Strength Training

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AidaWinona
AidaWinona Posts: 4 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Why isn't strength training counted as calories burned?

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  • jody664
    jody664 Posts: 397 Member
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    It can be. Under Cardiovascular, search for "strength" or "weight lifting." They both are there.
  • lorcart
    lorcart Posts: 406 Member
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    There are WAY too many variables to be exact or even close. How long do you rest between sets? How much exertion involved? How much weight? etc......That's why, as Jody said, you can "log" it and it's under cardiovascular, but it's not all that accurate because it can't be really.
  • jody664
    jody664 Posts: 397 Member
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    There are WAY too many variables to be exact or even close. How long do you rest between sets? How much exertion involved? How much weight? etc......That's why, as Jody said, you can "log" it and it's under cardiovascular, but it's not all that accurate because it can't be really.
    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
  • AidaWinona
    AidaWinona Posts: 4 Member
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    Makes sense. I was using a different app and lifting/strength training showed up against my daily calorie goal......
  • AidaWinona
    AidaWinona Posts: 4 Member
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    Thanks for the input!
  • Dustinryan24
    Dustinryan24 Posts: 233 Member
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    There are WAY too many variables to be exact or even close. How long do you rest between sets? How much exertion involved? How much weight? etc......That's why, as Jody said, you can "log" it and it's under cardiovascular, but it's not all that accurate because it can't be really.
    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    what they said.. but i will tell you, i used an HRM in the past, and it said i burned almost 500, when mfp was underestimating my calories burned.. just depends on the person i guess
  • vorgas
    vorgas Posts: 741 Member
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    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    It's worse than not 100% accurate. It's wildly inaccurate.

    HRMs are used to measure the volume load placed on your heart during aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise is when oxygen is combined with fat to create fuel. Your heart rate increases as the volume of oxygen required increases. In aerobic exercise your muscles are rapidly and rhythmically contracting. Think about running. Lots of muscles contracting frequently.

    Weight lifting is an anaerobic exercise. It uses glycogen as the fuel source. Your elevated HR is responding to a pressure load, not a volume load. When lifting weights there is a sustained contraction of a muscle group. It's a much slower process than aerobics. To control blood flow, vessels will constrict to non-working muscles, creating a rise in blood pressure. There is no corresponding uptake in oxygen consumption.

    As further evidence, I will point out that the amount of energy needed to lift a weight is well understood. It's 4.184 calories (that's .004184 Calories) per kilogram per meter. So to burn 1 Calorie that we track on mfp (technically a kilocalorie) you need to move about 250 kilograms (550 lbs) a meter (3.2 feet). Average weight motion is about half that, so you need to move 1100 pounds total, or 11 reps with a 100 lb weight.

    Of course, your body is terribly inefficient and so requires a lot more calories to apply 4.184 calories per kilogram per meter. But as you can see, it's nowhere near as many calories as your HRM would indicate.
  • Dustinryan24
    Dustinryan24 Posts: 233 Member
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    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    It's worse than not 100% accurate. It's wildly inaccurate.

    HRMs are used to measure the volume load placed on your heart during aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise is when oxygen is combined with fat to create fuel. Your heart rate increases as the volume of oxygen required increases. In aerobic exercise your muscles are rapidly and rhythmically contracting. Think about running. Lots of muscles contracting frequently.

    Weight lifting is an anaerobic exercise. It uses glycogen as the fuel source. Your elevated HR is responding to a pressure load, not a volume load. When lifting weights there is a sustained contraction of a muscle group. It's a much slower process than aerobics. To control blood flow, vessels will constrict to non-working muscles, creating a rise in blood pressure. There is no corresponding uptake in oxygen consumption.

    As further evidence, I will point out that the amount of energy needed to lift a weight is well understood. It's 4.184 calories (that's .004184 Calories) per kilogram per meter. So to burn 1 Calorie that we track on mfp (technically a kilocalorie) you need to move about 250 kilograms (550 lbs) a meter (3.2 feet). Average weight motion is about half that, so you need to move 1100 pounds total, or 11 reps with a 100 lb weight.

    Of course, your body is terribly inefficient and so requires a lot more calories to apply 4.184 calories per kilogram per meter. But as you can see, it's nowhere near as many calories as your HRM would indicate.
    where did you copy, and paste this from? lol
  • jody664
    jody664 Posts: 397 Member
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    There are WAY too many variables to be exact or even close. How long do you rest between sets? How much exertion involved? How much weight? etc......That's why, as Jody said, you can "log" it and it's under cardiovascular, but it's not all that accurate because it can't be really.
    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    what they said.. but i will tell you, i used an HRM in the past, and it said i burned almost 500, when mfp was underestimating my calories burned.. just depends on the person i guess
    LOL, I had the opposite experience.....MFP would say I burned 500 calories walking 30 minutes at 3.2 mph. My HRM would give me about 250 calories. Knowing both are inaccurate, I'd rather err on the side of caution and underestimate my burn.
  • vorgas
    vorgas Posts: 741 Member
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    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    It's worse than not 100% accurate. It's wildly inaccurate.

    HRMs are used to measure the volume load placed on your heart during aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise is when oxygen is combined with fat to create fuel. Your heart rate increases as the volume of oxygen required increases. In aerobic exercise your muscles are rapidly and rhythmically contracting. Think about running. Lots of muscles contracting frequently.

    Weight lifting is an anaerobic exercise. It uses glycogen as the fuel source. Your elevated HR is responding to a pressure load, not a volume load. When lifting weights there is a sustained contraction of a muscle group. It's a much slower process than aerobics. To control blood flow, vessels will constrict to non-working muscles, creating a rise in blood pressure. There is no corresponding uptake in oxygen consumption.

    As further evidence, I will point out that the amount of energy needed to lift a weight is well understood. It's 4.184 calories (that's .004184 Calories) per kilogram per meter. So to burn 1 Calorie that we track on mfp (technically a kilocalorie) you need to move about 250 kilograms (550 lbs) a meter (3.2 feet). Average weight motion is about half that, so you need to move 1100 pounds total, or 11 reps with a 100 lb weight.

    Of course, your body is terribly inefficient and so requires a lot more calories to apply 4.184 calories per kilogram per meter. But as you can see, it's nowhere near as many calories as your HRM would indicate.
    where did you copy, and paste this from? lol

    The calories to lift is copied from another post I made. But I did all of this with research. You know, so I don't sound like a complete idiot when I open my mouth.

    So I'm gonna start with the basic stuff:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joule - A joule is the SI measurement of lifting a weight
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calorie - The page that shows a small calorie is equal to approx 4.2 joules
    I'm assuming from there you can follow along with the basic math I already provided to end up with what you need to lift. This is actual science. The science and math shows the amount of energy needed to lift a given weight. And it's far, far, far less than that shown by a HRM.

    Next is the difference between aerobic and anaerobic exercise and which type weight lifting is.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerobic_exercise
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaerobic_exercise
    http://www.livestrong.com/article/376844-anaerobic-vs-aerobic-exercise-weight-loss/

    Here's a page that shows how to calculate calories burned during aerobic exercise with a known VO2 Max. Since the amount of oxygen being processed is an important factor in aerobic exercise, we can logically deduce that when oxygen is not a factor the same formula will no longer be accurate.
    http://www.shapesense.com/fitness-exercise/calculators/heart-rate-based-calorie-burn-calculator.aspx

    Of course, people always ask why the HR goes up while lifting weights:
    http://askville.amazon.com/relationship-blood-pressure-pulse-rate/AnswerViewer.do?requestId=392865

    And another page that shows the incredible calorie burn differences between lifting weights and cardio. If your HR were usuable, this difference would be so much smaller:
    http://www.livestrong.com/article/295718-does-lifting-weights-burn-more-calories-than-cardio/

    Here's a page that explains the fairly obvious notion that HR doesn't burn calories, it's activated cells that burn calories. And weight lifting is activating far fewer cells:
    http://www.sparkpeople.com/community/ask_the_experts.asp?q=75

    I mean, I could go on all day posting links. But really it's pretty simple:
    Aerobic exercise = fat + oxygen
    Anaerobic exercise = glycogen
    HRMs measure Aerobic exercise.
    Weight lifting is anaerobic exercise.
    QED
  • phjorg1
    phjorg1 Posts: 642 Member
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    There are WAY too many variables to be exact or even close. How long do you rest between sets? How much exertion involved? How much weight? etc......That's why, as Jody said, you can "log" it and it's under cardiovascular, but it's not all that accurate because it can't be really.
    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    it's actually 0% accurate. your heartrate has 0 bearing on calories burned for resistance training.
  • SoViLicious
    SoViLicious Posts: 2,633 Member
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    Yep, you're right about that. I use a HRM and record the calorie burn from that. But even that is not 100% accurate.
    It's worse than not 100% accurate. It's wildly inaccurate.

    HRMs are used to measure the volume load placed on your heart during aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise is when oxygen is combined with fat to create fuel. Your heart rate increases as the volume of oxygen required increases. In aerobic exercise your muscles are rapidly and rhythmically contracting. Think about running. Lots of muscles contracting frequently.

    Weight lifting is an anaerobic exercise. It uses glycogen as the fuel source. Your elevated HR is responding to a pressure load, not a volume load. When lifting weights there is a sustained contraction of a muscle group. It's a much slower process than aerobics. To control blood flow, vessels will constrict to non-working muscles, creating a rise in blood pressure. There is no corresponding uptake in oxygen consumption.

    As further evidence, I will point out that the amount of energy needed to lift a weight is well understood. It's 4.184 calories (that's .004184 Calories) per kilogram per meter. So to burn 1 Calorie that we track on mfp (technically a kilocalorie) you need to move about 250 kilograms (550 lbs) a meter (3.2 feet). Average weight motion is about half that, so you need to move 1100 pounds total, or 11 reps with a 100 lb weight.

    Of course, your body is terribly inefficient and so requires a lot more calories to apply 4.184 calories per kilogram per meter. But as you can see, it's nowhere near as many calories as your HRM would indicate.
    where did you copy, and paste this from? lol

    The calories to lift is copied from another post I made. But I did all of this with research. You know, so I don't sound like a complete idiot when I open my mouth.

    So I'm gonna start with the basic stuff:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joule - A joule is the SI measurement of lifting a weight
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calorie - The page that shows a small calorie is equal to approx 4.2 joules
    I'm assuming from there you can follow along with the basic math I already provided to end up with what you need to lift. This is actual science. The science and math shows the amount of energy needed to lift a given weight. And it's far, far, far less than that shown by a HRM.

    Next is the difference between aerobic and anaerobic exercise and which type weight lifting is.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerobic_exercise
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaerobic_exercise
    http://www.livestrong.com/article/376844-anaerobic-vs-aerobic-exercise-weight-loss/

    Here's a page that shows how to calculate calories burned during aerobic exercise with a known VO2 Max. Since the amount of oxygen being processed is an important factor in aerobic exercise, we can logically deduce that when oxygen is not a factor the same formula will no longer be accurate.
    http://www.shapesense.com/fitness-exercise/calculators/heart-rate-based-calorie-burn-calculator.aspx

    Of course, people always ask why the HR goes up while lifting weights:
    http://askville.amazon.com/relationship-blood-pressure-pulse-rate/AnswerViewer.do?requestId=392865

    And another page that shows the incredible calorie burn differences between lifting weights and cardio. If your HR were usuable, this difference would be so much smaller:
    http://www.livestrong.com/article/295718-does-lifting-weights-burn-more-calories-than-cardio/

    Here's a page that explains the fairly obvious notion that HR doesn't burn calories, it's activated cells that burn calories. And weight lifting is activating far fewer cells:
    http://www.sparkpeople.com/community/ask_the_experts.asp?q=75

    I mean, I could go on all day posting links. But really it's pretty simple:
    Aerobic exercise = fat + oxygen
    Anaerobic exercise = glycogen
    HRMs measure Aerobic exercise.
    Weight lifting is anaerobic exercise.
    QED

    Looks to me like Dustin just got SCHOOLED!

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