Calories Burned question....

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Mother4Jesus
Mother4Jesus Posts: 38 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I'm confused.. :embarassed:

When I did my elliptical today, It said , knowing my age that I burned 258 calories. I did 5 miles in 40 minutes. When I logged in my exercise here, it had my calories at over 550. That's a HUGE difference.
My machine only takes my age into account, and this website take my age and weight. Is that the difference?

Replies

  • poustotah
    poustotah Posts: 1,121 Member
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    I have such a hard time with those machines and the calories burned on them. I went out and bought a HRM so that I knew for sure what the heck was going on.
  • adamcf
    adamcf Posts: 126
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    age weight and height are factors. the elliptical is probably set to for a person that weighs about 135 lbs.
  • Rae6503
    Rae6503 Posts: 6,294 Member
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    Yeah, those machines are mot accurate. neither is the MFP database but I bet it is closer.
  • erinhale
    erinhale Posts: 137 Member
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    Trust a chest heart rate monitor. NOthing else is right.
  • chevy88grl
    chevy88grl Posts: 3,937 Member
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    For me I always go with the machines since they know how fast, slow, how much resistance, incline, etc I've been doing. MFP does NOT know that.

    The machines I use ask for weight and stuff, so I think it is close enough.

    I haven't use a HRM through my whole journey and while it'd be cool - I can't justify the cost when I'm in maintenance now.
  • cckeimig
    cckeimig Posts: 194 Member
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    MFP takes weight into consideration, but as was mentioned, it doesn't know about the resistance and such. All I know is that when I compare the calories burned at my current weight for certain activities to what I *used* to burn for the same activities, the site has recalculated things and I burn a fraction of what I did 30 lbs ago.

    I don't have an HRM either, but to be super-exact, that's your best bet. But like chevy88grl, I'm not buying one at this point in my journey because I'm nearly at my goal and am about to switch to maintenance. That, and things like that are super expensive down here--maybe the next time I go home to the US...
  • brandimarie6
    brandimarie6 Posts: 17
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    I have such a hard time with those machines and the calories burned on them. I went out and bought a HRM so that I knew for sure what the heck was going on.
    whats an HRM?
  • arc918
    arc918 Posts: 2,037 Member
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    I'm guessing your elliptical is way inaccurate as to the distance, thus overstating calories burned.

    I can run 8 minutes miles all day long, but I can't barely eek out a 9 minute mile on the elliptical.
  • Serenifly
    Serenifly Posts: 669 Member
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    It can be confusing ...

    I wear a HRM (Heart Rate Monitor)- Polar FT60 - which is more accurate for calorie burning than a machine that doesn't ask me my age, and height (or know my resting heart rate)

    When I run for 30 minutes, my Heart Rate monitor will say 170 Cals burned while the machine will say I did 350 Calories burned. I find machines to be heavily inflated ... I personally go by HRM -
  • Mother4Jesus
    Mother4Jesus Posts: 38 Member
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    What i've been doing is eating 1/2 of my exercise calories. I wouldn't eat them all anyway..that defeats the purpose of exercisng WHILE trying to lose weight. it's a good thing to know when I am maintaning.

    Thank you all...i'm as confused as ever. :laugh: :drinker:

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