Effort to burn 500 calories 60 min

I seem to average 400 calories per hour burn - some things are greater (eg. boxing, but I couldn't do this for a whole hour - lack of stamina and boredom hit me!) and others less. I reckon I could work a bit harder now though!

I spend an hour on the treadmill. A gentle run at 7.5 kmph for 30 minutes, 10 minutes at intervals doing 1 minute sprints and the rest is walking. I burn over 500 calories in this hour, probably at an overall effort of 8. I've gone from no exercise in years to joining a gym last November and learning to run for the last month. I then do weights afterwards. Not particularly sweaty by the end of it, but definitely getting more so as I'm running faster for longer!

Well look. Someone has already posted what I would have said.

I would add that doing cardio is perfectly fine, but you'll be more productive if you set time or distance goals, instead of arbitrary calorie goals. Much more functional that way.

A calorie goal is, in essence, a time or distance goal. Not sure how you are differentiating them.

If I say I want to run 5 miles today, I'm not setting a calorie goal. Whatever the calories are, they are. If I say I want to run 5 miles in 40 mins, I'm not setting a calorie goal, whatever the calories are, they are. If I say I'm going to increase my squat by 25 lbs by the end of March, I'm not setting a calorie goal, whatever they are, they are.

In each of these cases, I'm setting a tangible goal that won't just burn calories, it'll make me better at.....whatever it is that I'm trying to be better at. Set the goal, and the calories will come as they may. If I set calories burned goals, I'd end up doing an extra 12:46 on the elliptical even if I hated it, so I could hit some arbitrary, round number. (How come nobody ever sets a goal of 518 cals, or 926 cals?). If I set calories burned goals, I may choose to not waste my time deadlifting and squatting because the burn rates suck.

It might seem a slim difference, but it's a difference. Many high level athletes have the bodies we want. None of them train with a calories burned goal in mind. They all train for their sport, and in trying to improve they end up with outstanding physiques.

I to have a treadmill incline at 15 and speed at 3 mph to burn over 500 cals walking and watching youtube videos. i rate a 6.5.

Well look. Someone has already posted what I would have said.

I would add that doing cardio is perfectly fine, but you'll be more productive if you set time or distance goals, instead of arbitrary calorie goals. Much more functional that way.

A calorie goal is, in essence, a time or distance goal. Not sure how you are differentiating them.

If I say I want to run 5 miles today, I'm not setting a calorie goal. Whatever the calories are, they are. If I say I want to run 5 miles in 40 mins, I'm not setting a calorie goal, whatever the calories are, they are. If I say I'm going to increase my squat by 25 lbs by the end of March, I'm not setting a calorie goal, whatever they are, they are.

In each of these cases, I'm setting a tangible goal that won't just burn calories, it'll make me better at.....whatever it is that I'm trying to be better at. Set the goal, and the calories will come as they may. If I set calories burned goals, I'd end up doing an extra 12:46 on the elliptical even if I hated it, so I could hit some arbitrary, round number. (How come nobody ever sets a goal of 518 cals, or 926 cals?). If I set calories burned goals, I may choose to not waste my time deadlifting and squatting because the burn rates suck.

It might seem a slim difference, but it's a difference. Many high level athletes have the bodies we want. None of them train with a calories burned goal in mind. They all train for their sport, and in trying to improve they end up with outstanding physiques.

Distance is an artificial construct that we assign to a workout to make it more meaningful. The body only knows it has been exercising for x number of minutes at y intensity. Distance is just a mental picture we invent to give meaning to our workouts, so I disagree with the idea that one invented reality (distance) is more significant than any other.

There is no difference between setting a goal of running 5 miles in 40 minutes or setting a goal of, say, burning 670 calories on a cross trainer in 40 minutes. Or in trying to set a record for how quickly one can burn 1000 calories on a treadmill.

Given that there are specific recommendations from national health and professional organizations on weekly calorie expenditures, there is a case to be made for setting calorie-specific goals, especially on days where you might not quite be at your best, but still want to achieve something meaningful.

As always, having said that, we need to agree on terms. When I refer to using calories as a goal, I am primarily referring to machine calorie readings, not HRM readings. As you know, I have a generally low opinion of HRMs as calorie counters anyhow, and in this case they are particularly useless.

But machine calories, even if they are not accurate, are based on the actual workload being performed. As such, they represent a quantifiable measure of total aerobic work performed. Machine calories are actually one of the best ways to measure fitness progress. Machine calories can also help compare different types of workouts--running on the flat vs a random hill program, or different combinations of speed and resistance on a cross trainer, for example.

Just a different perspective.

Distance isn't an "artificial construct that we assign to a workout to make it more meaningful". For many, distance is the actual distance traveled... running, walking, cycling, swimming...

When I strap on my Garmin and run 10 miles in 90 minutes the calories burned do in fact represent the actual workload being performed. The machine is pre-set with my age, gender, height, weight, athlete profile, resting HR, max HR and the GPS tracks how far I went and elevation changes during that time. The calories burned is an important metric to ensure I take in enough fuel to recoup from my workout.

If a machine also has input for weight and uses a HRM, I'll consider its numbers valid. Without them, however, it's a generalized profile being used and certainly not accurate unless you are the perfect average human specimen.

I don't workout in an effort to hit a calories burned number. It's an extremely inefficient way to plan exercise. And when you combine it with the mfp plan of eating your calories back to net zero, you're putting yourself on a hamster wheel for no reason at all

Truth.

Please explain the better way.

By simply eating at a deficit to whatever activity you do. MFP will set your calorie target so you have a caloric deficit and will lose weight even without exercise. Rather than kill yourself with cardio (remember, MFP will add those calories for you to eat back since you already have a built-in deficit), most people who have been here for some time will tell you to eat at a modest deficit and lift heavy weights. The strain on your body of lifting heavy weights will at the very least allow you to retain lean muscle mass during a deficit and, if you have high days i.e. over maintenance/free days/binge days etc. your body will use those days to build muscle tissue if you're lifting. The more muscle mass you can build, the more calories you'll burn just doing nothing. Cardio is, in essence, inconsequential.

I'm a runner and I love to compete... so I run anyway. But weight loss is certainly harder when you add mass amounts of endurance cardio to your life. It's easier to just eat less.

Well look. Someone has already posted what I would have said.

I would add that doing cardio is perfectly fine, but you'll be more productive if you set time or distance goals, instead of arbitrary calorie goals. Much more functional that way.

A calorie goal is, in essence, a time or distance goal. Not sure how you are differentiatingthem.

I agree...Whether someone shoots for an increase of 10 calories burned each workout in the same amount of time..If someone shoots for an extra 10th of a mile in each workout..The increase in distance will more then likely increase your calories burned over the long haul..

Well look. Someone has already posted what I would have said.

I would add that doing cardio is perfectly fine, but you'll be more productive if you set time or distance goals, instead of arbitrary calorie goals. Much more functional that way.

A calorie goal is, in essence, a time or distance goal. Not sure how you are differentiating them.

If I say I want to run 5 miles today, I'm not setting a calorie goal. Whatever the calories are, they are. If I say I want to run 5 miles in 40 mins, I'm not setting a calorie goal, whatever the calories are, they are. If I say I'm going to increase my squat by 25 lbs by the end of March, I'm not setting a calorie goal, whatever they are, they are.

In each of these cases, I'm setting a tangible goal that won't just burn calories, it'll make me better at.....whatever it is that I'm trying to be better at. Set the goal, and the calories will come as they may. If I set calories burned goals, I'd end up doing an extra 12:46 on the elliptical even if I hated it, so I could hit some arbitrary, round number. (How come nobody ever sets a goal of 518 cals, or 926 cals?). If I set calories burned goals, I may choose to not waste my time deadlifting and squatting because the burn rates suck.

It might seem a slim difference, but it's a difference. Many high level athletes have the bodies we want. None of them train with a calories burned goal in mind. They all train for their sport, and in trying to improve they end up with outstanding physiques.

Distance is an artificial construct that we assign to a workout to make it more meaningful. The body only knows it has been exercising for x number of minutes at y intensity. Distance is just a mental picture we invent to give meaning to our workouts, so I disagree with the idea that one invented reality (distance) is more significant than any other.

There is no difference between setting a goal of running 5 miles in 40 minutes or setting a goal of, say, burning 670 calories on a cross trainer in 40 minutes. Or in trying to set a record for how quickly one can burn 1000 calories on a treadmill.

Given that there are specific recommendations from national health and professional organizations on weekly calorie expenditures, there is a case to be made for setting calorie-specific goals, especially on days where you might not quite be at your best, but still want to achieve something meaningful.

As always, having said that, we need to agree on terms. When I refer to using calories as a goal, I am primarily referring to machine calorie readings, not HRM readings. As you know, I have a generally low opinion of HRMs as calorie counters anyhow, and in this case they are particularly useless.

But machine calories, even if they are not accurate, are based on the actual workload being performed. As such, they represent a quantifiable measure of total aerobic work performed. Machine calories are actually one of the best ways to measure fitness progress. Machine calories can also help compare different types of workouts--running on the flat vs a random hill program, or different combinations of speed and resistance on a cross trainer, for example.

Just a different perspective.

Distance isn't an "artificial construct that we assign to a workout to make it more meaningful". For many, distance is the actual distance traveled... running, walking, cycling, swimming...

When I strap on my Garmin and run 10 miles in 90 minutes the calories burned do in fact represent the actual workload being performed. The machine is pre-set with my age, gender, height, weight, athlete profile, resting HR, max HR and the GPS tracks how far I went and elevation changes during that time. The calories burned is an important metric to ensure I take in enough fuel to recoup from my workout.

If a machine also has input for weight and uses a HRM, I'll consider its numbers valid. Without them, however, it's a generalized profile being used and certainly not accurate unless you are the perfect average human specimen.

Your body knows intensity and duration--it doesn't know distance. If two people of different fitness abilities run at a 70% effort for 1 hour, the effect on their bodies is the same, regardless of whether the less fit one ran 6 miles and the more fit one ran 10 miles. It is the running at 70% effort for 60 min that has the effect--not the distance traveled. You could do the same workout on a treadmill and cover no actual distance---or the treadmill could be miscalibrated so that the "distance" is a completely fabricated number -- still no difference as long as intensity and duration are the same. So, yes, distance is an artificial frame that humans apply to a workout to give it meaning for us. It has no other significance.

The calories on your Garmin MAY reflect the calories expended. And they may not. If you have your actual max HR (not a calculated one) and if you have actual, laboratory-measured VO2 max programmed into it, then it is likely that a top-level Garmin will provide a more accurate calorie reading that another type of HRM. I am not exactly sure if the Garmin uses the GPS distance and elevation in its calculations, but that could work pretty well also. However, there are limits in using any HRM calorie count as a measure of total aerobic work the way I described. There are a number of non-metabolic factors--illness, fatigue, anxiety, thermal stress, cardiovascular drift--that can affect heart rate and, thus, HRM calorie count numbers. If you have a higher-level Garmin, then there is a good chance some of this is accounted for -- at least the people from First Beat claim it is--but it's still not going to be precise in the way that I am describing.

I am not really arguing the properties of Garmin HRMs and am not really sure why you brought that up. I am disagreeing with DavPaul's assertion that distance is always more significant than total calories and that total calories burned is not a legitimate workout goal. (And the "disagreement" is totally for entertainment purposes only, since I know he can have fun with it).

I also wanted to point out that machine calorie totals can serve a useful purpose, regardless of whether or not the actual numbers are accurate. Cardio machines base their calorie estimates on measurements of actual workloads. With the use of microprocessors, the workloads can be measured consistently and relatively accurately. Therefore, the calorie count on a machine will be a consistent measurement of total aerobic work performed during an exercise session. Compared to the actual calories one burned, the calorie counts become inaccurate because the equations used to translate the measured workload into estimated calories are inaccurate. However that "inaccuracy' is a constant, so the differences in calorie counts from one workout to the next represent real differences in total aerobic work performed.

This can be a useful tool if someone is trying to compare different workouts with varying workloads--e.g. a "random hill" selection on a treadmill, or random resistance setting on a cross trainer, or a workout in which the user manually changes speeds, elevations, and resistance levels. If I do 320 calories on a cross trainer in 30 min, and 1 week later am able to do 350, that's a real increase in total work performed in 30 min--regardless of whether it is actually 350 calories or not. Without using that number, there would be not other way to track that type of progress. Average heart rate can't be used, neither can the calorie count on an HRM. Distance can't be used because one might pedal more quickly at a lower resistance one day and more slowly at a higher resistance the other.

Again, the actual numbers are of secondary importance. It doesn't make any difference whether the calorie numbers are accurate--as long as actual workload is being measured, the differences in machine total calorie numbers will represent actual changes in total aerobic work performed -- in ways that HRMs cannot --and thus can be used to chart relative progress.

Azdak, I just commented on your earlier post about relative reference to yourself based on the use of machines/formulas to measure calorie burn/effort. The further detail you just added is very good, and I agree when using it as a relative measure in the way described. I don't even think this entertaining disagreement ;-) between the differing views is necessarily mutually exclusive. Like I just said, I agree with your this last detailed comment, and I think it will be very helpful for many, yet I still focus almost entirely on other performance metrics because of what my objectives are. I want to run a certain distance nonstop at a certain speed regardless of the calorie burn, I want to do HIIT runs making increases over time to slow and fast speeds and fast intervals regardless of the calorie burn, and I want to work out near max HR for certain amounts of time regardless of calorie burn. Nevertheless, the two ways of looking at it do correlate to some extent even if one is better suited for particular individual for a particular goal.

500 in 60 mins i would be a 4, maybe a 5

Increase your intensity with intervals and higher intensity circuit training. Look into kettlebells. I've been using them for 5+ years now. I can easily burn (I monitor with a HR monitor) 400 calories in 25 minutes.

Too many on this board are wasting time doing long aerobic exercises. Stop wasting life on a treadmill. Get some of it back by picking up the pace and adding weighted exercises at a faster tempo. Better for you and you'll have more time for yourself.

If you are using an HRM with kettlebell swings, the HRM is overestimating your calories by 20%-30%. The reason is that the HR response is exaggerated during kettlebell swings, so HR increase is greater than the increase in VO2. A research paper showed that, during 20 min of kettlebell swings, HR reached 85+ percent of HR reserve, but VO2 was only 60%-65% (during aerobic exercise, VO2 would be 75%-80% at that HR.)

Arbitrarily dismissing endurance exercise as a "waste of time" represents a shallow view of working out. There are a number of ways in which endurance exercise can not only promote weight loss and fitness, but it can also enhance one's ability to perform HIIT training as well. And then there is higher-intensity steady-state training, which might be better than both of them. HIIT training can provide excellent benefits but, in the long term, a balanced program is going to work better for more people.