Calories Burned, According to Garmin

I heard a report recently about a small, preliminary study that indicates we vastly overestimate the amount of calories we burn through exercise. Our bodies adapt and become more efficient, especially if we're doing the same exercise repeatedly. Most calorie counting systems like those on treadmills, GPS watches and maps will be more accurate for someone relatively new to an activity, and will be fairly inaccurate for someone who is exercising regularly.

So, if you jog 3 miles, five times / week regularly, your Garmin is going to be overestimating your calorie loss.

If your neighbor takes up jogging and gradually works up to the same mileage as you, at least in the early stages his Garmin likely will be fairly accurate.

For you, I say 5/10 on accuracy.

Girl, you got this!

thejeff wrote:

I will throw this out: on my 20 miler this morning, it said I burned 3324 calories. My entered weight is 205lbs. Those calories seem insanely high, right?

No, you're just fat.

You burn calories based on minutes exercised and your weight.

Used to be I'd burn at least 600 calories on a six mile run. Now it's closer 480.

No one size fits all tool will be that accurate.

thejeff stole the pies wrote:

thejeff wrote:

I will throw this out: on my 20 miler this morning, it said I burned 3324 calories. My entered weight is 205lbs. Those calories seem insanely high, right?

No, you're just fat.

I was a 275lb defensive end with a six pack. Now, I am 205 with an even sixier pack. I would crush you like a bug, skinny man... if I could catch you.

NahSon wrote:

Girl, you got this!

I lol'd :-)

thejeff wrote:

thejeff stole the pies wrote:

No, you're just fat.

I was a 275lb defensive end with a six pack. Now, I am 205 with an even sixier pack. I would crush you like a bug, skinny man... if I could catch you.

Geez, how tall are you if you are skinny at 205?

I can't stand your religious posts ... but I really enjoyed this.

thejeff wrote:

I was a 275lb defensive end with a six pack. Now, I am 205 with an even sixier pack. I would crush you like a bug, skinny man... if I could catch you.

[quote]thejeff wrote:

My guess is that it gives you a reasonable bell curve, but where an individual FALLS on that bell curve is anybody's guess.

/quote]

Does it give a whole curve, or just a mean?

I am not sure tying it to HR would make it any more accurate as a lot of things can affect HR.

If this company that is opening soon ever hires me, I will see if I can get some data to look at the Garmin (with the footpod) compared to a metabolic cart reading.

Garmin (and others) protect their algorithms which makes it hard to get a full picture of what they are doing.

thejeff wrote:

thejeff stole the pies wrote:

No, you're just fat.

I was a 275lb defensive end with a six pack. Now, I am 205 with an even sixier pack. I would crush you like a bug, skinny man... if I could catch you.

I'm 6'3" you must be 7'3"?

This study used triaxial accelerometers as the criterion, which isn't particularly accurate either, and showed Garmin underestimated calories ~ 50% ...

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=

(Garmin%5BTitle%2FAbstract%5D)%20AND%20energy%20expenditure%5BTitle%2FAbstract%5D

This company, FirstBeat, does use heart rate to predict oxygen consumption, and they license their technology to Garmin, so calories are probably tied to heart rate ...

https://www.firstbeat.com/