Unsure how many calories I'm burning...and a hello :o)

fruitloop2
fruitloop2 Posts: 437 Member
edited December 17 in Fitness and Exercise
Hello all! I'm new to this site and just starting my journey to loose about 50 pounds or so. I would like to loose this by the end of Sept. and I believe I can make this happen or at least get pretty darn close...I hope :o/ . Right now I'm at 191lbs (I'm 5'3" tall) and would like to get down to 135...my weight before having kids. I previously (before this week) didn't exercise at all really...the occasional casual walk, I barely drank any water (started with coffee, went to a pop, and then would switch to a beer or 2 after work), and I am/was a junk food junky so my eating habits were horrible. Sunday I started with an exercise program (went and bought a treadmill) that I plan to do 5 days a week, cut out all pop and crap food and replaced it with healthy foods and the reccommended water intake, and I am now tracking my calorie intake (in/out ratio, etc). I believe that with all these changes and the will to make this happen that I will reach my goal...or I at least hope to.

I have been doing incline walking using the interval setting on my treadmill but I know the calorie reading is not right for what my weight is and the amount burning...or at least that's what I've read. I'm walking at 3mph (think it's in mph) for the high part of the intervals on a 10% incline and then on the low intervals it's about 1.8mph. I have short legs so walking at 3 is a pretty good speed walk for me and my heart rate is up and I'm sweating. So, my reading today for a 40 minute interval session on the settings I've stated say that I burned 274 calories but the fitness pal says for stair-treadmill egometer says I burnt 517 and for up hill walking it says 254 (or something like that). I'm not sure what reading I'm suppose to list when I'm tracking my exercise on here to keep track of the calories burnt. Can anyone shed some light on what I may be burning? Will the exercise choice I made help me loose this weight I'm trying to get rid of? A HUGE thanks in advance to anyone willing to offer up some advice on this :o)

Replies

  • christinekojack
    christinekojack Posts: 96 Member
    In my opinion,,, every body is different,,, so my advice to you would be to get a HRM (heart rate monitor), it's my best friend since i started on here as it gives me the exact cals MY body is burning, depending on how much effort I put in!! Hope this helps and good luck with your challenge! xx
  • chattipatty2
    chattipatty2 Posts: 376 Member
    Agree! The Polar Ft7 is my best friend! I have seen a lot of people say MFP estimates the highest cal burn, the machine can me off as well, but the HRM is the most accurate. It was about 75 dollars. Good investment.
    While your at it, invest in a food scale (cheap one) if you don't already have one.
    Oh and I was recently given this link http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/Data/SR17/wtrank/sr17a208.pdf as the most accurate way to estimate your calories (I was asking about meats).
    Good luck!!!
  • fruitloop2
    fruitloop2 Posts: 437 Member
    But do these give you an accurate reading with incline workouts? Don't you burn more calories working on an incline as apposed to flat?
  • chattipatty2
    chattipatty2 Posts: 376 Member
    IMO the HRM is the most accurate device to estimate exercise calories, as it takes into consideration your gender, wt, ht, HR.
    Some say no one method is perfect, but I do believe the HRM is the closest.
  • chattipatty2
    chattipatty2 Posts: 376 Member
    I think it's safe to assume that you would lose more calories on incline than flat, but I dont know for sure, as I dont do the treadmill.
  • LoraF83
    LoraF83 Posts: 15,694 Member
    But do these give you an accurate reading with incline workouts? Don't you burn more calories working on an incline as apposed to flat?

    The treadmill (or any other exercise machine) knows almost nothing about you.....you might put in your weight, but other than that, the machine is guessing at your calorie burn. You need a heart rate monitor to get the most accurate calculation. I have a Polar FT4, and it uses my weight, height, age, gender, and heart rate to calculate how many calories I burn. I think that makes it pretty accurate. It was one of the best investments I ever made.
  • aewalk07
    aewalk07 Posts: 51 Member
    Get a Heart Rate Monitor, I am using one by Polar. I really like it.

    www.polarpersonaltrainer.com

    See the blog I JUST wrote about it on my profile :)
  • fruitloop2
    fruitloop2 Posts: 437 Member
    Ya, from what I've read you burn more calories working on an incline, which is why I decided to workout that way. I only have a certain amount of time so I want to make it count! I found a site that calculates incline workouts but not sure how accurate that is either.
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