Things that make you go...Hmmmm....(outrageous calorie burn)

weird_me2

That's awesome.

I am by no means an expert. I try to figure out my cals on MFP but there isn't a place for the elevation of the treadmill. I was told once that jogging on the treadmill needs to be above incline of 1 to be the same as being outside on a flat surface. I try to never have it less than 2. I have walked/jogged through a full movie with the incline at no less than 4 and burned over 1000 cals (per treadmill) but MFP is way off.

Try this website to see what it comes up with. It has treadmill at various speeds and inclines:

http://www.sparkpeople.com/resource/calories_burned_list.asp

JustAGirlyGeek

I often wonder the same thing... everyone burns calories differently based on how hard they push themselves so who am I to judge? Best way to really know how much you burn is by using a HRM.

kpbs68

I do my met calculations myself then shave off the time on MFP's exercise entries to have them come out at the real caloric burn totals for my current weight.

MoreBean13

WE can get hung up in the theoretical calorie burns forver- is this possible at that weight? What about this at that body fat? What if you have an abnormally high or low Max HR or VO2max?

Bottom line, log whatever you want for your calorie burns. If you're not gaining or losing weight predictably according to the numbers, consider adjusting your methods. Your weight loss or gain is really the only way you can tell if your burn is appropriate or not- short of being hooked up to a metabolic cart during your runs. HRMs are just a tool- they're not absolute.

If you're not losing the weight you should, one likely problem is that you're overestimating your workout calories. The inexactness is why I never comment on other people's burns unless they're stuck at a plateau and asking for help trying to figure out what could be wrong.

Jynus

I know you think it's got to be almost impossible for people to burn 1000+ calories per hour without working out intensely or being a super athlete, but it's probably actually easier for non-conditioned athletes to achieve this than for conditioned athletes. If a person is out of shape or not conditioned for the activity they are doing, that person will often expend more energy with unnecessary movements and have a higher heart rate. An athlete who has trained for the activity and knows how to achieve the maximum results with the minimum effort (not saying they put in minimum effort, just that they minimize the work they do so that they can perform better and/or longer) will often expend less energy and have a lower heart rate even though they may go much further and faster. If you have two people the same age, height, weight and sex with different fitness levels, the more fit one is likely to burn less calories even if they work out harder.

It's about work performed. And the more fit you are, the better you're able to perform work, thus expend more calories. I know it seems counter intuitive to you, but when you're unfit, you're just utterly unable to maximally exert yourself for any length of time like a trained person can. This is again seen in tour de france riders, they can reach maximal heart rates while competeing that are IMPOSSIBLE for non trained people to reach, and do it for extended peroids of time. More bmp = more calories burned. http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/staging-your-personal-tour-de-france

"The typical Tour de France contestant reaches a maximum heart rate of above 200 beats per minute on a regular basis, compared to almost never for any other segment of the population, says Roll."

I found this calculator: http://www.shapesense.com/fitness-exercise/calculators/heart-rate-based-calorie-burn-calculator.aspx which calculates calories burned based weight, age, sex and heart rate. I put in F, 35, 175 lbs once with heart rate of 160 and once with average rate of 190. The person with the average heart rate of 190 would theoretically burn 200 calories more in an hour than the other.

Yes, I know that higher heartrate means the body has a higher oxygen demand to meet it's cardio energy system needs, thus more calories burned. But the counterpoint is this, good luck any female being able to go for any length of time at 190bpm. Unless they ARE TRAINED. Thats why the better trained you are, the better calorie burns you have,.

As for the 16 cal/minute being the maximum calories a person can give sustained, then why is it unreasonable to see someone burn 1000 calories in an hour? If a person can sustain this effort as you say, then they should be able to achieve that type of burn over the course of an hour as 16*60 =960 calories per hour.

Because thats the tops out level. As in you need to train for it. For untrained, you're unable to exert yourself hard enough to reach that sort of level. Without question the VAST MAJORITY of claims of 1000 calories an hour on this forum are straight up false. (not all, just most)

edit: As an aside, it's interesting that the utter levels of denial people have in order to get overweight are the same demons they seem to have to fight in order to fix their weight. There is prob a good psychological study in there somewhere.

arc918

I can burn 1,000 in an hour and I usually do it once a week as a tempo/steady state run by running 8 miles @ ~ 7:30 pace. That is pretty much my half marathon pace. It is a tough workout for sure.

Here is the trick, you have to be pretty heavy and pretty fast. I'm probably ~ 175 lbs (or so) right now, I think a burn of 125 per mile is reasonable for somebody my size - HRM & MFP agree.

You can call BS if you want, but the race results don't lie. http://athlinks.com/racer/results/35543525

Jynus

I can burn 1,000 in an hour and I usually do it once a week as a tempo/steady state run by running 8 miles @ ~ 7:30 pace. That is pretty much my half marathon pace. It is a tough workout for sure.

Here is the trick, you have to be pretty heavy and pretty fast. I'm probably ~ 175 lbs (or so) right now, I think a burn of 125 per mile is reasonable for somebody my size - HRM & MFP agree.

You can call BS if you want, but the race results don't lie. http://athlinks.com/racer/results/35543525

you're prob forgetting to subtract your BMR. your actual number would be closer to 800.

arc918

I can burn 1,000 in an hour and I usually do it once a week as a tempo/steady state run by running 8 miles @ ~ 7:30 pace. That is pretty much my half marathon pace. It is a tough workout for sure.

Here is the trick, you have to be pretty heavy and pretty fast. I'm probably ~ 175 lbs (or so) right now, I think a burn of 125 per mile is reasonable for somebody my size - HRM & MFP agree.

You can call BS if you want, but the race results don't lie. http://athlinks.com/racer/results/35543525

you're prob forgetting to subtract your BMR. your actual number would be closer to 800.

I'm not a science guy, but I assume MFP is already considering that. In the context of this site, I do not believe people need to adjust burns for BMR.

weird_me2

I know you think it's got to be almost impossible for people to burn 1000+ calories per hour without working out intensely or being a super athlete, but it's probably actually easier for non-conditioned athletes to achieve this than for conditioned athletes. If a person is out of shape or not conditioned for the activity they are doing, that person will often expend more energy with unnecessary movements and have a higher heart rate. An athlete who has trained for the activity and knows how to achieve the maximum results with the minimum effort (not saying they put in minimum effort, just that they minimize the work they do so that they can perform better and/or longer) will often expend less energy and have a lower heart rate even though they may go much further and faster. If you have two people the same age, height, weight and sex with different fitness levels, the more fit one is likely to burn less calories even if they work out harder.

It's about work performed. And the more fit you are, the better you're able to perform work, thus expend more calories. I know it seems counter intuitive to you, but when you're unfit, you're just utterly unable to maximally exert yourself for any length of time like a trained person can. This is again seen in tour de france riders, they can reach maximal heart rates while competeing that are IMPOSSIBLE for non trained people to reach, and do it for extended peroids of time. More bmp = more calories burned. http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/features/staging-your-personal-tour-de-france

"The typical Tour de France contestant reaches a maximum heart rate of above 200 beats per minute on a regular basis, compared to almost never for any other segment of the population, says Roll."

I found this calculator: http://www.shapesense.com/fitness-exercise/calculators/heart-rate-based-calorie-burn-calculator.aspx which calculates calories burned based weight, age, sex and heart rate. I put in F, 35, 175 lbs once with heart rate of 160 and once with average rate of 190. The person with the average heart rate of 190 would theoretically burn 200 calories more in an hour than the other.

Yes, I know that higher heartrate means the body has a higher oxygen demand to meet it's cardio energy system needs, thus more calories burned. But the counterpoint is this, good luck any female being able to go for any length of time at 190bpm. Unless they ARE TRAINED. Thats why the better trained you are, the better calorie burns you have,.

As for the 16 cal/minute being the maximum calories a person can give sustained, then why is it unreasonable to see someone burn 1000 calories in an hour? If a person can sustain this effort as you say, then they should be able to achieve that type of burn over the course of an hour as 16*60 =960 calories per hour.

Because thats the tops out level. As in you need to train for it. For untrained, you're unable to exert yourself hard enough to reach that sort of level. Without question the VAST MAJORITY of claims of 1000 calories an hour on this forum are straight up false. (not all, just most)

edit: As an aside, it's interesting that the utter levels of denial people have in order to get overweight are the same demons they seem to have to fight in order to fix their weight. There is prob a good psychological study in there somewhere.

I don't think that to say that people are in denial and that the VAST MAJORITY of 1000 calories an hour entries are wrong is accurate. I did not have to live in denial to get as overweight as I did. I knew exactly what I was doing, I just had no motivation to change it at the time. Many other people are the same. You don't have to be in denial to be apathetic to your situation.

As for the VAST MAJORITY being wrong, you really have no way to know. There were many, many days over the summer where I logged 1000 calories for 1 hour of exercise and maybe my status said I burned this doing exercise including "walking 4 mph". What it doesn't show is that I spent 3 hours in the pool and spent the whole time treading water and also did some intervals of "swimming, vigorously", so I logged that as 30 minutes of vigorous swimming , and that I also walked 1 mile at 4 mph and then jogged for 15 minutes on the treadmill at an average incline of 5%. No, I didn't log or believe that I burned 1000 calories by taking a brisk walk for an hour, and no I didn't do 1 hour of continuous exercise at a high intensity level, but I did several intervals of exercise that got me there and those intervals added up, as did the little movements that burned an extra hundred or two hundred calories an hour to get my total calorie burn up for the day. This wasn't me being in denial; this was me logging my exercise conservatively and it worked for me. This in fact worked very well and my average calories in vs. my average calories out using the activities I logged went right in line with the amount of weight I lost.

Yes, some people may just be in denial, and some people may just be unaware of what's truly accurate for them, but many other people are aware and know what they are doing. We are not dumb, in denial, or unaware just because we logged that we burned 1000 calories in an hour. Maybe they jogged for 15 minutes at 4 different times throughout the day and simply logged it and trusted MFP. Maybe they did 6 highly intense 10 minute workouts throughout the day and really burned 1000 calories and logged that. Maybe they did 3 hours of moderate intensity exercise but logged it as 1 for personal reasons. Maybe they worked out with a HRM and used it's calculations. Just because you don't agree with or believe a person's inputs into a personal diary does not mean that they are dumb or lying to themselves.

tappae

I can burn 1,000 in an hour and I usually do it once a week as a tempo/steady state run by running 8 miles @ ~ 7:30 pace. That is pretty much my half marathon pace. It is a tough workout for sure.

Here is the trick, you have to be pretty heavy and pretty fast. I'm probably ~ 175 lbs (or so) right now, I think a burn of 125 per mile is reasonable for somebody my size - HRM & MFP agree.

You can call BS if you want, but the race results don't lie. http://athlinks.com/racer/results/35543525

you're prob forgetting to subtract your BMR. your actual number would be closer to 800.

I'm not a science guy, but I assume MFP is already considering that. In the context of this site, I do not believe people need to adjust burns for BMR.

Also, his BMR probably isn't 4800 calories. Maybe you meant he should subtract 75 or so?

Restybaby2012

I get scolded and reprimanded here if I log that I burned 1099 calories in 3 HOURS of some activity. The problem as I see it..........NO one here knows what I weigh or what my fitness level is...or how intense what Im doing is for ME..........FOR ME.

NOT someone else. Not someone maybe half my weight or height or someone more fit than I am.

Im the first to admit Im not fit. I have horrendous physical limitations and most days I give this healthy lifestyle journey and activity level / workout every single damn thing I have. I cant work out like most of you but please, dont dis me for what I can do just because it's different than you. Im trying. Im losing. Im determined. Im motivated. Im progressing. Im learning. Judging me wont help me, Ridiculing or teasing or tormenting wont help either.

Better to help me learn, or to encourage me, or offer solid advice, advice I can implement or learn from. Im open to it, I really am. At the very least...just ignore me and get on with your badself and let others be what they will.

Im not necessarily speaking JUST FOR ME BUT FOR ALL OF US who have the physical limitations that I do and cant do the intense work outs the majority of you do. And for gawd sake DONT PITY ME

Azdak

I can burn 1,000 in an hour and I usually do it once a week as a tempo/steady state run by running 8 miles @ ~ 7:30 pace. That is pretty much my half marathon pace. It is a tough workout for sure.

Here is the trick, you have to be pretty heavy and pretty fast. I'm probably ~ 175 lbs (or so) right now, I think a burn of 125 per mile is reasonable for somebody my size - HRM & MFP agree.

You can call BS if you want, but the race results don't lie. http://athlinks.com/racer/results/35543525

you're prob forgetting to subtract your BMR. your actual number would be closer to 800.

I'm not a science guy, but I assume MFP is already considering that. In the context of this site, I do not believe people need to adjust burns for BMR.

The number is not included, but it is also usually insignificant unless you are doing a low-level activity. My BMR is 72 cals/min. So if I burn 1000-1100 in a 1-hr run, it doesn't really mean anything--esp since the numbers aren't precise anyhow. But there are always BMR-Nazis out there waiting to nitpick.

RobynLB

I can burn 1,000 in an hour and I usually do it once a week as a tempo/steady state run by running 8 miles @ ~ 7:30 pace. That is pretty much my half marathon pace. It is a tough workout for sure.

Here is the trick, you have to be pretty heavy and pretty fast. I'm probably ~ 175 lbs (or so) right now, I think a burn of 125 per mile is reasonable for somebody my size - HRM & MFP agree.

You can call BS if you want, but the race results don't lie. http://athlinks.com/racer/results/35543525

A 7:30 pace is pretty freakin' fast, and you've got almost 50 lbs on me, I buy it. I wish I could sustain 7:30 for 8 miles! That's killer.

wolfchild59

I had some crazy high calorie burns when I first started working out because I went by the machine numbers and the MFP numbers for my elliptical workouts. Back then I was often posting 800-900 calorie burns for an hour or so on the elliptical, because that's what I had to go off of and I trusted it.

Then I got an HRM and discovered that I was actually burning about 400-500 calories during that time, nowhere near what the machine or MFP was telling me. Thankfully I wasn't eating back hardly any of the calories back then so it didn't have a negative effect on my weight loss, but I could have been in trouble if I'd been eating them.

Nowadays I have a much idea of what I actually burn. it's about 600 calories per hour for running, ARC trainer, stair mill, or roller blading (I'm fast, I grew up on skates, literally, from the time I was 10 months old). And it's about 400 calories per hour for elliptical and stationary bike. Race days I tend to go out a bit faster and burn closer to 650 an hour instead of 600 an hour while running races.

But I got on an elliptical at the gym once that I worked out on for one hour. I'd entered my weight and age when I started and didn't do anything differently than I had on other machines. This one actually counted all the way to 999 calories on the counter and reset back to 0 to continue counting more. Luckily I knew better than that, but other people may not, so they trust what's in front of them and go with that.

Cougar7279

This is all pretty subjective... There are many factors that come into play for calorie burning... It's all best guess based on some criteria. Like age, weight, basic lifestyle, muscle mass, current fitness level, and most importantly, what percentage of your maximum HR you're utilizing and for how long etc... Sometimes people with really high calorie burns stop losing because they don't eat enough... And even high burn people can plateau because their bodies become accustomed to what they're doing.....so they need to change up their routines and "trick" their bodies through the plateau!!! While I don't know BigCed personally, I know of him here on MFP... I can promise you that he is Mr. Intensity himself... I have people who are pretty good road runners who completely fall apart and can't hang with me on my very hilly trail runs... The intensity demand for the distance run is greatly increased! We each need to be as accurate as we can be when reporting what we do... Then, tweak our own lifestyles based on whether or not we're achieving our desired goals...
Anyone is welcome to come on one of my 5 hour to all day workouts to see how many calories you burn... (think Ironman triathlon)

jenniferinfl

My burns are high, I go by what Endomondo posts for me. The route I do is over 3 miles with 378 feet of ascent and 368 feet of descent. I'm female, 212 lbs, and my heart rate is 170+ when I exceed 4 mph.

_LilPowerHouse

I think i just burn 1550 calories just reading this CRAP!!!!

johnpangan

I don't pay attention to the amt of calories I burn. I just work my *kitten* off in the gym. So far, I think I get good results.

heybales

Sometimes. But you gotta remember that someone who is 350lbs or more is going to burn a metric craptonne of calories even just walking on a treadmill for half an hour.

I'm 245 and if I go 4.0mph on a slightly inclined treadmill for 30 mins my HRM registers a near 400 cal burn. So if I had the time to just walk and watch a movie I could feasibly hit 1200 cals or more.

Wow, your HRM is actually registering about right for calorie burn. At current fitness level anyway.

http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/WalkRunMETs.html

Many don't at all.

ahviendha

when i burn over 1500 cals for 3-4 hours of uphill hiking, i freaking earned it!

but then i pass out for a 3 hour nap and binge eat because i'm starving. but i guess it's not binge eating if you eat 1k calories cause you're 2k in the hole.

Amandamaslin

I only go with either the readings of the machines in the gym or the calculations from the app. but swimming appears to burn huge calories, apparently due to the resistance of the water and the fact you are using the whole of your core. I do however take it with a pinch of salt and am very careful of my calorie intake. I would eat an extra 1000 calories cause it says I have burned that many. so far the weight loss going well so we'll see how accurate the predictions are.

jcstanton

I don't pay attention to the amt of calories I burn. I just work my *kitten* off in the gym. So far, I think I get good results.

^^^THIS!!! When I'm at the gym, I pay less attention to how many calories I'm burning and pay closer attention to my HR, respiration, and perspiration. If I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, my HR will peak at around 170BPM, my lungs feel like they're going to collapse (may be a SLIGHT exaggeration, but you get the picture), and fifteen or twenty minutes in, I'm beginning to look like I jumped in a swimming pool.

Cougar7279

I don't pay much attention to mine either... I stopped logging burns months ago because the numbers almost seemed like bragging....and all that's important to me is performance... And i tweak what i eat based on how i feel and how i perform...

samlankford

I go by what the HRM tells me that I burn.... even then I don't fully belileve it you know? it is afterall just a machine right? Only reason I am keeping track is for my own information... Now the days that I had 1700 calorie burn, was when I was completly out of my freaking mind and did 3 workout dvd's in a row (insanity and the asylum)... I was in the mood to workout and got REALLY aggirvated at work... will I ever do that again? doubtful, but cannot make any promises :bigsmile:

OMGSugarOHNOS

I use what the Strava run app gives me for my burns. i know it's not 100% accurate but I don't eat back calories. My calorie intake is set to 500 below my TDEE. i just log my workouts to keep track.

Hopefully i get a HRM for Xmas

TheCaren

I see some crazy calorie burn stuff and I think to myself "no way Jose". And when I use those same MFP exercise stats, I just shorten my time to make the total calorie count burned more realistic. But in the end, they are just cheating themselves. And I don't say a word about it. If I see them post "why am I not losing weight, I'm doing everything right", then that's an invitation to butt in. Otherwise, I butt out.

Azdak

This is all pretty subjective... There are many factors that come into play for calorie burning... It's all best guess based on some criteria. Like age, weight, basic lifestyle, muscle mass, current fitness level, and most importantly, what percentage of your maximum HR you're utilizing and for how long etc... Sometimes people with really high calorie burns stop losing because they don't eat enough... And even high burn people can plateau because their bodies become accustomed to what they're doing.....so they need to change up their routines and "trick" their bodies through the plateau!!! While I don't know BigCed personally, I know of him here on MFP... I can promise you that he is Mr. Intensity himself... I have people who are pretty good road runners who completely fall apart and can't hang with me on my very hilly trail runs... The intensity demand for the distance run is greatly increased! We each need to be as accurate as we can be when reporting what we do... Then, tweak our own lifestyles based on whether or not we're achieving our desired goals...
Anyone is welcome to come on one of my 5 hour to all day workouts to see how many calories you burn... (think Ironman triathlon)

There are primarily two factors--intensity(VO2) x weight--that determine calories burned during a workout. What happens afterwards (afterburn) depends on different factors and is not really quantifiable on a consistent basis.

This only appears complicated because of the imperfect and imprecise methods we have commonly available to estimate calorie expenditure during exercise. People put way too much faith in the accuracy of HRMs and data tables--and the plethora of inconsistent and inaccurate data that comes from these sources does more to obfuscate than to illuminate.

So I would disagree--it's not subjective at all. It only appears "subjective" because of all of the BS.

Chinadorian

bump. MFP calculator for alot of exercises is whack.

happycauseIride

I can program my weight into my treadmill and it was telling me I would burn like 600 calories walking 3.5 - 4.0 on different inclines in 35 minutes. I got all excited. Then I got a HRM and found out it wasn't even close to that. You never know how many calories you are burning unless you use a HRM. Those outrageous numbers could be coming from the machine that doesn't know Jack from Jane. IMO.

TubbsMcGee

I used to use another website to track my calories in and burned.
I recently just deactivated that account, after not using it for a full year. Just for giggles, I checked out my exercise history.
Turns out I was logging "8 hours of desk work," "2 hours of standing", "20 minutes of driving", "60 minutes of cooking and cleaning", and "45 minutes of shopping" EVERY SINGLE DAY for a daily calorie burn of 1876.

THAT'S outrageous. I would have been doing those "exercises" if I was fat, anyway!
Buying a HRM changed everything, I only log my exercises when I wear it and I find that when it's on, I push myself harder to burn as much as I can and really break a sweat