calories burned during fitness

pjkubat

Has anyone compared say what their treadmill says for calories burned vs. what myfitnesspal records for calories? My treadmill for 30 min gave me 250 whereas myfitnesspal said 450. That's a pretty big difference. A friend said perhaps myfitnesspal is factoring in age/weight into the amount of time? Or does it perhaps include what the body may continue to burn off with a higher metabolism after the workout?

Richardbaker

To burn 450 calories in 30 minutes you obviously would be burning 15 calories per minute to do that you would be working at quite a high intensity, and more likely because of that intensity the majority of those calories if not all would be coming from sugar.

At a lower intensity you may only be burning 8 calories per minute but there is a good chance a high proportion would be coming from fat.

The only true way of knowing is to have a metabolic profiling assessment that will tell you exactly how many calories you are burning at any given heart rate (intensity) and what % is coming from fat.

SimonLondon

If you can't do that then a good heart rate monitor (one with the chest strap) will also give you a more accurate estimate. My HRM gives me way less than this site but then I am a lot fitter than I was 5 months ago so I wouldn't expect it to be the same now.

J4Jacoby

Pam, I'd go with the calories your bike shows. It knows your speed better than myfitnesspal would. when I do the elliptical I use the calories the machine tells me (which is different from what show up here) simply because the machine knows how fast I was really going.

pjkubat

After Brenda commented that it probably takes into account age/weight, I compared and when she walks 30 min at 3.5 mph and I do the same, myfitnesspal records different # of calories burned. So I think she's right in that. My treadmill doesn't allow me to put in age/weight like hers does. We have the iFit NordicTrack and would have to buy that software otherwise if I plug in how many calories I want to burn it takes me on a wild "chase" hiking through various kinds of terrain and I'm not in good enough shape to do that program. So, I don't really know which version to trust. Just gotta' keep finding ways to lose weight.