Calories Burned Question

Kaylee11133

This may have been asked an abundance of times before, and if so, I apologize ahead of time.

I have a stamina recumbent bike that I cannot program my weight/height into. It always gives me a calories burned reading of a lot less than this site does. So, I've been just using what the bike says, because I feel better underestimating my calories burned than overestimating them. I've been told machines generally default to the calories burned of someone who is 150 lbs, so I'm assuming that's what its basing it's calories burned from? I'm 177.5 lbs, 5'4".

So, I just exercised for 60 minutes. The bike says 340 calories burned. This site, when I put in stationary bike general says 562 calories burned. I wore a polar heart rate monitor with the chest strap the whole time, my average heart rate was 165 bpm. I'm 23, so a bpm of 165 would put me at an 85% of maximum heart rate zone. When I calculate calories burned based off of that with calculators online, I get an estimated calories burned of 644 calories burned, but I assume that is also the calories i'd burn from just sitting here too. But i'm just not sure. Also, I'm not sure based on that heart rate what I should be logging it in as, general/light/moderate?

Should I just go with the lower of the numbers, the bike reading? Should I take the average of the bike and MFP? Any opinions would be greatly appreciated! :flowerforyou:

itsbasschick

i just put your info with heart rate into an online calorie burn calc and it came up with
Calorie Burned(kCal): 644.155

i got the same result at another calc, but it said that was gross. for net, it said "your net calorie burn is approximately 570 calories." ah, so that might explain the differences.

editorgrrl

All of the burns are estimates. Pick one to trust for several weeks, then reevaluate your progress.

Read the Sexypants post: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1080242-a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-Sexypants

Personally, I'd go with the lowest. Some people reduce the margin of error by eating back half their exercise calories. It will take trial & error to find what works for you.

Kaylee11133

i just put your info with heart rate into an online calorie burn calc and it came up with
Calorie Burned(kCal): 644.155

i got the same result at another calc, but it said that was gross. for net, it said "your net calorie burn is approximately 570 calories." ah, so that might explain the differences.

Hey, Thanks! This puts it pretty close to what MFP says for the stationary bike general for 60 mins. So i'm just thinking i'll average out the bikes 340 calories burned with MFP's 562 and go with...451 calories burned. Thanks to a friends recommendation of doing so since i'm uncertain. That seems like what would be a good, safe middle ground for the calories burned.

FatFreeFrolicking

Heart rate monitors gives the most accurate burn.

Don't go off of the machines or MFP.

Susanlove316

I noticed the same thing. I have a Polar F6HRM and it showed almost double calories burned on MFP than on the HRM. I started wondering if I had it set wrong or which to trust.