Does washing the car really count as exercise?

skmeyer7143

Does anyone think that washing the car inside and out is a workout? lol Debating if I should track it or not. Its not in the data base but according to 2 different websites, for doing 35 minutes of car washing I am supposed to lose 297-310 calories. One website says only 135 calories. Suck it up as a loss and a great deed for my mom on Mother's Day or is it a win/win for me?

grinditout44

You are awesome for washing your moms car on Mother's day! I think I'd count it as a nice deed and then go (walk/run/bike whatever you do for cardio) and count that as a nice deed for yourself and log that.

EmRobo

I don't log it, but I guess it depends on what you have logged your activity level as?

wellbert

Washing the car? Seriously?

Maybe hand buffing it.

victoria4321

Maybe if you count watching tv and breathing too.

StalkinWolfSC

The responses here are really poor. I wasn't going to post but then I thought others may go to this for horrible advise.

Here's a real way to look at this. These people above have no idea what your work ethic is. If you work in construction doing hard labor 24/7, then yes, I agree with them and you should not log it.

However, if you sit at a desk 24/7 then that's a different story.

I would consider washing a car as light cleaning. This means, if you sit at a desk 24/7 and YOUR myfitnesspal profile fitness activity level is marked as SEDENTARY work, then YES, you should include it as light cleaning. This is because you are working harder than normal as defined by your fitness level. Flag it as light cleaning then. If your activity is anything higher than sedentary, no, don't add it

I hope this helps clarify your question some, as well as others who may wonder.

SiempreBella

The responses here are really poor. I wasn't going to post but then I thought others may go to this for horrible advise.

Here's a real way to look at this. These people above have no idea what your work ethic is. If you work in construction doing hard labor 24/7, then yes, I agree with them and you should not log it.

However, if you sit at a desk 24/7 then that's a different story.

I would consider washing a car as light cleaning. This means, if you sit at a desk 24/7 and YOUR myfitnesspal profile fitness activity level is marked as SEDENTARY work, then YES, you should include it as light cleaning. This is because you are working harder than normal as defined by your fitness level. Flag it as light cleaning then. If your activity is anything higher than sedentary, no, don't add it

I hope this helps clarify your question some, as well as others who may wonder.

Very wise person. Everything he said is correct. Also I would suggest you look at Fitbit devise. They are awesome and have helped me start on my success.

JoelleAnn78

The responses here are really poor. I wasn't going to post but then I thought others may go to this for horrible advise.

Here's a real way to look at this. These people above have no idea what your work ethic is. If you work in construction doing hard labor 24/7, then yes, I agree with them and you should not log it.

However, if you sit at a desk 24/7 then that's a different story.

I would consider washing a car as light cleaning. This means, if you sit at a desk 24/7 and YOUR myfitnesspal profile fitness activity level is marked as SEDENTARY work, then YES, you should include it as light cleaning. This is because you are working harder than normal as defined by your fitness level. Flag it as light cleaning then. If your activity is anything higher than sedentary, no, don't add it

I hope this helps clarify your question some, as well as others who may wonder.

^^ Agreed -- and, for future reference, even if you don't include it and log it, your body knows you did it and you may be pleasantly surprised with a loss. I am often hesitant to log some of those activities because I DO eat back my exercise calories and I don't want to have an additional 300 cal worth of food if the activity wasn't that much.

Sounds like you did your research and have found some numbers to go by. Don't log it simply because you want 300 extra calories to eat a dessert. Log it if you are tracking your exercise and feel you worked hard enough to make it legit.

gel91

Why do people actually have to be so rude?

Just because you do things differently to others doesn't mean you need to be so sarcastic or speak down to them, they wouldn't make the thread if they knew and there is plenty of ways to say what you want too in a polite way.

To OP, I wouldn't normally but if you are set to sedentary and you don't usually do things like that, go for it & enjoy the extra snack you have. If you do it often or it was in place of a different form of exercise you might usually do at that time, then I wouldn't log it.

skullshank

only if you pick it up to wash underneath.

DopeItUp

For stuff like this, I will generally log a minimal amount if I feel I need to. Maybe 100 calories per hour. When you have 4 cars and you spend half the day washing, buffing, drying, etc it can add up. But 300 calories for 35 minutes...no. Try 50, maybe.

raingirl21

If you are going to log it, I would recommend only logging in a third of the time. I do that for most of the things on MFP as they seem to count an extremely high amount of calories burned.