HRM (Polar FT4) for yoga?

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brownmousemama
brownmousemama Posts: 49 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I've read on here that HRM's don't work for exercise like strength training and stretching, and am wondering why. Is it be ause your heart rate isn't elevated enough? I just got a Polar FT4 and have been using it for two days. I do 45 min of cardio(incline walking with lots of upper body movement) and follow that up with 15 minutes of fairly Intense yoga. It seemed that my HRM was working just fine. I burned 456 calories during the cardio and another 95 during the yoga, but I figured maybe that was just "afterburn" from my cardio. I did 50 minutes of just yoga last night hours after my cardio/yoga routine, and it seemed to be working fine then too. Burned 278 calories in 50 minutes. MFP shows that for me 50 minutes of yoga would burn 190 calories.

Anyone have any more info about this? I don't eat back my burned calories except on days where I did Really good workouts and want a treat(like the past two days, remind me never to buy Ben and Jerry's again!) and even then I will only eat a small bit of them, so it doesn't matter except for curiosities sake.

Replies

  • iheartpolkadots
    iheartpolkadots Posts: 20
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    I use my heart rate monitor for all exercises and it seems to be accurate! I usually get around 300 calories for an hour of yoga which seems more realistic to me than the 150 that MFP thinks i burned. I also use it for strength training and have had no issues!
  • seena511
    seena511 Posts: 685 Member
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    i also use it for vinyasa yoga and it's encouraging to see a larger burn that estimated by MFP, which i'm assuming thinks you're doing more like hatha yoga. for my more vigorous routines it's told be i've burned upwards of 400.
  • brownmousemama
    brownmousemama Posts: 49 Member
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    i also use it for vinyasa yoga and it's encouraging to see a larger burn that estimated by MFP, which i'm assuming thinks you're doing more like hatha yoga. for my more vigorous routines it's told be i've burned upwards of 400.

    I was thinking this too, maybe since there is only one automated entry for yoga it assumes Hatha or something simar so its not overshooting calories as if you did more strenuous yoga. I do vinyasa yoga too with a bunch of strength moves added in, so its more strenuous.
  • 3dogsrunning
    3dogsrunning Posts: 27,167 Member
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    Here is a really great blog that explains how they work.
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/Azdak/view/the-real-facts-about-hrms-and-calories-what-you-need-to-know-before-purchasing-an-hrm-or-using-one-21472

    Basically it is for steady state cardio. If your heart rate is not elevated due to cardio, it is not able to be estimated accurately.
    Heart rate can be elevated for other reasons, like in strength training, that does not share the same relationship to calories burned.

    "HRMs calorie counts are only accurate when there is a consistent and measurable relationship between heart rate and oxygen uptake. That means exercises and exercise movements that are aerobic in nature and that are performed at intensities between 40% of VO2 max and the lactate threshold"
    So if your yoga class does not have you working at that level, it can't accurately estimate calories.

    An HRM will estimate calories based on the heart rate it has measured but that does not mean the estimate is accurate. Without being able to accurately measure calories burned and compare to HRM it is impossible to know how close the estimate was.
  • TygerTwoTails
    TygerTwoTails Posts: 108 Member
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    Here is a really great blog that explains how they work.
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/Azdak/view/the-real-facts-about-hrms-and-calories-what-you-need-to-know-before-purchasing-an-hrm-or-using-one-21472

    Thank you for sharing this, I found it very helpful!

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