Clydesdales/Athenas (200+ lb / 91+ kg) - Accurate calories consumed

Edit: Sorry the title, should say used not consumed.

As per my previous post I am currently given fitday a go. After only a week I don't want to draw any solid conclusions but results appear good. I tried not to change my diet too much just to see how I was going and there were some surprises so I think weight loss for me at the moment is still more food than activity orientated.

Anyway, I am still not convined on the accuracy of some of the activities, especially when some of them are listed as either light, moderate of heavy effort. How am I supposed to know what constitutes 'moderate' effort?

So back to the story. There is some foul weather around at the moment so today I was at the gym and on the bike and cross trainer there. And it occured to me that these machines when you input your weight give you the amount of calories you burn in a session. It's NOT dependant on heart rate.

So my question is, how accurate would these machines be at calculating calories used? I know they won't be perfect but I was going to see if I could use it as a bit of a standard to figure out what light, moderate etc really mean by comparing calories burned per minute or something similar.

Edit: Sorry the title, should say used not consumed.

As per my previous post I am currently given fitday a go. After only a week I don't want to draw any solid conclusions but results appear good. I tried not to change my diet too much just to see how I was going and there were some surprises so I think weight loss for me at the moment is still more food than activity orientated.

Anyway, I am still not convined on the accuracy of some of the activities, especially when some of them are listed as either light, moderate of heavy effort. How am I supposed to know what constitutes 'moderate' effort?

So back to the story. There is some foul weather around at the moment so today I was at the gym and on the bike and cross trainer there. And it occured to me that these machines when you input your weight give you the amount of calories you burn in a session. It's not dependant on heart rate.

So my question is, how accurate would these machines be at calculating calories used? I know they won't be perfect but I was going to see if I could use it as a bit of a standard to figure out what light, moderate etc really mean by comparing calories burned per minute or something similar.


They are based on many years of testing different people doing the machine and their general heart rates used and etc... and etc... Those are very generic, and almost all of them are on the high side to make people feel better. After talking with a few people who have their masters in kinesiology, I started using what the machine showed and taking 70% of that as closer to actual calories burned. It is amazing how much different it really is. As an example, I can be on an elliptical machine for 60 minutes and have my heart rate at the 140 to 150 range for almost 50 minutes of the time and burn 1800 calories. The next day I will run on the treadmill and keep my heart rate at the same range for approximately 50 minutes of the time and I will burn 1550 calories. My Garmin 305 would put me at about 1350 calories.

This is just my observation, and don't use it for more than that.

Some of those machines have a heart-rate monitor in the handles and beep if you're too low or high. Don't know about the accuracy.

Some of those machines have a heart-rate monitor in the handles and beep if you're too low or high. Don't know about the accuracy.


The accuracy of the heart rate monitors in the handles is usually accurate. I wore my Polar HRM and my Garmin and compared them to the machines in our YMCA and they were within 1 bpm on each machine at the most during my exercise times.

If you're focused on calorie burn the best way to go is get a heart monitor with a calorie function. That will be more accurate because it will give results based on your fitness level.

I've found that I burn about 25% - 30% more calories than machines with no built-in heart rate monitor, 15%- 20% more calories than most of the machines with a built-in heart rate monitor, and about 10% FEWER than my calibrated heart rate monitor says that I'm burning. I figured this out while logging each bite of food that I ate, my daily and weekly weight,and also tracking the calories that machines and heart rate monitors said that I burned over a few months.

There are so many variables involved, as to how many EXTRA calories you burned for the day after a workout as well. This is especially true if I work out a lot harder than usual, and am so worn out that I'm less likely to move around or do anything much for the rest of the day.

In any event, I think that these tools only provide a ballpark estimate of the number of calories that you burn. They have to put you on a machine that measures the oxygen levels in your breath while you workout, to get a really accurate measurement of how many calories you REALLY burn during a workout.