Originally Posted by
bbbean
Keep in mind also that many (most) cycling and exercise apps tend to overestimate the number of calories burned. If you combine this with a natural tendency to underestimate food calories, it's easy to show a deficit when there is actually a surplus. Unless you're using a power meter and a scale, you should always view your numbers as suspect. I got the best results when I tried to underestimate exercise and overestimate food. Combined with a daily weigh in first thing in the morning (after using the bathroom), that gave me a good picture of how I was doing, but I still have to allow for daily variations in response to stress, muscle recovery, sodium, carbs, sleep, or other factors.
BB
Yes most aps are WAYYYYYYY off for most forms of exercise. I eat 100 cals of exercise back at the most, today Cyclemeter linked with my Wahoo TICKR wanted to give me 1400 cals for 21 miles, Wahoo gave me 1453. I will have to fine tune the exercise credit once I reach my target weight. One lady I know who time trials in the UK trains about 19mph on a road bike, or races at 24-25 on a trials bike, she factors in 400 cals an hour for training or racing...it is looking like that is maybe a little low...but it is not miles off though.
Running a 7 day average really shows what is going on, the average consistently drops :-).
I have plans to buy a power meter right about a year from now, I will graduate to a road bike the first week of October, drop another 70 lbs by mid summer, and that will give me a solid year of training, a power meter will start to make sense for me NEXT year probably :-).
Bill