Cycling burns that many calories???? Doesn't make sense to me

nguyenlychee
nguyenlychee Posts: 27 Member
edited November 19 in Fitness and Exercise
I cycled 39 miles today, took me 3h20m, which is 11.7mph.

I put it in the MFP cardiovasular calculator thing and it says I burned 1089 calories.

Is this off?????

Replies

  • SingingSingleTracker
    SingingSingleTracker Posts: 1,866 Member
    Not off at all. It depends on how hard, and how fast one rides. Zone 1, Zone 2, Zone 3, Zone 4, or intervals into Zone 5. If you were 11.7 mph (on pavement I am assuming) that's not a very hard effort, so your calorie count reflects that. Had you ridden 3 hours and 20 minutes in the 16-18 mph speed, or 18-20+ well then the calorie burn would have been quite a bit more.

    I rode my singlespeed on mountain bike trails with some grunt climbs today for 2 hours and burned more than you did. ;-)
  • burtnyks
    burtnyks Posts: 124 Member
    Its definitely seems reasonable. I do a spin class while wearing a heart rate monitor and will typically burn 550 calories in an hour long class that is pretty fast paced.
  • avalonms
    avalonms Posts: 2,468 Member
    There is really no way to be sure. My opinion is that generally the shown calories burned for various exercises and activities I do is too high. When I play a 3 hour round of golf, walking, pulling clubs, I get a burn of a little over 1200 calories. This just seems too high, but then again, what do I know?

    I know that doesn't help, but how would you go about proving it right or wrong?
  • nguyenlychee
    nguyenlychee Posts: 27 Member
    SingingSingleTracker wrote: »
    Not off at all. It depends on how hard, and how fast one rides. Zone 1, Zone 2, Zone 3, Zone 4, or intervals into Zone 5. If you were 11.7 mph (on pavement I am assuming) that's not a very hard effort, so your calorie count reflects that. Had you ridden 3 hours and 20 minutes in the 16-18 mph speed, or 18-20+ well then the calorie burn would have been quite a bit more.

    I rode my singlespeed on mountain bike trails with some grunt climbs today for 2 hours and burned more than you did. ;-)

    That's wicked good! And yea, I was on a dirt/stonedust trail for like 2/3 of it, the rest of pavement
  • CarlydogsMom
    CarlydogsMom Posts: 645 Member
    edited June 2015
    Well, maybe, maybe not! Did you mountain bike those 39 miles (that's a great ride, by the way). Or road bike? Was it mostly flat, or hilly and challenging?

    When I mountain bike, I usually just calculate about 50 calories per mile. If I was road-biking and it was relatively flat, I'd probably calculate less. I think MFP's estimates are a little high.

    But if I mountain-biked 39 miles (which would be an amazing ride for me!!!), I would think my calorie burn would actually be higher. I mountain-biked 20 miles today and calculated about 1,000 calories. Again, though, if it was a typical road bike on a bike path on flat terrain, I'd probably go less than that.

    So, yes, I think that estimate is ok, esp. now that I read your response above with the details.
  • nguyenlychee
    nguyenlychee Posts: 27 Member
    avalonms wrote: »
    There is really no way to be sure. My opinion is that generally the shown calories burned for various exercises and activities I do is too high. When I play a 3 hour round of golf, walking, pulling clubs, I get a burn of a little over 1200 calories. This just seems too high, but then again, what do I know?

    I know that doesn't help, but how would you go about proving it right or wrong?

    You're right, I feel like there's no way to be sure, that's why I don't input my exercise and workouts into the exercise diary. I don't want to overeat if it tells me I can eat an extra 1k calories
  • m00tmike
    m00tmike Posts: 248 Member
    I feel the same way sometimes. I ride 10 miles a day in about 1hr and runtastic gives me about 500 calories and that seems crazy to me. From what I have read the best way to get a good number is to use a heart rate monitor (and even those are just better at guessing). What I usually do it halve the number it gives me if I'm planning to eat my calories back.
  • nguyenlychee
    nguyenlychee Posts: 27 Member
    burtnyks wrote: »
    Its definitely seems reasonable. I do a spin class while wearing a heart rate monitor and will typically burn 550 calories in an hour long class that is pretty fast paced.

    CarlydogsMom wrote: »
    Well, maybe, maybe not! Did you mountain bike those 39 miles (that's a great ride, by the way). Or road bike? Was it mostly flat, or hilly and challenging?

    When I mountain bike, I usually just calculate about 50 calories per mile. If I was road-biking and it was relatively flat, I'd probably calculate less. I think MFP's estimates are a little high.

    But if I mountain-biked 39 miles (which would be an amazing ride for me!!!), I would think my calorie burn would actually be higher. I mountain-biked 20 miles today and calculated about 1,000 calories. Again, though, if it was a typical road bike on a bike path on flat terrain, I'd probably go less than that.

    So, yes, I think that estimate is ok, esp. now that I read your response above with the details.
    m00tmike wrote: »
    I feel the same way sometimes. I ride 10 miles a day in about 1hr and runtastic gives me about 500 calories and that seems crazy to me. From what I have read the best way to get a good number is to use a heart rate monitor (and even those are just better at guessing). What I usually do it halve the number it gives me if I'm planning to eat my calories back.

    Jesus, so many calories I'm still trying wrap my head around it
  • brocantrs
    brocantrs Posts: 273 Member
    You're working the largest muscles in your body so it's easy to burn a bunch of calories. Hard to beat cycling!
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