do you count your strength training under strength or cardio

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Schwiggity
Schwiggity Posts: 1,449 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I've posed this question before, and got a lot of mixed responses. I came across an article stating weight lifting doesn't count as good cardio because of the following:

People often say their weight lifting workouts are exhausting and ask if they count as cardio. No! (The one exception is hybrid workouts) - lets look at why. Here is a typical weight workout:

14uvr0l.jpg

Well, its longer than 20 minutes in duration so it satisfies the definition of cardio there, but look at the heartrate. In the rest between sets, its drops to almost the resting heartrate. To be cardio, the heartrate has got to stay above that 60% line for the entire 20 minutes!

Source: http://www.scoobysworkshop.com/cardio.htm

Looking for some opinions of people who have done consistent weight training for a little while and how you've counted your workouts.

Replies

  • Angela4Health
    Angela4Health Posts: 1,319 Member
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    You're right lifting is not cardio but it does burn calories. It's just not possible to count how many calories burned with an HRM.
  • swseibert
    swseibert Posts: 8
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    I count it as cardio because it does burn calories, and if your goal is weight loss then calorie counting is the best way to go
  • hockeyman28
    hockeyman28 Posts: 136
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    I think its silly to not count a part of my workout where sweat is dripping. It has to be burning calories, calories that I would have not burned, I should get to eat them if I choose to. Now I do a lot of hybrid workouts, but none with active cardio, just with no rest between exercises, moving from muscle group to muscle group, set to set. I count it as cardio on mfp, under stength training.
  • Bob_Sugar
    Bob_Sugar Posts: 61
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    Hell yeah I count it! I wear a polar hrm and count the calories. Ppl count dumb crap like doing dishes and dog walking I'm going to count my weights.
  • jenomaha
    jenomaha Posts: 631 Member
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    I wear my Polar HRM too, track my weights as cardio AND I eat back my exercise calories :wink: It's all working for me!!
  • thkelly
    thkelly Posts: 466 Member
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    You're right lifting is not cardio but it does burn calories. It's just not possible to count how many calories burned with an HRM.

    someone with a lot more knowledge than me posted an article stating why your HRM isn't going to be accurate when you're lifting weights. i can't remember the exact reason, but you're obviously still burning calories and weight lifting causes your body to further burn calories even after you're done so i just go ahead and count mine. i also try to keep my HR up in between sets by doing ab exercises so it's at least a bit more accurate.
  • lilRicki
    lilRicki Posts: 4,555 Member
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    and the calorie count on MFP for lifting weights is quite low. I'm not burning thousands of calories, I'm burning less than my cardio, so I log it...I work my *kitten* off, of course I'm going to log it
  • JennLifts
    JennLifts Posts: 1,913 Member
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    i count it under the cardio section. I count it as 200/hour. So not much, and some I'm panting and some I'm like ....yea not even sweating. But I still count it as the same.

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