Calories from Running vs my Garmin
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blues4miles
Posts: 1,481 Member
Okay, I have a question and am hoping you guys might be the right group of people for this or might be able to point me in the right direction or at least give me a ballpark.
I use a Garmin Forerunner 305 when I run. I also use the chest strap heart rate monitor function with it. At the end of my run, the Garmin calculates how many calories it thinks I burned. I'm not sure if it's using the heart rate for this, or possibly more likely, just my weight and speed/time. My concern is that it seems really high. And I'm a pretty slow runner. I can use the heart rate data from the Garmin to calculate on a number of different sites what my calorie burn might be. But they all seem pretty high as well. As of today I'm just eating my TDEE (based off online calculators again) but in the future as I get closer to goal weight, having a better idea of calories I burn while running would be helpful. I'll take a couple recent runs as examples for some input...
4.03 miles ran in 51:49 (that's a ~12:51 minute/mile avg or about 4.66 mph). Garmin says I burned 467 calories. My average heart rate was 163 bpm.
3.15 miles ran in 35:36 (~11:18 minute/mil, ~5.31 mph). Garmin says 415 calories burned, 164 average bpm.
The second run was one of my best times yet. But because Garmin uses some kind of speed calculation, I went from 9 calories / min burned on my 4 mile run to 11.6 calories / min on the 2nd run. As you can see, I am a pretty slow runner. Mid-12s is more common for my speed. I've been running a little over a year, maybe 10-15 miles a week on average, closer to 15 miles a week now. As I get better (and faster) let's say in another year I am down to an 11 minute/mile average (which a lot of people would still consider pretty slow) the Garmin is just going to crank the calorie burn up because I am getting faster. Does that seem realistic? I thought I've read on Lyle McDonald's site that 10 calories/min is sort of the high end for a normal person. I just want to make sure when I get to maintenace I'm not WAY overestimating calories burned. When I plug the average heart rate numbers into online calculators, I get usually slightly higher numbers than what the Garmin gives me. Appreciate any input on this, thanks.(Also I am 5'4", 162 lbs, 28 y/o female if that means anything)
I use a Garmin Forerunner 305 when I run. I also use the chest strap heart rate monitor function with it. At the end of my run, the Garmin calculates how many calories it thinks I burned. I'm not sure if it's using the heart rate for this, or possibly more likely, just my weight and speed/time. My concern is that it seems really high. And I'm a pretty slow runner. I can use the heart rate data from the Garmin to calculate on a number of different sites what my calorie burn might be. But they all seem pretty high as well. As of today I'm just eating my TDEE (based off online calculators again) but in the future as I get closer to goal weight, having a better idea of calories I burn while running would be helpful. I'll take a couple recent runs as examples for some input...
4.03 miles ran in 51:49 (that's a ~12:51 minute/mile avg or about 4.66 mph). Garmin says I burned 467 calories. My average heart rate was 163 bpm.
3.15 miles ran in 35:36 (~11:18 minute/mil, ~5.31 mph). Garmin says 415 calories burned, 164 average bpm.
The second run was one of my best times yet. But because Garmin uses some kind of speed calculation, I went from 9 calories / min burned on my 4 mile run to 11.6 calories / min on the 2nd run. As you can see, I am a pretty slow runner. Mid-12s is more common for my speed. I've been running a little over a year, maybe 10-15 miles a week on average, closer to 15 miles a week now. As I get better (and faster) let's say in another year I am down to an 11 minute/mile average (which a lot of people would still consider pretty slow) the Garmin is just going to crank the calorie burn up because I am getting faster. Does that seem realistic? I thought I've read on Lyle McDonald's site that 10 calories/min is sort of the high end for a normal person. I just want to make sure when I get to maintenace I'm not WAY overestimating calories burned. When I plug the average heart rate numbers into online calculators, I get usually slightly higher numbers than what the Garmin gives me. Appreciate any input on this, thanks.(Also I am 5'4", 162 lbs, 28 y/o female if that means anything)
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bump - to see if anyone has some info.
That number doesn't sound outrageous to me, BTW. Last night, my Polar gave me a number of 382 for 38 minutes of activity, and I know I was walking for almost 10 minutes of that time (warm up and cool-down walks). I was at a 9 min /km pace (so, a lot slower than you)0 -
I also don't think your numbers sound outrageous (depending on your weight and everything). I'm not familiar with the 305 but I have the FR60 (no GPS but chest strap and footpod) and I would assume the 305 would have at least the same setup parameters as the FR60 (since the FR60 is cheaper). If you put in your weight, age, gender, "exercise level" or whatever the hell they call it, and any other information they ask for then it's going to be as close as you can get. Even a HRM is still an just an estimate of calories burned.
Just for reference/comparison sake:
I'm a 210lb 40 year old male and this morning I ran 4.03 miles at an average 9:46min/mile. My average HR was 148 and the Garmin thing estimated my calorie burn at 628 calories (16ish calories/minute). I normally burn anywhere from 15 to 18 calories/minute when running depending on my pace.0 -
I'm basically HRM impaired and have nothing constructive to contribute to this. Sorry!
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I'm basically HRM impaired and have nothing constructive to contribute to this. Sorry!
Me too...brb getting heybales!0 -
So sadly the FR 305 doesn't use HR info to estimate calorie burns.
Activity type, and pace and weight.
For running that can be great and probably more accurate, at least up to about 6.3 mph, then starts falling off, but still potentially better than pure HR based estimate.
But bike, could be decent, but if you didn't push as hard on the tail wind as you did the head wind for a decent distance, it doesn't match up. And I could never do that, usually wasted from the headwind, and tailwind was recovery time though fast.
So for your running, you might compare what those burns would be using standard calculator, say if you did it on a treadmill with 1% incline to mimic wind resistance.
http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/WalkRunMETs.html
So 162.
52 min @ 4.66 mph - 567 calories - 10.9 cal/min
36 min @ 5.31 mph - 441 calories - 12.3 cal/min
Sounds about right actually going that pace.
Your HR at those efforts is just indicating how hard it was for you, but the energy needed to move that mass to escape gravity doesn't change much unless you are running really funny and inefficiently.
And the change of ratio between carb and fat used as main energy source.
Garmin probably took into account elevation gain too, though that is decently inaccurate. Wind effect against you makes a difference too.
Steep downhills where you might brake, compared to gentle long downhill just going faster, same for uphill, all can effect that in real life.
As long as your weight entered in the HRM is what you are running with, which is usually not naked weight, that can be very accurate. Because they are basing their math on the same calculations that show high accuracy.
Within 5 calories accuracy to measured for 1 mile, pretty good, huh.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/774337-how-to-test-hrm-for-how-accurate-calorie-burn-is
The online sites based on using VO2max probably would end up close too. But sadly they don't take into account HRmax stat, they assume it in the calc's. And you must have decent VO2max.
And yes, MFP exercise tables use the same calcs - but you must be going the exact speed in the description, level.0 -
those numbers seem about right to me.
Yes. You pretty much burn the same amount per mile regardless of speed, so if you cover more miles in your hour than you used to, you will burn more per pound of body weight.As I get better (and faster) the Garmin is just going to crank the calorie burn up because I am getting faster. Does that seem realistic?
However, if you lose weight during this same time, your burn per mile will decrease.
Therefore in the end you may be burning nearly the same amount per minute.0 -
Thank you heybales, that is phenomenally helpful.
It just seemed like a lot of calories and I was really worried about giving myself too much "credit" as it were. :laugh: And was worried as I got faster it would just be even more off balance but looks like it agrees with the data you are familiar with.
I saw the article on testing your HRM, but have been too lazy to actually hop on a treadmill and do it. I've compared the readout to my exercise bike's HRM and the two read pretty much within 3 bpm of each other the whole time, and my max bpm during a run (180ish usually) seems consistent with what my doctor told me was the max bpm I saw during a stress test I had last summer (193). Since the Garmin doesn't use that for calories, I am mostly just using it as a tool to measure as I get better, hopefully the HRM is at least accurate to itself if nothing else.
Anyways I really appreciate you taking the time to post this info. Also thank you for clarifying the whole energy to run versus heart rate thing. I guess I was kind of concerned as I got better that logically my burn would go down since it was easier, but it is nice to know it's going to be fairly consistent to pace/time.0 -
those numbers seem about right to me.
Yes. You pretty much burn the same amount per mile regardless of speed, so if you cover more miles in your hour than you used to, you will burn more per pound of body weight.As I get better (and faster) the Garmin is just going to crank the calorie burn up because I am getting faster. Does that seem realistic?
However, if you lose weight during this same time, your burn per mile will decrease.
Therefore in the end you may be burning nearly the same amount per minute.
Right and that's fine (since the numbers seemed so high anyways). I'm told weight loss makes it easier to get faster anyways, so I am okay with anything that helps my training even if it means a lower calorie burn. My pace over the last year has improved and it's hard to tell how much of that is training or how much is weight loss, but I will take it either way.0 -
Thank you heybales, that is phenomenally helpful.
It just seemed like a lot of calories and I was really worried about giving myself too much "credit" as it were. :laugh: And was worried as I got faster it would just be even more off balance but looks like it agrees with the data you are familiar with.
I saw the article on testing your HRM, but have been too lazy to actually hop on a treadmill and do it. I've compared the readout to my exercise bike's HRM and the two read pretty much within 3 bpm of each other the whole time, and my max bpm during a run (180ish usually) seems consistent with what my doctor told me was the max bpm I saw during a stress test I had last summer (193). Since the Garmin doesn't use that for calories, I am mostly just using it as a tool to measure as I get better, hopefully the HRM is at least accurate to itself if nothing else.
Anyways I really appreciate you taking the time to post this info. Also thank you for clarifying the whole energy to run versus heart rate thing. I guess I was kind of concerned as I got better that logically my burn would go down since it was easier, but it is nice to know it's going to be fairly consistent to pace/time.
So good you didn't waste time with this HRM on that test, would have been nothing. But your next drive home from the gym, put it on jogging and turn on a workout session, and see just how high your burn could go until you get home. ;-) Don't eat that back though.
You may become slightly more efficient with the running, like as weight drops. But the weight dropping will be the main reason for lowering of burn on running.
Now even before you lose much weight at all, your HR can improve for the same effort, as you get more fit.
There's the fault of HR only based calorie calcs. HRM sees lower HR, assumes less effort done, lower calorie burn.
But in reality, your weight and pace and effort were exactly the same, therefore calorie burn too, but your aerobic system is much more efficient, your VO2max is higher. Therefore heart can beat less.0 -
yep they estimate 2-3 seconds per mile per pound, all else being equal -- so I predict you will be even faster than 11 min/mile by this time next year if you lose a half pound/week -- 30 pounds of loss will give you a minute per mile, and if you are training consistently during that time, you'll get even faster!I'm told weight loss makes it easier to get faster anyways0 -
FWIW, here is a really good explanation of the various methods, and their accuracy, Garmin devices use to calculate calories burned. Note, not all devices support all methods.
http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2010/11/how-calorie-measurement-works-on-garmin.html
Edit 1: I just looked at the link above... Looks like the 305 supports the new leaf VO2 test profile which is more accurate than using the HRM strap... No clue on the cost of the test though.
Edit 2: from the article below, looks like the test cost ~$125 in 2007 dollars...
http://www.atrailrunnersblog.com/2007/02/my-vo2-max-test-results.html0 -
FWIW, here is a really good explanation of the various methods, and their accuracy, Garmin devices use to calculate calories burned. Note, not all devices support all methods.
http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2010/11/how-calorie-measurement-works-on-garmin.html
Edit 1: I just looked at the link above... Looks like the 305 supports the new leaf VO2 test profile which is more accurate than using the HRM strap... No clue on the cost of the test though.
Edit 2: from the article below, looks like the test cost ~$125 in 2007 dollars...
http://www.atrailrunnersblog.com/2007/02/my-vo2-max-test-results.html
Indeed does. And cheaper than that, you can create your own profile to upload to the HRM.
And you build that profile based on best estimates of lactate threshold, HRmax, VO2max, ect, creating your own personal calorie burn slope.
Not too bad at all.0
