Eating back what HRM says? Too much? MATH PROBLEM

embclark

So my mathematical side of my brain has a question... Let's see if we can say this the right way...

I read online that if you wear your HRM for an hour while watching tv or something that you can then multiply that number of a lories burned by 24 to get your amount of calories burned in a sedentary day. Make sense?

So then If I wear my HRM to exercise for an hour, shouldn't I be subtracting the number of calories I burned in a sedentary hour from that because it was already accounts for?

I feel like I will be eating too many calories if I don't...

What do you think?

dad106

HRM's are not meant to be worn at rest.. So any number you do get will most likely be inaccurate.

If you want to figure out what you burn in an hour, you need to take your BMR, divide by 24 and that will tell you what you burn in an hour.

Personally, I never subtract the calories and have lost weight just fine. HRM's like everything else, are an estimation of calories burned.. so why mess with it, and potentially throw off the estimation even more?

SuffolkSally

I don't have an HRM but would think the calories used are already accounted for when you set MFP activity level as long as they're usually counted for as part of say a sedentary lifestyle or a lightly active one. In that situation I would eat back calories from say running or gym use, which perhaps you wouldn't have had as a normal part of you lifestyle. Be interested to see other comments

kyle4jem

I calculated my BMR by wearing my HRM while at rest (while dozing on the train on my commute into London).

I also wore my HRM for three hours while working and used that to calculate my sedentary AMR - both daily and per minute.

I have done this on more than one occasion to I know the numbers are reasonably accurate.

Now when I exercise with my HRM or use MFP's exercise calories, I always subtract my AMR/min x #mins exercised to give a better estimate of calories burned during exercise.

Of course it's not going to be 100% accurate, but this way I can see how many calories I have in the bank, so to speak.

I have also set my daily Calories to be the equivalent of maintenance calories at my desired weight. In doing so, I am effectively still on a calorie deficit, but I am learning better what constitutes 2200 Calories thus affecting a very real shift to eating a balanced, sustainable diet today and every day.

Tourney3p0

Yes, you should account for the time spent exercising. Realistically this number shouldn't mean very much unless you tend to exercise quite a bit, or your BMR is very high. As has been mentioned, it might be better to use your BMR number since heart rate monitors aren't meant to be used at rest. I don't think the number will be very substantial.

As an example, if your BMR is 1800/day, you're burning 1.25 calories per minute at rest. Your HRM might say you're burning 1.5 calories per minute.

If you exercise for an hour, you should subtract 75 from your calories if you go by your BMR or 90 according to your HRM. The difference there is about 15 calories/hour, which isn't even really worth worrying about. But then again, you might not consider 75 to be worth worrying about (I do).

Personally, I go according to BMR. But in practice, you likely won't tell a difference either way.

CoderGal

HRM's are not meant to be worn at rest.. So any number you do get will most likely be inaccurate.

^this