calorie readouts on bike computers
Discussion
does anyone know how accurate the calories burnt readouts are on these bike computers. i was intruiged to notice on a post about riding to kimmeridge and back that the rider burned nearly 400 calories. seems quite a lot and have never really thought about how much you burn. any idea on what the tolerances are ie +/- 10%? clearly it can't take wind into consideration, nor hills i imagine, so it must just work on speed, but then there must also be a factor for size of tyres. obviously skinny road tyres are much easier than mtb tyres. anyone know the degree of accuracy?
It can't be very accurate as it doesn't take into account loads of things.
Also and please ignore my understanding of biology here but wouldn't someone very fit hardly breaking into a sweat on a 3 mile run burn less calories than a fat person struggling to complete the jog? their body would be working a LOT harder as they are unfit and sweating like a pig huffing and puffing whereas the fit person is just warming up, computer still ticking along at the same rate. Some fnacy ones do ask for your age and weight I presume for this reason.
How a phone does this accurately I have no idea, distance and time as thats the only info it has?
Also and please ignore my understanding of biology here but wouldn't someone very fit hardly breaking into a sweat on a 3 mile run burn less calories than a fat person struggling to complete the jog? their body would be working a LOT harder as they are unfit and sweating like a pig huffing and puffing whereas the fit person is just warming up, computer still ticking along at the same rate. Some fnacy ones do ask for your age and weight I presume for this reason.
How a phone does this accurately I have no idea, distance and time as thats the only info it has?
Accelebrate said:
I use an app on my phone to track my rides, which provides a calorie readout. I have two phones, an iPhone and an Android phone, if I track the same ride on both phones the iPhones calorie count is significantly higher. 
Mine tells me how many burgers I've burned. What I want to know is how it knows if I've had bacon, cheese mayo etc on said burger! If its got a HRM and cadence monitor attached then its likely to be reasonably accurate, particularly if when setting it up you input your age / height / weight / resting pulse and any other relevant variables.
My Garmin asked for all of the above together with an idea of how much exercise i do, that said i would still suspect that it misreads by 5-10% but even so its good enough to be a useful training tool.
If i run the Garmin without the HRM then the readouts are vastly different, i.e. higher as it clearly assumes an average / default level of fitness ( thats not to say i am overly fit but i do a lot of riding so it takes less effort over a set distance than someone who is new to it ). Therefore i suspect that anything giving a readout based purely on speed / distance without taking any other factors into consideration is unlikely to be very accurate unless your body type is bang on the default settings.
Interestingly i have a Polar HRM as well for when i go running. This also asked for resting heart rate / age / weight when i was setting it up and the calorie readouts are pretty much what i would expect when compared with the bike so i am fairly confidant that i can trust the readouts.
My Garmin asked for all of the above together with an idea of how much exercise i do, that said i would still suspect that it misreads by 5-10% but even so its good enough to be a useful training tool.
If i run the Garmin without the HRM then the readouts are vastly different, i.e. higher as it clearly assumes an average / default level of fitness ( thats not to say i am overly fit but i do a lot of riding so it takes less effort over a set distance than someone who is new to it ). Therefore i suspect that anything giving a readout based purely on speed / distance without taking any other factors into consideration is unlikely to be very accurate unless your body type is bang on the default settings.
Interestingly i have a Polar HRM as well for when i go running. This also asked for resting heart rate / age / weight when i was setting it up and the calorie readouts are pretty much what i would expect when compared with the bike so i am fairly confidant that i can trust the readouts.
Comfortably Dumb said:
Mine tells me how many burgers I've burned. What I want to know is how it knows if I've had bacon, cheese mayo etc on said burger!
Ah the burger count...does anyone know how many calories are likely in a large Dominos pizza with a side order as thats my weekend poison? Suspect that its at least 2500-3000, if so its about an 80 mile ride at a reasonably quick tempo just to repay the damage - sometimes it pays not to think about it!For them to be accurate they need to be a pretty high end one. If you can enter your sex, age weight, height, body fat percentage, VO2MAX, etc., (that level of detail) then using GPS, your heart rate and the other factors you enter they can be pretty accurate. More so if the also utilise the cadence and speed sensors.
Most basic info it needs to be even slightly accurate is heart rate, age, weight, speed, duration - anything less and it's so guesswork it's not worth worrying about.
Most basic info it needs to be even slightly accurate is heart rate, age, weight, speed, duration - anything less and it's so guesswork it's not worth worrying about.
Mine is decidedly optimistic, endomondo with a hrm gives a reasonable guess. That said if my primary goal was burning calories I wouldn't be on a bike, it's far too efficient.
Token comment to say I understand that some people have joint problems etc that prevent them from running, or that they just enjoy cycling more or whatever reason for using a bike for weight loss.
Token comment to say I understand that some people have joint problems etc that prevent them from running, or that they just enjoy cycling more or whatever reason for using a bike for weight loss.
shouldbworking said:
Mine is decidedly optimistic, endomondo with a hrm gives a reasonable guess. That said if my primary goal was burning calories I wouldn't be on a bike, it's far too efficient.
Cycling is one of the best ways to burn calories simply because it's quite easy to maintain a fairly steady intensity over a long period of time.Gassing Station | Pedal Powered | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff