Polar FT7 shows I burned 500 calories less than MFP???

gsager

Hello everyone. I just got the FT7 yesterday. I worked out today and did 30 minutes on the exercize stationary bike. MFP calculates 676 calories. Imagine how floored I was when my new FT7 said 186 calories!! I have heard of people saying the HRM calculates less than MFP, but that is one heck of a difference. I wet the strap as indicated in the instructions. I spent the first 5 minutes burning 35 calories at the average hr of 140 with a max of 147. The fatburn was 1:49 and fitness 2:45 minutes. I checked to make sure the strap was still wet becasue MFP would have calculated the first 5 minutes at that speed at over 100 calories. The second portion I worked out was 151 calories burned in 25 mins. The fatburn was 14 mins and fitness was 11.22. The average hr was 121 and the max was 136.

The FT7 calories was very close to what is on the stationary bike, but that does not take into account my height and weight. Has anyone else experienced this? Any advise is appreciated. I am very surprized MFP is that far off.


Thanks!

Your heart rate monitor is right. If it isn't wet or getting a connection it will tell you it won't just give you a wrong reading.

lauraloo83

Hey Hun the HRM will always be more accurate. I'm scared to go by mfp because the cals in exercise here don't take into account your personal stats. Say you were 30 stone & really unfit the calories you burn would be far greater than if you were 9 stone and super fit. Although its disheartening what your monitor says in comparison You'd be upset if you ate over your cals because of inaccurate measurements xxx

boggsmeister

My HRM often shows calorie burns higher than MFP. Then again I am 6'3" and 300 pounds so that makes a real difference. 186 for 30 minutes of the exercise bike sounds right. Over 600 is fantastically unrealistic.

bush_woman187

i was going 18mph which is supposed to be vigorous. I'd rather count what I 'm actualy doing, but wow, I was eating some of those calories back, not sure how i actually lost weight! I wanted to see if anyone else experienced that. I am a larger woman and wasn't sure if maybe the strap was too tight or not tight enough or if I just wasn't working out as hard as MFP said I should. :-) Thanks for the feedback.

bush_woman187

I am 5'4 and over 200 lbs so any exercise I do makes me sweat and I feel like my heart is racing. :-) If I were 150 lbs I would expect that the burn rate would be much less, but at such a high weight, although I have lost 38 lbs, i would think the rate would be more than that.

NovemberJune

600+ seems way too high but 186 seems too low if you really are working out hard during the 30 minutes. Not sure of your weight, but when I was around 200 lbs, I probably burned about 280 in 30 minutes of stationary bike, but I also did a little hand weight work at the same time. can you check during your workout that your HR is still picking up? And double-check your settings.

ETA just saw where you posted your weight

jerrbear67

I've also just purchased the Polar FT7 as well. Here are my results so far.

For Elliptical training on my Precor 5.17 for 30 minutes with my heart rate 11:46 min in fat burn (below 123 bpm) and 18:16 min in fitness (above 123 bpm). I am 45 years old, 5 ft 7 in and 254 lbs.

MFP says I've burned 560 cal
My elliptical says i've burned 412 cal
My Polar FT7 states I've burned 289 cal.

I was marking down what my elliptical stated, but since I've purchased the FT7, this is what I record.

ColleenAtherton

After getting my FT7 I was very surprised at the difference between my HRM and MFP. In my experience, MFP grossly overestimates burns. However, I did go on a 5.5 mile walk last week @ 3 mph and my HRM showed 944 calories burnt and MFP was only going to give me 400! :noway: I'm sooo glad I got my HRM!

skullshank

i was going 18mph which is supposed to be vigorous. I'd rather count what I 'm actualy doing, but wow, I was eating some of those calories back, not sure how i actually lost weight! I wanted to see if anyone else experienced that. I am a larger woman and wasn't sure if maybe the strap was too tight or not tight enough or if I just wasn't working out as hard as MFP said I should. :-) Thanks for the feedback.

how much resistance? i think that needs to be taken into account as well.
18mph on a flat will obviously not get your HR up the way 18mph on any sort of incline would.

trust your hrm more than mfp.
and just as a rule of thumb...pick the lower number! its best to underestimate burns than overestimate...
don't wanna eat back calories based on an inflated number.

bush_woman187

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/182246-low-calorie-burn-w-hrm

This happened to me too. I returned mine and eventually bought a polar f4 and it works well.

did you find that the FT4 is much different than the FT7?

bush_woman187

i was going 18mph which is supposed to be vigorous. I'd rather count what I 'm actualy doing, but wow, I was eating some of those calories back, not sure how i actually lost weight! I wanted to see if anyone else experienced that. I am a larger woman and wasn't sure if maybe the strap was too tight or not tight enough or if I just wasn't working out as hard as MFP said I should. :-) Thanks for the feedback.

how much resistance? i think that needs to be taken into account as well.
18mph on a flat will obviously not get your HR up the way 18mph on any sort of incline would.

trust your hrm more than mfp.
and just as a rule of thumb...pick the lower number! its best to underestimate burns than overestimate...
don't wanna eat back calories based on an inflated number.

Thanks for your reply. Resistance ranged from 4-6. i was talking with my dietician because my weight loss has been flat. she thought i was eating too many carbs (which is true! :-) But, she thought maybe my calories were underestimated. But, now it seems my workouts were way overestimated, so it makes sense, but it doesn't feel motivating at the moment. I'll need to let it marinate in my head how upset I am that I'm not really burning a lot of calories...lol.

bush_woman187

i'm glad to know it can go the other way too and give you more calories burned! :-) I did zumba today for 20 mins and at my weight i felt i was going to die! I was almost dripping in sweat....and i burned 163 calories. I thought it would be much more, but it wasn't. I am going to give it some time for me to get used to it. I'd rather know what I'm really burning and lose weight than use MFP's estimation and remain the same weight or lose much more slowly.

sc1572

Go with the HRM, no matter how shocking it is! I experienced this...my HRM was pretty accurate with the treadmill/bike, but the elliptical it was 300 less! However, it was higher than MFP for my group classes/outdoor runs!

bush_woman187

600+ seems way too high but 186 seems too low if you really are working out hard during the 30 minutes. Not sure of your weight, but when I was around 200 lbs, I probably burned about 280 in 30 minutes of stationary bike, but I also did a little hand weight work at the same time. can you check during your workout that your HR is still picking up? And double-check your settings.

ETA just saw where you posted your weight

thanks for your reply. Will it tell me if it stops picking up my HR? I saw the HR pretty consitently moving up and down while working out. granted this was my first time using it. i also didn't hear it beep any time during the workout. is the beep really low?

sleepytexan

I typically burn more for "stationary bike" or spin than MFP says.

The higher your watts (effort -- a function of resistance and speed), the higher your calorie burn.

Obviously, not everyone is riding a stationary bike with the same effort. Therein lies the problem if you are looking for exact numbers.

For cycling, if you have a bike that shows watts, you can convert that to METs and multiply it by (RMR/24) to find your calories burned.

Here's a formula:

http://www.livestrong.com/article/77130-calories-burned-using-stationary-bike/

Livestrong also has other useful formulas for calculating calorie burn.

blessings.

fmbomzo

I don't have an HRM. I'm debating buying one since I do a lot of interval training. I use a combination of MFP and Livestrong to come up with reasonable estimates based on my weight and height. I err on the low side if they are drastically different.

Kelico528

I'm SO glad I found this thread! I just used my Ft7 yesterday for the first time. My treadmill takes my weight into account, but nothing else. My HRM showed that I burned about 75% MORE calories that the treadmill showed. I was afraid to believe it! I feel like I need to be in a support group.... "Learning to trust your HRM" LOL

kristelpoole

I'm SO glad I found this thread! I just used my Ft7 yesterday for the first time. My treadmill takes my weight into account, but nothing else. My HRM showed that I burned about 75% MORE calories that the treadmill showed. I was afraid to believe it! I feel like I need to be in a support group.... "Learning to trust your HRM" LOL

This is how it worked for me too! I was burning way more calories than even MFP was estimating for most exercises. And I have learned more about my body and how much it can do with my HRM because my HRM pushes me to reeeeally work myself hard during my workouts. I also hold myself more accountable because I can see in the HRM whether I've truly worked hard or not.

Anyway, best exercise or fitness investment EVER. I my Polar FT7.

To the OP: The beep isn't that loud, especially if you are wearing headphones.

torygirl79

Yeah my HRM calculates much lower than the site. It's depressing but also much more accurate.