Recumbent Bike Calories Burned Question

rustyguy

HI everyone,

I ride a stationary recumbent bike as part of my exercise routine and I'm having trouble determining the calories burned. Has anyone found a good calculator? The closest thing I could find on MFP says 60 minutes is 858 calories (Stationary bike, light effort (bicycling, cycling, biking) but that seems very high for calories burned. it also doesn't take into account the user's weight or speed so I find that result to be suspect.

I've found calculators on the internet but some of them calculate at over a thousand calories for the 70 minutes I ride (12mph avg) and again, that answer just seems too high. If I was burning anywhere close to a thousand calories an hour I would see much different results.

Has anyone had any luck using a calculator and if so, can you provide a link?

Thanks

rehtri101

This is a decent calculator, use it for estimates though:

http://www.self.com/calculatorsprograms/calculators/caloriesburned/stationary_biking

If you really want to get specific, you may want to look at more exact equations, like this:

http://www.ideafit.com/fitness-library/calculating-caloric-expenditure-0


Yes, the calculator for MyFitnessPal is broken for biking. To burn more than 1000 calories an hour, you'd feel the exertion and know it.

seinfeldlove

So far my only exercise has been my stationary bike (I plan to add walking soon though). At 201 lbs, riding for 30 minutes MFP says I burn 333, at 'moderate' level. I thought that seemed high. Except for my butt aching long before I'm ready to stop, I could bike longer, so I do 30 minutes in the morning and 30 in the evening. I've been trying to mix it up as far as playing with the tension. Light tension, ride faster, 16-17 mph, harder tension, try to keep above 13mph, going in 5 minutes increments back and forth.

I just keep saying I hope it's working, lol. Thanks for the link, it's good to have another site to verify the calories.