How do you know how many calories you burned?

NeahF
NeahF Posts: 49 Member
edited December 2024 in Fitness and Exercise
I don't wear a Fitbit. I don't track my steps. I do workouts like the following:

10 hill sprints (30-40m), Weight training, CrossFit, jump rope.

I know calories burned depends on weight and muslce mass, right? Doesn't it also depend on intensity? Because walking and running will burn different calories and so will a sprint. Does weight training even burn calories? I don't know how to plug this stuff into myfitnesspal and I've never eaten back exact exercise calories, only however much I think is necessary. So... How can I be sure of my calories burned?

Replies

  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,934 Member
    You can't be sure. You can achieve a reasonably useful estimate.

    I'm not a runner, but people here often advocate the formulas for net calories for walking and running. I'm pretty sure it's 0.3 x distance in miles x bodyweight in pounds for walking, but I always forget the factor for running: 0.6? Hope someone who knows will chime in.

    For moderate intensity steady-state cardio, things without much strength component, heart-rate-based estimates are probably reasonable, if the device knows your true HRmax, and you don't have a known anomaly (example:
    Unusual heart condition, medication that affects HR, etc.). If it doesn't know your true HRmax, it will matter somewhat how far from the age formulas you are. (Once you're fit, there are tests for estimating HRmax more accurately, or you can buy fitness assessment tests from some university labs that will include this). A medical stress test is not necessarily a good guide, as they'll often stop the test when you reach age estimates without bad cardiac-system symptoms. Estimates from fitness trackers or HR monitors are usually gross estimates (includes BMR).

    Weight training burns calories (how could it not? it takes energy), but it's hard to estimate. Using the MFP exercise database for this is probably as close as it's going to get. HR monitors tend to be pretty bad at estimating it. Behind the scenes, MFP is using METS-based estimating. More about that method here: https://sites.google.com/site/compendiumofphysicalactivities/home

    Experientially, if you're logging both eating and exercise, and find that you gain/maintain/lose as expected whether you exercise or not (over a period of weeks), you've found exercise estimates that are close enough for gubmint work.
  • MidlifeCrisisFitness
    MidlifeCrisisFitness Posts: 1,106 Member
    There are good websites with calculations as well. Google them and then search MFP cardio exercises for similar.

    However most of the time I create my own. Then I can be sure it's accurate or at least conservative.
  • mmapags
    mmapags Posts: 8,934 Member
    edited May 2020
    All you can do is estimated. You never know exactly.

    One a different note, bravo for used the verb burned as opposed to the adjective burnt, as is too often seen in these environs.
    The Grammar Pedant
  • Chieflrg
    Chieflrg Posts: 9,097 Member
    One could try to estimate caloric intake and burned and some feel more comfortable doing so.

    In a case where you are counting calories or portions either by good scale or eye, consistency is key to estimating.

    The same will go for activities. If you consistently do the same amount of crossfit classes or hill sprints, your estimate will be steady for the week and will average out.

    If either isn't exact, it's no big deal as long as you are consistent. So if you ate approximately 1000 calories more than you thought in a week, it still gives us a base to reflect upon to you activity level.

    Then you just adjust you food intake to zero in on your body weight goal.

    It's more simple than I can explain but once again you have to be consistent and adjust after seeing a trend.
  • NeahF
    NeahF Posts: 49 Member
    edited May 2020
    These are all very helpful. So I downloaded an app that has you plug in your weight, duration, and physical activity you did. If someone has experience with it or wants to check it out, please let me know what you think about it: does it seem accurate, would you use it, etc? Thanks in advance.

    https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.firstcenturythinking.exercisecalculator
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,934 Member
    NeahF wrote: »
    These are all very helpful. So I downloaded an app that has you plug in your weight, duration, and physical activity you did. If someone has experience with it or wants to check it out, please let me know what you think about it: does it seem accurate, would you use it, etc? Thanks in advance.

    https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.firstcenturythinking.exercisecalculator

    Appears to be METS-based estimating - same strategy as MFP database (and the compendium site I linked in my PP). Accuracy (which is inherently approximate!) hinges on accuracy of the METS value (based on sound research, or no, for starters) and suitability of the METS methodology for the given exercise (pretty sure that for some exercises, another methodology has higher odds of accuracy, but not true for all), among other factors.

    Likely there's still some subjectivity: Just to give examples, that may or may not specifically be in their database, running at X mph for Y minutes is pretty METS-estimatable, based on bodyweight, probably. Aerobics at "intense" vs. "moderate" level is more subjective, so iffy. Whether they have those specific examples or not, the difference matters: Are we talking about an objectively-measurable intensity, or a subjectively-perceived (let alone marketing-based) intensity?

    But, if it gives you consistent estimates (whether accurate or not) and you have a more-or-less consistent exercise schedule, it will give you a useful estimate, for the reasons @Chieflrg explained.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 10,019 Member
    Running is 0.63 x weight * distance. Walking is 0.3 x
  • NeahF
    NeahF Posts: 49 Member
    I agree the app is subjective and wish it had more activities to log! Also, as far as tracking running calories, it's x .6? Bringing up what @AnnPT77 said about walking being .3 x miles x body weight.

    So if I ran a mile today:
    .6 x 1 x 123 (current weight) = 73.8

    However, doesn't that change based on intensity? What if I sprinted 4 x 400m 🤷
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    NeahF wrote: »
    I don't wear a Fitbit. I don't track my steps. I do workouts like the following:

    10 hill sprints (30-40m), Weight training, CrossFit, jump rope.

    I know calories burned depends on weight and muslce mass, right? Doesn't it also depend on intensity? Because walking and running will burn different calories and so will a sprint. Does weight training even burn calories? I don't know how to plug this stuff into myfitnesspal and I've never eaten back exact exercise calories, only however much I think is necessary. So... How can I be sure of my calories burned?

    Everything burns calories. Your burn a crap ton of calories merely being alive and nothing else. You burn calories brushing your teeth. You burn calories driving your car. You burn calories sitting here typing. So yes...weight training obviously burns calories.
  • NeahF
    NeahF Posts: 49 Member
    cwolfman13 wrote: »
    NeahF wrote: »
    I don't wear a Fitbit. I don't track my steps. I do workouts like the following:

    10 hill sprints (30-40m), Weight training, CrossFit, jump rope.

    I know calories burned depends on weight and muslce mass, right? Doesn't it also depend on intensity? Because walking and running will burn different calories and so will a sprint. Does weight training even burn calories? I don't know how to plug this stuff into myfitnesspal and I've never eaten back exact exercise calories, only however much I think is necessary. So... How can I be sure of my calories burned?

    Everything burns calories. Your burn a crap ton of calories merely being alive and nothing else. You burn calories brushing your teeth. You burn calories driving your car. You burn calories sitting here typing. So yes...weight training obviously burns calories.

    OK, yes, I realize everything burns calories. I just meant... Does it burn a considerable amount that should make me keep track, increase calories, etc.
  • mmapags
    mmapags Posts: 8,934 Member
    NeahF wrote: »
    I agree the app is subjective and wish it had more activities to log! Also, as far as tracking running calories, it's x .6? Bringing up what @AnnPT77 said about walking being .3 x miles x body weight.

    So if I ran a mile today:
    .6 x 1 x 123 (current weight) = 73.8

    However, doesn't that change based on intensity? What if I sprinted 4 x 400m 🤷

    You are making an apples and oranges comparison. The burn rate formula for running does not apply to sprints. It is a formula for medium intensity steady state running.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 10,019 Member
    edited May 2020
    NeahF wrote: »
    I agree the app is subjective and wish it had more activities to log! Also, as far as tracking running calories, it's x .6? Bringing up what @AnnPT77 said about walking being .3 x miles x body weight.

    So if I ran a mile today:
    .6 x 1 x 123 (current weight) = 73.8

    However, doesn't that change based on intensity? What if I sprinted 4 x 400m 🤷

    From school physics: energy expenditure is moving a mass over a certain distance. Of course, if this mass happens to be a crate from very rough wood and the surface is coarse as well then friction plays a bigger role there than if it's something of the same mass on wheels. There's a bit of variation based on intensity, excluding actual sprints. The data I've seen quite a while ago suggest that running very slow or very fast burns a bit more calories as an 'average' speed. But it's not a lot.

    Just anecdotal: As a certified slow runner I can certainly testify that running slow is more tiresome and that my steps are substantially smaller. That means I'll have to propel myself off the ground more often over the same distance then when I was running with bigger steps. No idea what the explanation might be for more calories when running faster. Increased air friction might play a small role there, maybe the energy needed for large jumps exceeds the one for more, smaller ones. No idea.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,934 Member
    NeahF wrote: »
    I agree the app is subjective and wish it had more activities to log! Also, as far as tracking running calories, it's x .6? Bringing up what @AnnPT77 said about walking being .3 x miles x body weight.

    So if I ran a mile today:
    .6 x 1 x 123 (current weight) = 73.8

    However, doesn't that change based on intensity? What if I sprinted 4 x 400m 🤷

    No, the app is not subjective. Some of the estimates - ones that require you to gauge your intensity based on self-perception - will be subjective. That's different.

    Exercise calorie estimating, outside of a metabolic chamber, is . . . always estimating. It can be useful and workable, but not "accurate" in an absolute sense. We don't need it to be precisely accurate, happily.

    If you want more activities for METS-based estimates, see the Compendium I linked. (Perhaps the app includes all of those; I don't know. Don't care enough to install it and check, frankly. :flowerforyou: ).

    Or, get a good-quality fitness tracker, and trust that (but adjust based on experience - which you can probably do on a percentage basis, if you happen to be outlier-ish). I could use my Garmin's all-day calorie estimate (which is 25-30% off, about the same extent to which MFP's estimate is off) by tracking it over maybe 60 days, and dialing in the accurate percentage adjustment. Since I had a sufficient handle on my maintenace calories before getting the Garming, I don't bother, but I'm pretty sure that would work. And the device itself will be close to correct for most people . . . because statistics. :lol:

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