (but I wouldn't count vacuuming or cleaning, that is just bonus calories for me). So last night for my cardio I did C25k for 34 minutes. My base metabolism rate is 1935. That means I burn roughly 1.34 calories a minute just by living ((1935/24)/60)=1.34 and if I include them in my calories burned, I am kinda double counting. So I take my 1.34 calories and multiply that by the minutes exercised. 1.34*34=45 calories. I subtract that from the calories my HRM said I burned (449). I enter 404 calories for that exercise in my log.

i do this, too, thanks to Mr. Jester.

...and if you are under estimating, it isn't that bad.

kt2007

I say that really it shouldn't be that bad to have to do that much work to get the numbers. I dont even think of the cals I burn on a day to day. i would just have to say that the cals I burn just being and doing reg stuff is just a bonus. The only cals I count are the ones I eat and the ones I do doing physical activity burning. I walk around at work all day but dont count them in at all.

rickcobb

This approach makes sense to me. If my normal daily activity is calculated at 2400 calories, that's 100 calories/hour that I'm going to burn regardless. So, if I burned 975 calories in a hour spin class according to my HRM, then the extra calories I burned from exercising is 975-100 = 875. I'm going to enter the 875 net calories burned for my workout, not the gross 975. Thanks.

Rick

ginnyroxx

This approach makes sense to me. If my normal daily activity is calculated at 2400 calories, that's 100 calories/hour that I'm going to burn regardless. So, if I burned 975 calories in a hour spin class according to my HRM, then the extra calories I burned from exercising is 975-100 = 875. I'm going to enter the 875 net calories burned for my workout, not the gross 975. Thanks.

Rick

word.

Azdak

I have my lifestyle set to sedentary. For me that means anything I do above and beyond, i count (but I wouldn't count vacuuming or cleaning, that is just bonus calories for me). So last night for my cardio I did C25k for 34 minutes. My base metabolism rate is 1935. That means I burn roughly 1.34 calories a minute just by living ((1935/24)/60)=1.34 and if I include them in my calories burned, I am kinda double counting. So I take my 1.34 calories and multiply that by the minutes exercised. 1.34*34=45 calories. I subtract that from the calories my HRM said I burned (449). I enter 404 calories for that exercise in my log.

Just another method: For me, those extra 45 calories are not worth thinking about. None of our methods of estimating either calorie intake or calorie expenditure are better than 80%-85% accurate anyway, so I don't bother taking them out. Plus, my caloric burn is in the 750-1000/hr range, so the 74 BMR calories per hour seem even less significant. I don't count lifting weights (unless that's all I do for my workout), recreational activities (walking the dog, golf, work, etc) either.

That part of it I like to keep simple....:happy: Of course I am also at more of a "maintenance" level, so I don't need that much precision anyway.

It doesn't make any difference as long as you have an "accounting" system that makes sense to you.

rickcobb

An update: I wore my HRM for a few hours yesterday just doing normal things (errands, sitting at home). The calories I burned per hour ranged from 250-400. So, a more accurate number for the calories I burn per hour when awake is 300 than the 100 calories per hour based on taking my daily activity of 2400 calories and simply dividing by 24 to get an hourly rate of 100 . In order to record my NET calories gained from exercise, I'm going to up the number of calories I subtract from the gross calories recorded by my HRM to 300/hour (or 75 calories for every 15 minutes of exercise). I'd rather underestimate the number of calories burned by exercise than overestimate.