HOW DO I KNOW?!

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laurenwarwick
laurenwarwick Posts: 29
in Fitness and Exercise
if my heart rate monitor is accurately calculating my calories?

i have a polar ft4 with chest strap, and all personal settings are accurate. i even change the weight every time i weigh in and lose. my issue is that it seems to be WAY overcalculating my calories. i am 5'6", 126ish pounds depending on the day, and 25 years old. in an hour of tubokick, it says that i burn 700+ calories. my old hrm (sportline dup women's hrm with chest strap) said i only burned around 400 per class.

what is going on?? which is accurate?

Replies

  • ilovegreg05
    ilovegreg05 Posts: 96 Member
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    Seems to me inaccurate, but as long as its always inaccurate you'll be ok.

    If you are burning 700 cals 3 days a week and not losing, you'll know to shoot for 100cals

    make sense?
  • laurenwarwick
    laurenwarwick Posts: 29
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    Seems to me inaccurate, but as long as its always inaccurate you'll be ok.

    If you are burning 700 cals 3 days a week and not losing, you'll know to shoot for 100cals

    make sense?

    somewhat. not really.
  • myfitnessnmhoy
    myfitnessnmhoy Posts: 2,105 Member
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    Seems to me inaccurate, but as long as its always inaccurate you'll be ok.

    If you are burning 700 cals 3 days a week and not losing, you'll know to shoot for 100cals

    make sense?

    somewhat. not really.

    I think he/she meant 1,000 calories, not 100.

    If your HRM is reporting 700 calories for a workout and you're really burning 400, and you eat the 700, you're losing 300 calories of the deficit that you want to have in order to lose weight. You can fiddle with your heart rate monitor to try and improve its accuracy, or you can work out until the HRM reports 1,000 calories, then you simply report that to MFP as 700 calories burned.

    You can also keep track of your actual heart rate during a workout and use any one of a number of web sites that you can enter your weight, age, heartrate, and time into. They'll do the exact same calculation that your HRM is supposed to be doing. For example, get on an elliptical and get your heart rate up to, say, 140. Put your heart rate monitor on and maintain 140bpm for 30 minutes. Now you know how much your heart rate monitor thinks you burn in 30 minutes at 140pbm. Find a web site that estimates calorie burn and enter the same 30 minutes at 140bpm. Now you know how far off your HRM is.
  • MoreBean13
    MoreBean13 Posts: 8,701 Member
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    What do you have set for the VO2max setting? It is a common culprit for HRM miscalculations. Try using this website to estimate your VO2max and see how it lines up with whatever you have set.

    http://www.brianmac.co.uk/vo2maxnd.htm

    (hint: website seems not to work in internet explorer, fine in chrome, firefox, safari)
  • laurenwarwick
    laurenwarwick Posts: 29
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    What do you have set for the VO2max setting? It is a common culprit for HRM miscalculations. Try using this website to estimate your VO2max and see how it lines up with whatever you have set.

    http://www.brianmac.co.uk/vo2maxnd.htm

    (hint: website seems not to work in internet explorer, fine in chrome, firefox, safari)

    the ft4 is a lower model that does not have the vo2max setting option.

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