Double dipping? Getting credit for total steps plus exercise?

MCG910
MCG910 Posts: 5 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Hi everyone. My Fitbit is synced to MFP. Do you log your exercise when you already get credit for total steps? For instance, I "earned" almost 400 calories for 15k+ steps today. Five thousand of those came from cardio. MFP credited me another 300+ calories for that. Seems like double dipping, right?

Maybe it's better to write your exercise down as a note instead?

Replies

  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    Yep, double counting
  • Clarewho
    Clarewho Posts: 494 Member
    If you put the start time and duration of the cardio when you log it I'm sure MFP ignores the steps occurring during that period?
  • TomInAiken
    TomInAiken Posts: 30 Member
    I use whatever the FitBit provides for cals burned and exercise minutes. I don't use MFP to log exercise except when I want to track something specific that the FitBit does not recognize. For example, strength training I log with MFP. I enter total minutes exercised but I override the cal count provided by MFP by setting the calorie count to one. I tried, once, doing the method Clarewho suggested for something FitBit already logged. However, doing that resulted in the FitBit being reset to whatever I entered in MFP. (In this case, one cal expended was propagated to the FitBit resulting in my FitBit changing what it already logged to the single calorie total I had entered in MFP.)
  • MCG910
    MCG910 Posts: 5 Member
    Thanks everyone. I think I'll just keep it in the note section for now. Appreciate it!
  • 7elizamae
    7elizamae Posts: 758 Member
    If you have one of the newer FitBits, it should prevent 'double-dipping.'
  • JimKudos
    JimKudos Posts: 3 Member
    Hi when you say newer FitBits can you be more specific? I got a FItBit Charge 2 days ago and I have been logging my cardio exercise in MFP should I stop this as FitBit is synched to UA record?
  • JeepHair77
    JeepHair77 Posts: 1,291 Member
    It seems to prevent "double dipping." It adds your "true" exercise calories FIRST, and then seems to subtract those calories from your "fitbit calories." Meaning that if your exercise calories are equal to your fitbit calories, then you get zero fitbit calories, until your fitbit steps exceed a certain amount.

    Does that even make sense? I don't really understand how it works, but it does. I use a fitbit and a garmin for my runs. So for example, a few days ago, I had 93 fitbit calories before I went for my run. When I got back from my run, and garmin synced my run with MFP, it had readjusted so that I had all of my 293 "run" calories, and my fitbit calories had been adjusted to zero. Weird, but works.
    howarj00 wrote: »
    Hi when you say newer FitBits can you be more specific? I got a FItBit Charge 2 days ago and I have been logging my cardio exercise in MFP should I stop this as FitBit is synched to UA record?

    So based on the above, I'd say you're doing exactly right. Log your cardio separately, and MFP *should* adjust your fitbit calories accordingly.
  • JimKudos
    JimKudos Posts: 3 Member
    Thank you that makes sense. Also before I entered my cardio today MFP had already given me the extra cals. Then when I logged the cardio the MFP reduced those calories to take into account so no double dipping.
  • no_day_but_2day
    no_day_but_2day Posts: 222 Member
    edited April 2016
    MCG910 wrote: »
    Hi everyone. My Fitbit is synced to MFP. Do you log your exercise when you already get credit for total steps? For instance, I "earned" almost 400 calories for 15k+ steps today. Five thousand of those came from cardio. MFP credited me another 300+ calories for that. Seems like double dipping, right?

    Maybe it's better to write your exercise down as a note instead?

    I turn on negative calorie adjustment so it doesn't get me double dipping. For example I burned 400 calories today at the gym. I inputted that information into MFP. With negative calorie adjustment my fitbit will add or subtract from that total for the day. When I inputted the 400 into MFP, there was already 392 calories posted in there from the Fitbit. However, after a few minutes it will adjust to only 392 by giving a negative calorie adjustment of -8. Make sense? I love that part of the app.
  • quiksylver296
    quiksylver296 Posts: 28,439 Member
    I unsynced my Fitbit from MFP.
  • no_day_but_2day
    no_day_but_2day Posts: 222 Member
    howarj00 wrote: »
    Hi when you say newer FitBits can you be more specific? I got a FItBit Charge 2 days ago and I have been logging my cardio exercise in MFP should I stop this as FitBit is synched to UA record?

    I also removed mapmyrun and UA record because it confused the app too much and wasn't synching correctly. If I use mapmyrun I just manually enter that exercise into MFP. ALSO, just a reminder that your fitbit will take a couple days to get your correct daily expenditure. Does yours have a heart rate monitor attached to it?
  • Katerbels
    Katerbels Posts: 106 Member
    I have a Garmin (the Vivosmart HR) and it only syncs my workout calories to MFP, not my calories from steps. The downside to this is that it ONLY adds calories from actual workouts (starting activity mode on my wrist and stopping when I'm finished) and not my active calories from times when I may be more active than usual (like raking my yard, for example) but it's better to be too low than too high. I can see them in the Garmin app if I get curious.
    I tried allowing negative adjustments on MFP for a day and they deducted my step calories from my workout calories so 60 minutes of vigorous cardio showed like 200 calories lol.
  • heatherheyns
    heatherheyns Posts: 144 Member
    I add exercise into fitbit. The reason is that if you give it hte proper start and end times, it overrides whatever it thinks you burned and puts in what you say for that time, so no double dipping. Then the adjustment is made based on the difference between what MFP thinks you'll burn based on their information and what fitbit says you have burned (and carried forward to what you'll burn for the day). So, I add things that won't show well as just steps, but I only add them into fitbit and let it do all those calculations. Just make sure your start time and duration are correct.
  • no_day_but_2day
    no_day_but_2day Posts: 222 Member
    Katerbels wrote: »
    I have a Garmin (the Vivosmart HR) and it only syncs my workout calories to MFP, not my calories from steps. The downside to this is that it ONLY adds calories from actual workouts (starting activity mode on my wrist and stopping when I'm finished) and not my active calories from times when I may be more active than usual (like raking my yard, for example) but it's better to be too low than too high. I can see them in the Garmin app if I get curious.
    I tried allowing negative adjustments on MFP for a day and they deducted my step calories from my workout calories so 60 minutes of vigorous cardio showed like 200 calories lol.

    I know it sucks but it's more accurate with the negative allowance that way. I've burned 400 calories in a 60 minute vigorous workout and did nothing the rest of the day so MFP took away like 200 of those calories because I was inactive the rest of the day and it evened out. In my opinion it's better that way so I knew not to eat back 400 calories of exercise (even though I hardly ever eat those back anyways) and only to eat back the extra 200 calories.
  • no_day_but_2day
    no_day_but_2day Posts: 222 Member
    heatherheyns wrote: »
    I add exercise into fitbit. The reason is that if you give it hte proper start and end times, it overrides whatever it thinks you burned and puts in what you say for that time, so no double dipping. Then the adjustment is made based on the difference between what MFP thinks you'll burn based on their information and what fitbit says you have burned (and carried forward to what you'll burn for the day). So, I add things that won't show well as just steps, but I only add them into fitbit and let it do all those calculations. Just make sure your start time and duration are correct.

    ^^This^^ You explained it much better than I. I also removed the counting of steps on MFP. There's no point if you already have a fitbit/step counter in my opinion.
  • Katerbels
    Katerbels Posts: 106 Member
    no_day_but_2day wrote: »
    Katerbels wrote: »
    I have a Garmin (the Vivosmart HR) and it only syncs my workout calories to MFP, not my calories from steps. The downside to this is that it ONLY adds calories from actual workouts (starting activity mode on my wrist and stopping when I'm finished) and not my active calories from times when I may be more active than usual (like raking my yard, for example) but it's better to be too low than too high. I can see them in the Garmin app if I get curious.
    I tried allowing negative adjustments on MFP for a day and they deducted my step calories from my workout calories so 60 minutes of vigorous cardio showed like 200 calories lol.

    I know it sucks but it's more accurate with the negative allowance that way. I've burned 400 calories in a 60 minute vigorous workout and did nothing the rest of the day so MFP took away like 200 of those calories because I was inactive the rest of the day and it evened out. In my opinion it's better that way so I knew not to eat back 400 calories of exercise (even though I hardly ever eat those back anyways) and only to eat back the extra 200 calories.

    I don't see the logic to that unless I told MFP that I was highly active and then did nothing all day except workout. I entered very low activity (to account for lazy days) initially, so my daily calories are low. I was still quite busy PLUS worked out for an hour that day (60 minutes of cardio, busting my butt the whole time) ...I definitely earned those extra calories. Granted, I don't eat back exercise calories because I never trust the accuracy, it is nice to have a buffer. If I can lay in bed all day and eat 1,200 calories and be at a deficit OR move all day, do an hour of cardio and only gain an extra snack pack it's hardly worth all the sweat LOL.

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