Machine Calories or MFP Calories?

DaniH826

The best thing to do is to pick 1 method of estimating and do that consistently for a month. Then evaluate. if your estimations have you in a calorie deficit and thus you expect to be losing weight but are actually gaining, then chances are good your estimates are off (eating more than you think and/or burning less than you think) and you can adjust appropriately. At the end of the day everything we do is based on estimates so some trial and error is a necessary part of all this.

So what I'm taking away from all this is that it's useless to get an HRM if I'm doing heavy lifting (and by "heavy" I mean I'm still at the entry levels of barbell training with an eye on progressive loading), and that it may or may not benefit me when I do cardio, which includes mostly on the spot jogging, some dancing, some bicycling if the weather is nice and otherwise mostly walking?

Just trying to figure out if I should even bother investing in an HRM or if I should just accept the MFP estimates, knowing there's going to be some variation, but I'm not interested in super accurate numbers anyway, just a ball park because I'm looking for long-term results and am prepared to apply a ton of patience with the process I've committed myself to.

PayneAS

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/Azdak/view/exercise-calories-sometimes-the-cardio-machines-are-more-accurate-404739

There's the blog I read ages ago and finally found.