Calories burned from Insanity...Over Estimating

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  • evansb1053
    evansb1053 Posts: 1 Member
    I just burned 800+ calories using my heart rate monitor. I am on month 2 and was doing the Cardio Interval workout. I am 37 and weigh 182 lbs. It seems right to me b/c that would be close to the calories burned in a 6 mile run for me at 8 minute pace.
  • leedowningkeat
    leedowningkeat Posts: 1
    Hi im new to fitness pal and im doing insanity too on round 2 month one. When entering exercise what do you put on for wxercise becuz insanity dont come up and closes sounding workout is circuit bit only gives 348 caloriea any infp be great
  • JodaNord
    JodaNord Posts: 496 Member
    I am 30 and 5'6' and when i do Insanity, i have a Polar FT40 and its baiscally 10 cals a minute, so the most i typically burned was around 600 give or take on the 60 minute month two workout. I would think 900 sounds high, but if your calculations are correct i guess it s possible!
  • murf19
    murf19 Posts: 453 Member
    It seems correct. Everyone is different and depending on intensity everyone will burn a diff amount of calories. However, I think you’re in the ball park. Having done P90X, Insanity, Asylum and Turbo Fire workouts, the cardio programs can get you HR way up and you can burn alot of calories. Do it a few times and take an average.
  • CraigmileD
    CraigmileD Posts: 45
    I would guess it's pretty accurate. I'd also add that it's probably not real helpful to compare your burn to the women posting in this thread. Men and women burn calories at a different rate.
  • Angiechastain
    Angiechastain Posts: 18
    Wouldn't you think the hrm would be correct?
  • fowlerma
    fowlerma Posts: 1
    Nope that is actually completely right. If you go to Beachbody's website, they do give as average calories burned and your number is just about right.
  • mlittleplume
    mlittleplume Posts: 12 Member
    You would create your own by entering info from your heart rate monitor
  • bbgughj
    bbgughj Posts: 219 Member
    What HMR do you have ?
    Seem right for your age .

    I'm on day 60
    Here are all my number from Max Cardio Conditioning
    I'm
    37
    5'8
    220lbs
    My HR on these work out were about 75-80%

    Day 38 570
    Day 43 627
    Day 47 637 Cardio Abs 172
    Day 52 608
    Day 58 598
  • lacurandera1
    lacurandera1 Posts: 8,083 Member
    I used my HRM and my calories burned was a disappointing 249!

    It's possible that my body doesn't find Insanity challenging since I've been taking bootcamp classes for months.

    Sympathizing with you- I'm in week 5 and the highest burn with a HRM I've gotten is 340. i run, too. And the only things that really get my heart rate up seriously are running, running steps, and jump roping.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    Totally depends.

    What is your HRmax compared to everyone else giving their values?

    What does your HRM have as the HRmax?

    It probably defaults to 220-age as HRmax.

    But if you avg 150, and your HRmax is really 170, that is indeed a huge effort, and worthy of a high calorie burn.

    But if HRmax is actually 190, then that wasn't that high at all, and is really less of a burn.

    In addition to that, if the HRM is using your weight to decide if you are fit or not, it may decide that a high HR is expected for your fitness level (VO2max) and not give that many calories.

    But if you actually are very fit and reached a high HR, it should be a lot of calories.

    Way to many factors for a comparison of cheap Timex with cheap Polar's to know if it was right or wrong.

    In addition, the idea behind Insanity is work at the upper ranges, "intervals turned upside down!", so you are supposed to be working at a level that is actually incorrect for HRM calc's anyway.

    Plus, the calorie burn formula's are only intended for steady-state aerobic. Did you HR ever stay at one level within a few beats for 3-5 minutes? If not, inflated there too.

    So comparison is just about impossible and that's not even considering the effort.

    At least with a properly setup HRM, or in the case of that Timex that Brayburn site referenced above, with a known or calc'd VO2max, and an adjusted age to take into account your real HRmax, you can get decent estimate.

    Or use the HRM tab in the spreadsheet linked in this topic. Polar funded study formula, your personal stats and help getting them best they can be, and your personal calorie burn table. Just need workout time, and avgHR.
    Same potential inaccuracies mentioned above apply, likely inflated for Insanity.

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/813720-spreadsheet-bmr-tdee-deficit-macro-calcs-hrm-zones
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    I used my HRM and my calories burned was a disappointing 249!

    It's possible that my body doesn't find Insanity challenging since I've been taking bootcamp classes for months.

    No, your body is burning the same number of calories if you are the same weight. You may have gotten a tad more efficient in your movements causing slightly less burn there.
    But your HR dropping a lot for the same effort is not related to that.

    Does the force (energy) required to lift 5 lbs from the clutches of gravity change for anyone? No.

    Your cardiovascular system isn't finding it as challenging if you have trouble getting the HR as high. So your heart and lungs aren't getting the workout they once were.

    Your body is.
  • bdunt2646
    bdunt2646 Posts: 99 Member
    i had found an actual formula for how they figure out calories burned with heigh weight heart rate etc...and i plugged in numbers just to see out of curiosity and that sounds about right... even if you go to the insanity site, it says you can burn around 1000 calories in an hour!!... awesome job by the way lol
  • bbgughj
    bbgughj Posts: 219 Member
    My best Burn was today's work out. Max Interval Circuit 60Minutes for 782 Cal Burned, Same work out last week was 764
  • docdriza
    docdriza Posts: 2
    I am in my second week of Insanity and I am seeing some awesome results. I know the wife is happy. If you do not have a HRM and really dont have the money for one, how else could you calculate the calories burned.
  • Shelleben82
    Shelleben82 Posts: 483 Member
    I am in my second week of Insanity and I am seeing some awesome results. I know the wife is happy. If you do not have a HRM and really dont have the money for one, how else could you calculate the calories burned.

    i use this- http://www.everydayhealth.com/food-fitness/exercise-activity/calories-burned-conditioning-exercises
    im sure obviously it is not dead accurate but a close enough range is all i need to get a general idea until i can afford
    to purchase and HRM
  • Eileen889
    Eileen889 Posts: 117
    I always go by what my HRM says as far as calories burned during my Insanity workouts.
  • wealthychef
    wealthychef Posts: 5 Member
    As a reality check, try wearing your heart rate monitor while sitting on the couch for an hour, then compute your calories. Take the difference and that will be more accurate. I usually subtract 400 calories from each workout. The main idea here is to meet your fat loss goals, so feel free to adjust numbers to get a result. To me, the heart rate monitor is just there to make sure I maintain intensity in my workout. It's not a result in itself. The REAL result is measured in millimeters of fat in my skin fold at my belly button, inches around my chest and waist. That's the main thing for me.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    As a reality check, try wearing your heart rate monitor while sitting on the couch for an hour, then compute your calories. Take the difference and that will be more accurate. I usually subtract 400 calories from each workout. The main idea here is to meet your fat loss goals, so feel free to adjust numbers to get a result. To me, the heart rate monitor is just there to make sure I maintain intensity in my workout. It's not a result in itself. The REAL result is measured in millimeters of fat in my skin fold at my belly button, inches around my chest and waist. That's the main thing for me.

    Sadly the formula's for estimating calorie burn based on HR are totally based on aerobic steady-state exercise.

    Sitting around on couch, shoot, simple walking, and lifting and intervals done right - none of those are aerobic exercise with steady-state HR.

    You are getting inflated values for that little test.

    Read Polar's own funded study on it, linked on this page.
    http://www.braydenwm.com/calburn.htm
  • Lizziebeth125
    Lizziebeth125 Posts: 5
    Working out how many calories are burned always needs a combination of various things. You need to use your weight, how long you do the workout for, how energetically you do it - which is why sometimes the calculations are wrong because you may think you are being extremely energetic whereas someone else might put that intensity down as medium so you need to be really really honest about how hard you are working. Then you have to use something that calculates the energy involved in the particular workout. There is a calculator which will work it out for you but if your estimate of low, medium or high intensity is wrong it will not be accurate- you just have to consider that overall and say if it is really really hard for you but other people might put more energy in then it is probably still medium or you might be overestimating. The calculator is at http://insanitycalories.com/ you can try the various intensities and see which looks closest to you.

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