Calories burned from lifting?
Replies
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I don't eat back my calories. So honestly, if its not accurate it doesnt matter to me. But in a 1 hour lifting session, my HR could be "in the zone" for 45-50 mins. I train all parts of my body right now, just trying to burn calories while maintaining muscle. So there isn't much time when i am sitting there doing nothing like some people. When I finish on a machine, i walk to the next one. I never let my HR get too low for longer than a minute or so.
Whatever I am doing, it's working.0 -
calories burned from lifting come form the "afterburn" over the next 36-48 hours whilst your muscles are repairing. The lifting activity itself is only about 300cals per hour, and if you're lifting heavy enough you should only be able to do 30-45 mins
I love when people talk in definites and absolutes.
When you find out that "afterburn" is only about 4 calories per minute, it doesn't sound nearly as impressive....
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Not that I think the estimated calories burned with exercise in MFP are all that accurate, but I'd be curious to know where it comes up with a number if you select "strength training" under the cardio section? I work out for an hour with a trainer twice a week. I figure if I exclude the time I spend watching her demonstrate the exercise, the rest periods in between and then the 10 minutes she stretches me at the end, I probably only spend about 30 - 35 minutes actually exercising. If I put in 30 minutes it calculates my calories burned at 135. I wonder how it comes up with that number? I don't eat back my exercise calories anyway because I've factored them into my daily calorie goal already. I'm really just more curious than anything else.0
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So, a new person comes on the forums and is told to 'eat back' their calories.
They do cardio exercises and record the calories and eat them back.
Then they are told that cardio is not good, that they should be lifting heavy instead.
So they start lifting weights.
Now they know they are supposed to eat back their exercise calories so they won't get yelled at on the forums, but when they log their strength training exercises, it shows no extra calories added.
So they use their HRM to figure their calorie burn for the workouts.
And now they are still told that they are doing it wrong.
No wonder people get frustrated with all the conflicting advice on the forums.
^^This!
No, actually this:So, a new person comes on the forums and is told to 'eat back' their calories.
They do cardio exercises and record the calories and eat them back.
Then they are told that cardio is not good, that they should be lifting heavy instead.
So they start lifting weights.
Now they know they are supposed to eat back their exercise calories so they won't get yelled at on the forums, but when they log their strength training exercises, it shows no extra calories added.
So they use their HRM to figure their calorie burn for the workouts.
And now they are still told that they are doing it wrong.
No wonder people get frustrated with all the conflicting advice on the forums.
the problem is that people generally ask fairly narrow questions, "Hi. I'm trying to lose 2lbs per week. Ive been doing insanity for a few weeks now and am thinking about adding in 30DS. Would that be too much?" Sounds pretty straight forward, right?
The problem is that the conversation should be much bigger than that. Its a narrow question to which people usually give narrow advice. But as the conversation broadens to things like specific goals, diet, exercise and food preferences, health issues, etc, the advice changes (or more accurately evolves) to reflect the additional factors that came out.
People need to realize that everything affects everything else. You can't have conversations or make changes in a vacuum.0 -
One of the benefits of lifting for me is that it CAN burn quite a lot of calories overall.
However, when not at a large deficit, I'm happy to have my deficit increased.
If I've set a deficit of 500 calories and I burn 850 one day, I'm not going to get struck down by that mythical god starvation-mode and hopefully at least (with lots of protein etc), I'll have a good chance of not losing muscle.
Welcome to the internet.No wonder people get frustrated with all the conflicting advice on the forums.
One of the tricks of using the internet as an informational tool is being able to work out who's offering good advice and not - ideally by further research, rather than by the "just going with the person who agrees with what you want to do" method which so many use.
I use an hrm when lifting, because it helps me keep track of intensity and the watch doubles as my timer.
While the formula used by the hrm may not be accurate, it can still be useful data. Especially if your resistance training is based on compound moves. In other words, if you use it consistently, then adjust your deficit/surplus based on overall results (as in whther you are losing as predicted or not), you can make pretty good progress. No, it's not accurate, but it can be close enough to be effective if you apply a broad error correction. In my case, if I do a TRX workout with speed rope, then deduct 100 cals per hour from the total, I lose or gain pretty much as predicted by MFP. If this stops working, I will update my calorie goal based on actual results.
The other reason I do resistance training with a hrm is to get an idea of how my fitness is improving based on recovery time. When I started, my recovery times were significantly lower than they are now. That's what I like to see! Also interesting that jumping squats us to send my heart rate into the 190's , and the same move only gets me to 160 or less these days.
I think people here are often letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. No, I have no idea how much I am actually burning, but I have some idea of intensity and I can compare that to a different day, and as long as I apply a broad error correction that is updated on a regular basis, I will continue to make progress. The actual number doesn't need to be accurate as long as I can loosely figure out some relationship with what I am eating.
This is a good perspective on how to try to make a tool work for YOU, rather than you working for the tool (actually that sounds like my job some days, but I digress).
My only caveat to the general audience is to keep an open mind and make sure that any relationship you see is actually causal and not coincidental.
One of the problems with using HRM calories as an aggregate representation of total work performed is that there are a number of factors -- fatigue, thermal stress, caffeine, etc--that can affect heart rate independently of both the intensity and volume of work performed. If someone does cardio before lifting, the type, intensity, and duration of the cardio session can affect HR response to lifting.
I suspect in your case you have been making enough observations that you recognize your HR response patterns under various conditions, so, again, I am not addressing you specifically, but it's easy for people to draw inaccurate conclusions looking at HRM data.0 -
Well I wore my Polar HRM during my last lifting session and my heart rate varied between 120 ish when I was laying down doing ab exercises, and all the way up to 180 when I was doing like stepping things with my absolute max weight, so clearly at a HR of 180 I'm burning significant calories, for the whole 35 min session it said I burned 260 calories which doesn't sound too off to me..is it really that inaccurate? I don't eat them all back so if it's less it should still be fine, but I like having an idea
Have you ready through this thread, or do you just refuse to believe that HRMs aren't designed/meant to work with strength training?
The psychological power of the number on the screen of that watch cannot be underestimated.0 -
Not that I think the estimated calories burned with exercise in MFP are all that accurate, but I'd be curious to know where it comes up with a number if you select "strength training" under the cardio section? I work out for an hour with a trainer twice a week. I figure if I exclude the time I spend watching her demonstrate the exercise, the rest periods in between and then the 10 minutes she stretches me at the end, I probably only spend about 30 - 35 minutes actually exercising. If I put in 30 minutes it calculates my calories burned at 135. I wonder how it comes up with that number? I don't eat back my exercise calories anyway because I've factored them into my daily calorie goal already. I'm really just more curious than anything else.
If you are up for a read, someone did take the time to address this in more detail:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/Azdak/view/estimating-calories-activity-databases-1980410 -
Here's my two cents, and it's probably worth exactly that:
If you're only doing cardio, and not doing any weight training, you're burning calories, but not adding lean muscle.
If you're only doing lifting, and not doing any cardio, you're adding lean muscle, but not burning calories.
When people tell you to lift, they aren't telling you to ONLY lift. They're telling you to add lifting to your workout routine. I'm not a heavy lifter, yet. I lift 3 days a week, for 2 tabata sets each day. In other words, A grand total of 24 lifting minutes for the week. I go hard and with very minimum rest, but that's what I do.
I also do a lot of cardio.
The results, with a balanced diet, has been a bump in lean muscle, while a steady decrease in BF% and weight.
In other words, don't add your lifting calories. Run a half mile (or even walk a half mile, or bike to the gym?) before you lift. Log that.0 -
I don't log my weight training either.0
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If you're lifting for the calorie burn, you're doing it wrong.
You also don't have to do cardio. If you enjoy cardio, then do it for that reason. If you have a goal like running a half or full marathon, do it for that reason. It's not necessary for fat loss.
Eat at a deficit, and train with resistance to maintain your lean body mass (eat lots of protein, also), and you will lose fat.0 -
I don't log my resistance training.
Maybe I should log every time I walk up the stairs.
"Lysander666 burned 4 calories stairwalking"
"Wooo good job"
"Great burn!"
"WTG!"
Aghhh.0 -
I use my HRM for lifting, but the calories that I burn are so insignificant that it's just really not making or breaking me. Just sitting at my desk, I guess(just through basic math) that I burn about 130-160 calories an hour doing nothing. If I spend and hour at the gym, my HRM may say that I've burned 250-300 calories... but, half of that would have been burned if I was sitting on my behind doing nothing... so that leaves maybe 80-100 calories. I log it more so that I can keep track of exercises. If I were doing a circuit (or HIIT) then I would log it as cardio. Just my own little logic of how I do it.0
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I don't log my resistance training.
Maybe I should log every time I walk up the stairs.
"Lysander666 burned 4 calories stairwalking"
"Wooo good job"
"Great burn!"
"WTG!"
Aghhh.
Three days a week, I embark on my training rituals for my tower running (Climb to the Top - Rockefeller Center, Empire State Building Run Up). I do 60-100 flights of stairs, up and down, in 20-30 minutes.
I don't even log that. :P0 -
calories burned from lifting come form the "afterburn" over the next 36-48 hours whilst your muscles are repairing. The lifting activity itself is only about 300cals per hour, and if you're lifting heavy enough you should only be able to do 30-45 mins
I love when people talk in definites and absolutes.
When you find out that "afterburn" is only about 4 calories per minute, it doesn't sound nearly as impressive....
4 calories per minute for 48 hours?? 11,520 calories? I dont know about that one....0 -
I wear a HRM while I lift for two reasons:
1. I use the timer to measure my rest periods.
2. I use the actual HR function to keep track of when the intensity needs to be ramped up. For instance, if my average HR is notably lower for my Monday session this week than it was three weeks ago, I need to do something to increase the intensity (more weight, shorter rest periods, etc.).
I do track the calorie burn in my training log, but again, this is only because it helps me measure intensity trends over time. I do not consider it to be an accurate measure of actual calories burned during a heavy lifting session.0 -
Reading through this I can't help but wonder...what would a HMR record if you wore it during rumpy pumpy :bigsmile:0
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Reading through this I can't help but wonder...what would a HMR record if you wore it during rumpy pumpy :bigsmile:
Especially if it sites you a minute number afterwards.
LoudmouthLee spent 4 minutes having sex (vigorous).
Wait. What? It was definitely longer than 4 minutes... right, baby?0 -
calories burned from lifting come form the "afterburn" over the next 36-48 hours whilst your muscles are repairing. The lifting activity itself is only about 300cals per hour, and if you're lifting heavy enough you should only be able to do 30-45 mins
I love when people talk in definites and absolutes.
When you find out that "afterburn" is only about 4 calories per minute, it doesn't sound nearly as impressive....
4 calories per minute for 48 hours?? 11,520 calories? I dont know about that one....
Thank you for catching that -- needless to say, that's per hour.......:grumble:0 -
So, a new person comes on the forums and is told to 'eat back' their calories.
They do cardio exercises and record the calories and eat them back.
Then they are told that cardio is not good, that they should be lifting heavy instead.
So they start lifting weights.
Now they know they are supposed to eat back their exercise calories so they won't get yelled at on the forums, but when they log their strength training exercises, it shows no extra calories added.
So they use their HRM to figure their calorie burn for the workouts.
And now they are still told that they are doing it wrong.
No wonder people get frustrated with all the conflicting advice on the forums.
Or maybe they learn that every action doesn't need a food reward. Lifting doesn't burn a lot so there's no need to eat anything back. Same as washing the dishes, sweeping the floor, etc. Food is for sustaining life, not a reward for actually doing something.
the lifting that i do is not anywhere related to doing moderate house cleaning. my lifting sessions are far more taxing on my body than any cardio i do. I'm not sure how you can assume that you shouldn't replenish your body after lifting, especially if you are doing it the way it should be done.0 -
Got some research etc for the 4 cals per hour? - that's not consistent with my anecdotal evidence.
(Not saying it isn't true, just want to understand more.)
I'd wondered before - it could be used to judge performance, as well as perhaps as a 'lie detector' to see if your partner was really as excited as they appeared to beReading through this I can't help but wonder...what would a HMR record if you wore it during rumpy pumpy :bigsmile:. 0 -
I wear a HRM while I lift for two reasons:
1. I use the timer to measure my rest periods.
2. I use the actual HR function to keep track of when the intensity needs to be ramped up. For instance, if my average HR is notably lower for my Monday session this week than it was three weeks ago, I need to do something to increase the intensity (more weight, shorter rest periods, etc.).
I do track the calorie burn in my training log, but again, this is only because it helps me measure intensity trends over time. I do not consider it to be an accurate measure of actual calories burned during a heavy lifting session.
Heart rate response is not really anything you need to track when lifting weights. Manipulating the variables of your routine to maintain a higher heart could be counterproductive. For example, if you are lifting heavier, you need longer rest periods.Shortening those to keep HR elevation would go against the goals of the workout.
When lifting heavy, heart rate response to exertion occurs as a result of a different physiological mechanism than during cardio. So changes in the heart rate likely don't mean what you think they mean. There is no point to trying to keep heart rate elevated during a heavy lifting session. You are not burning significantly more calories and you are not engaging in aerobic conditioning.
Intensity is measured by how much you lift, unless you are trying to do some type of hybrid circuit training workout--but that's a different topic.0 -
Reading through this I can't help but wonder...what would a HMR record if you wore it during rumpy pumpy :bigsmile:
Especially if it sites you a minute number afterwards.
LoudmouthLee spent 4 minutes having sex (vigorous).
Wait. What? It was definitely longer than 4 minutes... right, baby?
:laugh:0 -
[/quote]
I'd wondered before - it could be used to judge performance, as well as perhaps as a 'lie detector' to see if your partner was really as excited as they appeared to be.
[/quote]
Our baby gate acts as my lie detector...if I cant get over it then I really was excited good old shakey legs!! 0 -
Got some research etc for the 4 cals per hour? - that's not consistent with my anecdotal evidence.
(Not saying it isn't true, just want to understand more.)
I'd wondered before - it could be used to judge performance, as well as perhaps as a 'lie detector' to see if your partner was really as excited as they appeared to beReading through this I can't help but wonder...what would a HMR record if you wore it during rumpy pumpy :bigsmile:.
There is all kinds of research--and it is all over the map. Often you have to dig into the details of a research study (if you can find them) and look at the actual raw data. It sounds impressive to make EPOC claims of "elevating burn for 30 hours)--but it doesn't really mean that much if you look at the actual measurements and the total extra calorie burn over that 30 hours is less than 150 calories. The other problem is that the exercise protocols are seldom the same, so it is hard to compare apples to apples. And, finally, there is the aerobic portion of the EPOC vs the "anerobic" portion that cannot be measured directly and must be estimated. And the method to estimate that portion is not universally accepted so it is hardly ever addressed.
So is there one study that says "4 calories per hour"? No. I used that number because it is representative of results I have seen for studies measuring EPOC (usually 130-170 total calories) and to make the point that people throw around the "elevated for 30+ hours" phrase uncritically. The benefits of resistance training are substantial--they don't need to be exaggerated for ideological purposes.0 -
A HRM is only accurate with a significantly increased HR so if you are sitting and lifting especially with machines it probably isn't going to give you an accurate burn. You can wear it and see what kind of HR's you get when you lift to know if it would be tracking properly. The fact that you feel like you're really working hard because things are heavy doesn't mean it's necessarily raising your HR a lot.
My resting heartrate can double or sometimes even triple when lifting. Especially Squats, step ups, pull ups, and various types of lunges.
I've read the posts about using a HRM when lifting is useless but I still do it. Since I don't use it to eat back my calories I just like to watch my progress and set goals based on my calorie burn.0 -
Here's the way I see it....
It's all an estimate anyway. HRM or not, it's all an estimate.
So, I could wear my HRM while I lift and it may say I burnt 300 calories in 30 minutes. I can log the 300 cal burned and eat back my exercise calories.
OR
I can just raise my calorie goal by 300 on days I weight train.
And as long as I am not increasing my scale weight (my goal right now)--- it all evens out in the wash - which ever method I choose.
Do whatever method works for you in order to keep achieving or maintaining the goals you set forth for yourself. Measuring your results against your goal is really the only way to ensure 'accuracy' for yourself. A HRM will not do that, MFPs database will not do that. They are only tools.0 -
So, a new person comes on the forums and is told to 'eat back' their calories.
They do cardio exercises and record the calories and eat them back.
Then they are told that cardio is not good, that they should be lifting heavy instead.
So they start lifting weights.
Now they know they are supposed to eat back their exercise calories so they won't get yelled at on the forums, but when they log their strength training exercises, it shows no extra calories added.
So they use their HRM to figure their calorie burn for the workouts.
And now they are still told that they are doing it wrong.
No wonder people get frustrated with all the conflicting advice on the forums.
People should be doing both. Cardio is weight lifting for your heart and cardiovascular system...it is important to overall heart health and general fitness. Strength training maintains and builds lean body mass...improves overall metabolic rate, makes you stronger, increases bone density, etc.
I really don't see how it's that complicated or frustrating. Also, this is all very easily researched...I think people get frustrated when they simply don't here what they want to here. Would it be better to just say yeah...use your HRM and eat your calories back from weight lifting...when in fact, that would be "sabotage?" Please...this isn't that friggin' hard.
It would help if people actually set fitness goals rather than just goals based on calorie burn...it would open up a whole new world of fitness for most people and they'd enjoy themselves a lot more too.0 -
A HRM is only accurate with a significantly increased HR so if you are sitting and lifting especially with machines it probably isn't going to give you an accurate burn. You can wear it and see what kind of HR's you get when you lift to know if it would be tracking properly. The fact that you feel like you're really working hard because things are heavy doesn't mean it's necessarily raising your HR a lot.
My resting heartrate can double or sometimes even triple when lifting. Especially Squats, step ups, pull ups, and various types of lunges.
I've read the posts about using a HRM when lifting is useless but I still do it. Since I don't use it to eat back my calories I just like to watch my progress and set goals based on my calorie burn.
<sigh>0 -
A HRM is only accurate with a significantly increased HR so if you are sitting and lifting especially with machines it probably isn't going to give you an accurate burn. You can wear it and see what kind of HR's you get when you lift to know if it would be tracking properly. The fact that you feel like you're really working hard because things are heavy doesn't mean it's necessarily raising your HR a lot.
My resting heartrate can double or sometimes even triple when lifting. Especially Squats, step ups, pull ups, and various types of lunges.
I've read the posts about using a HRM when lifting is useless but I still do it. Since I don't use it to eat back my calories I just like to watch my progress and set goals based on my calorie burn.
<sigh>The psychological power of the number on the screen of that watch cannot be underestimated.0 -
(see comment below)0
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