calorie burn numbers

TXHunny84

First- Do you go by the calorie burn on your HRM or by what MFP says you burned?....

Also...... Do you know if MFP gives you the Net Calorie Burn or the Total Calorie Burn?


When I say net calorie burn I'm talking about this...

"We mislead ourselves when we talk about the total calorie burn (TCB) of exercise rather than the net calorie burn (NCB). To figure the NCB of any activity, you must subtract the resting metabolic calories your body would have burned, during the time of the workout, even if you had never gotten off the sofa.

You rarely hear anyone talk about the NCB of workouts, because this is America, dammit, and we like our numbers big and bold. Subtraction is not a popular activity. Certainly not among the infomercial hucksters and weight-loss gurus who want to promote exercise schemes. "It's bizarre that you hear so much about the gross calorie burn instead of the net," says Swain. "It could keep people from realizing why they're having such a hard time losing weight."

If you want to read the whole article its In RunnersWorld.com & it's called How Many Calories Are You Really Burning?
http://www.runnersworld.com/article/1,7120,s6-242-304-311-8402-0,00.html

thanks for the help:flowerforyou:

SuperSnoopy

Now thats food for thought, thats opened up a whole new can of worms for me, thanks I need to go away and think about this some more. Byeee

erickirb

most if not all calculators of calories give you total calories burned, not net (meaning the calories burned on MFP or from a HRM, are total calories and include BMR and maintenance calories) If you eat 100% of cals back you should be backing out maintenance cals from the total calories burned to enter the amount you should eat into MFP as the maintenance portion is already accounted for in your caloric allotment.

I think the article you quoted is saying to back out BMR, but I would argue that you should be backing out maintenance calories, as if you were not working out you would burn more than BMR, and maintenance calories is already taken into account on MFP.

the machine, HRM, or the database MFP uses was not created with MFP in mind, meaning it gives total cals burned, not extra calories burned. A portion of the burn you would have achieved had you worked out or not.

I myself tend to use my HRM (Polar) and back out maintenance cals which for me are 1900, so for every minute of exercise I back out 1.3 (1900/24/60) cals to get "net" or cals burned from exercise alone. according to Polar the calories burned are total, not extra or "net".

Di3012

I too, go by my Polar HRM. I used to go by the calories burned as stated on the treadmill. All was fine and I once lost 41lbs going by the treadmill calories stated. However, I bought an HRM a couple of weeks back and it shows that the treadmill calories are quite a bit more.

Now that wouldn't be a problem if I were to eat back all my exercise calories, but as I never used to, I was still in a deficit, so the weight shifted.

I am happy I purchased an HRM though, it is worth its weight in gold.

erickirb

I too, go by my Polar HRM. I used to go by the calories burned as stated on the treadmill. All was fine and I once lost 41lbs going by the treadmill calories stated. However, I bought an HRM a couple of weeks back and it shows that the treadmill calories are quite a bit more.

Now that wouldn't be a problem if I were to eat back all my exercise calories, but as I never used to, I was still in a deficit, so the weight shifted.

I am happy I purchased an HRM though, it is worth its weight in gold.

As I mentioned in my reply, Polar also includes maintenance calories in that total so if you are eating back exercise cals you should only eat most not all, or back out maintenance from the total on the HRM when entering it in MFP.

CyberEd312

Don't over think it...... I can't stress this enough.... Even though the HRM is not the end all be all it is the most reliable to get a pretty close estimate of your total calories burned. I have a Polar FT60 and use it for all my cardio, I do not use it during strength training. As far as the Net to Total Calories I am not going to do anything other than start my HRM at the beginning of my workout and stopped at the end. If I pause in between (which I never do anyway) I would hit the pause button and then restart it when I resumed. Then log my calories burned...... Your talking semantics when you start trying to take out calories you would have burned sitting on the couch for 30 minutes or 60 minutes while you are exercising instead.... For me it just doesn't seem worth the hassle. Good Luck!!

Sackit

Way to complicated! Tak eit from the guy who lost 293 lbs. He obviously knows what he is doing. KUDDOS to him!

erickirb

Don't over think it...... I can't stress this enough.... Even though the HRM is not the end all be all it is the most reliable to get a pretty close estimate of your total calories burned. I have a Polar FT60 and use it for all my cardio, I do not use it during strength training. As far as the Net to Total Calories I am not going to do anything other than start my HRM at the beginning of my workout and stopped at the end. If I pause in between (which I never do anyway) I would hit the pause button and then restart it when I resumed. Then log my calories burned...... Your talking semantics when you start trying to take out calories you would have burned sitting on the couch for 30 minutes or 60 minutes while you are exercising instead.... For me it just doesn't seem worth the hassle. Good Luck!!

Amazing loss man, wow.

I agree it does not make much of a difference and even a HRM is just an estimate, but that being said, if you are doing low intensity (hiking) for 3-5 hours in a day, or bowling or gardening, the maintenance calories will make quite a difference. Assume your maintenance is 1.5 cals/min, if you hiked for 4 hours you would over estimate your burn by 360 calories (1.5*240), but for anything under an hour, not need as it is such a small total amount you would back out.

katcod1522

good stuff. When I run 5mph...96 net cals per mile. When I do run/walk intervals..I would net burn about 70 net cals. Seems pretty spot on.

p0stdramatic

Definitely don't make it more complicated than it needs to be. I've said this before, but I lost 50 pounds using my TOTAL calorie burn from my Polar HRM and eating my exercise calories back. It took 4 months.

And yeah, if anyone knows it's Ed!

katcod1522

good stuff. When I run 5mph...96 net cals per mile. When I do run/walk intervals..I would net burn about 70 net cals. Seems pretty spot on.

this is also when I only run for 3 miles..I dont feel like I have to eat my exercise cals back.

Jessamine

In the back of my mind I've always known that we really should be calculating our "net" calories burned. That is, we need to subtract the BMR calories. We don't want to double-count them.

But then again, we also don't account for the extra calories we burn AFTER our workouts end. Your metabolism gets a boost whenever you work out, so afterwards you're burning calories at a higher rate than your BMR. So I've always figured that it would even out in the end.

lisa91263

bump

CyberEd312

Don't over think it...... I can't stress this enough.... Even though the HRM is not the end all be all it is the most reliable to get a pretty close estimate of your total calories burned. I have a Polar FT60 and use it for all my cardio, I do not use it during strength training. As far as the Net to Total Calories I am not going to do anything other than start my HRM at the beginning of my workout and stopped at the end. If I pause in between (which I never do anyway) I would hit the pause button and then restart it when I resumed. Then log my calories burned...... Your talking semantics when you start trying to take out calories you would have burned sitting on the couch for 30 minutes or 60 minutes while you are exercising instead.... For me it just doesn't seem worth the hassle. Good Luck!!

Amazing loss man, wow.

I agree it does not make much of a difference and even a HRM is just an estimate, but that being said, if you are doing low intensity (hiking) for 3-5 hours in a day, or bowling or gardening, the maintenance calories will make quite a difference. Assume your maintenance is 1.5 cals/min, if you hiked for 4 hours you would over estimate your burn by 360 calories (1.5*240), but for anything under an hour, not need as it is such a small total amount you would back out.

Thanks and yes I agree with you if you are doing prolonged low intensity cardio that would be necessary... My basis is totally going on High intensity/interval training cardio.. I go to the gym pick my equipment of choice (normally elliptical because of my knee's) and do 65 minutes (5 minute warm up, 55 minute interval training, and 5 minute cool down) on and off and out of the gym burning 1000-1200 calories..... Now I tend to only eat back 90% of my exercise calories (which is kinda like taking out your net calories) but I just am not putting in the effort to figure out exactly to the calorie what I may need to subtract... But I am a big believer in eating back those exercise calories.......

bethdris

Having 3 little kids, a household, 3 dogs and a husband..I was able to lose 96 pounds in about 7 months and maintaining since then using total cals burned...I personally wouldn't break it down so much

Side note: only IF I was hungry did I ever eat into my exercise cals. So I guess its possible to be counter productive if ate back ALL the exercise cals assuming the treadmill, etc was over estimating.

mhankosk

I have a bodybugg SP and it tells me how many calories I burn per every couple minutes throughout the day. So basically I pick the time frame I worked out it and subtract out the calories I burned during a sedentary period of time of the same length. The bodybugg rocks! But I would have to agree with the above posters, don't over think it too much. I don't normally eat back all my exercise cals, I just use them as a cushion if I happen to go over. Good luck!