Calories burned

nozzac
nozzac Posts: 408
edited July 2011 in Health, fitness & training
Anyone have any info or links on the amount of calories burned during XC. I've looked at various calcs online and they give massively varying results.

One I just looked at has 4838 cals burned for my weight for 3 hours! That's a lot of energy gels.

I'm trying to work out if I really need to be taking an energy with me on a 3 hour ride which admittedly has lots of stops to get my breath back after each section. .
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Comments

  • weeksy59
    weeksy59 Posts: 2,606
    according to my Garmin i'm looking at about 700-800 per hours burned.
    Salsa Spearfish 29er
    http://superdukeforum.forumatic.com/index.php
  • Tank-slapper
    Tank-slapper Posts: 968
    4800 cals sounds a lot, but it depends how heavy you are, your age and the level of exercise.

    According to my Garmin, I burn 400-500/hr on an average ride and up to 700/hr on a toughy.
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    NozzaC wrote:
    I'm trying to work out if I really need to be taking an energy with me on a 3 hour ride which admittedly has lots of stops to get my breath back after each section. .
    No. You don't.
  • nozzac
    nozzac Posts: 408
    yeehaamcgee wrote:
    NozzaC wrote:
    I'm trying to work out if I really need to be taking an energy with me on a 3 hour ride which admittedly has lots of stops to get my breath back after each section. .
    No. You don't.

    That sounds right but what is the reasoning behind it?
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    Just common sense. If you're absolutely blasting it for 3 hours, then yes, some energy will be beneficial. But for a 3 hour regular ride, with a few breathers etc, you'll be fine.
    If you take on too many calories, you'll just end up fat.
  • Briggo
    Briggo Posts: 3,537
    They say you burn around 600cals per hour on a good workout cycling (which kinda agrees with my Garmin readings), even if you go at half pace thats still 300cals-ish.

    900 cals burned, that has to be replaced unless you're wanting to go on a super diet so you either eat it during the ride to help fight 'the bonk' or eat afterwards.

    I personally would eat food (not energy gels, they're fookin disgusting) during the ride to help fight the bonk.
  • Tank-slapper
    Tank-slapper Posts: 968
    Very approximately, there is roughly 2,000 calories of carbohydrate energy stored in the body. If you are still exercising after burning that, your body will be burning muscle tissue which is not good.

    So, the answer is yes, you do need to take on energy for your 3 hour/4800 cal rides.

    It is up to you how you take it though. Anything sweet will work - cake, flapjack, dried fruit, etc. Start eating at the beginning of the ride and continue nibbling throughout. This will help keep your body store topped up.
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    Just common sense. If you're absolutely blasting it for 3 hours, then yes, some energy will be beneficial. But for a 3 hour regular ride, with a few breathers etc, you'll be fine.
    If you take on too many calories, you'll just end up fat.

    This IMO. People massively over estimate how many calories they're burning - not helped by online tools suggesting you can burn 4800 calories in 3 hours! Riding really hard you'll probably manage about 800/hour, your average recreational rider I'd expect to be nearer 500, and that's actually whilst riding, not stopping and chatting!

    You should be able to complete a steady 3 hour ride without needing to stuff your face. Some sort of sustainance wouldn't go a miss, but don't aim to knock back 3000 calories plus!
  • nozzac
    nozzac Posts: 408
    njee20 wrote:
    Just common sense. If you're absolutely blasting it for 3 hours, then yes, some energy will be beneficial. But for a 3 hour regular ride, with a few breathers etc, you'll be fine.
    If you take on too many calories, you'll just end up fat.

    This IMO. People massively over estimate how many calories they're burning - not helped by online tools suggesting you can burn 4800 calories in 3 hours! Riding really hard you'll probably manage about 800/hour, your average recreational rider I'd expect to be nearer 500, and that's actually whilst riding, not stopping and chatting!

    You should be able to complete a steady 3 hour ride without needing to stuff your face. Some sort of sustainance wouldn't go a miss, but don't aim to knock back 3000 calories plus!

    Yeah I don't believe I'm burning 4800 cals per ride. If I could then weight loss would be pretty easy since a pound of fat is 3500 cals.

    I guess the answer is reasonably complicated. You'd need to know how much was eaten before the ride, how long before the ride and the composition of the food (re: how much and quickly it's releasing energy).

    The thing is how different your performance and tiredness when comparing burning glucose from your gut vs glycogen. Do you notice the difference?
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    Tank-slapper wrote:
    your 3 hour/4800 cal rides.
    WHAT?
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    The thing is how different your performance and tiredness when comparing burning glucose from your gut vs glycogen. Do you notice the difference?

    Yes, you get a lot slower when you run out of glycogen! A lot of it depends on what you want to achieve. If you're trying to lose weight then eating is a bit pointless and you're better off running your reserves low, if you're racing or trying to be competitive then running out of energy is going to cause real problems.
  • andyrm
    andyrm Posts: 550
    Around 800ish per hour for a fast XC ride, around 1000 per hour when racing flat out. They are pretty tried and tested figures from several training coaches and racers I know and are what I work to.

    It's a horrific amount of expended energy - I personally find that pre-loading the day/night before helps tons, but then need to refuel a lot through the course of a ride/race and tend to get a pretty savage "burn on" for the next 24-36 hours as well........
  • Tank-slapper
    Tank-slapper Posts: 968
    yeehaamcgee wrote:
    Tank-slapper wrote:
    your 3 hour/4800 cal rides.
    WHAT?

    That's what the OP said. It sounds a lot to me as well, but is perfectly feasible if he weighs 30 stone...

    The problem is he hasn't told us and we don't know.
  • MrBibble
    MrBibble Posts: 79
    Not sure if it helps but ......

    I've an app on my mobile that logs loads of things including calories burned called cardiotrainer. I did a road ride this sunday gone, 55 miles just under 5 hours 5.19 mins per mile average. I'm almost 37 and around 11.5 stone fairly fit etc.

    said device is set reasonably accuratley and it proclaims i used 2340 calories. One banana, two powerbars and one gel to get me up my hill i live on consumed. Tbh i could have eaten more as was quite hungry after that. Oh and a bowl of porridge and a protein shake before the off.

    this was obvioulsy road riding but the app works well and recommend it
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    How does it actually calculate it though? Is it just on speed/age/weight etc, or does it know HR/power/some sort of exertion?

    Apparently Polar's 'OwnCal' is the most highly regarded algorithm.
    55 miles just under 5 hours 5.19 mins per mile average. I'm almost 37 and around 11.5 stone fairly fit etc.

    Those don't go together :-)
  • andyrm
    andyrm Posts: 550
    njee20 wrote:
    How does it actually calculate it though? Is it just on speed/age/weight etc, or does it know HR/power/some sort of exertion?

    Herein lies the problem with many simple calorie calculators on cycle computers - all they are doing is working a crude kinetic energy calculation (energy used = mass x speed) figure and not taking into account an athlete's efficiency, gearing, heart rate/zone, terrain, metabolic rate or anything else that has a bearing on a true energy expenditure figure.
  • bennett_346
    bennett_346 Posts: 5,029
    njee20 wrote:
    55 miles just under 5 hours 5.19 mins per mile average. I'm almost 37 and around 11.5 stone fairly fit etc.

    Those don't go together :-)
    Why not?
  • Ian43
    Ian43 Posts: 172
    I did an Evans ride it from Dorking saturday 30 miles round the surrey hills ect and my garmin 205 comes in at 3300 for a 5hr 20 ride, which is pretty accurate at about 600 cal an hour.

    Bike weight is set to 25lbs on the watch plus my weight 12stone, the ride length includes a couple of 5min stops plus 10mins to fix a puncture., food consumed x2 sis gels x2 nutragrain bars plus sis energy drink + cake :)

    http://www.mapmyride.com/workout/53162966
    http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtop ... t=12778805
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    How do you know that's "pretty accurate"? Have you had some kind of lab tests to find out your energy expenditure at varying levels of exertion?
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    edited July 2011
    njee20 wrote:
    Quote:
    55 miles just under 5 hours 5.19 mins per mile average. I'm almost 37 and around 11.5 stone fairly fit etc.


    Those don't go together


    Why not?

    Because 11mph on the road isn't that quick, it was tongue in cheek.[/quote]
  • Ian43
    Ian43 Posts: 172
    No but the GPS watch is set to my weight + the bikes weight and that average of 600 cals seems to fit in with all the other garmin users on this thread, I burn a 1000 cals while running with that watch so 600 while riding is about right.

    If the watch is wrong or you have a better calculation for working out calories burned then I am all ears.
    http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtop ... t=12778805
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    Ian43 wrote:
    No but the GPS watch is set to my weight + the bikes weight and that average of 600 cals seems to fit in with all the other garmin users on this thread, I burn a 1000 cals while running with that watch so 600 while riding is about right.

    If the watch is wrong or you have a better calculation for working out calories burned then I am all ears.
    Erm, that's kind of my point. Your GPS is close or very similar to OTHER GPS units. That doesn't make it accurate - it's still just an educated guess.

    To find out true calorie use, you'd need to be hooked up to machines that measure everything from heart rate to your breath. And the reason for that is because it's different for each person, at differing levels of intensity. There is no one size fits all calculation.
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    Erm, that's kind of my point. Your GPS is close or very similar to OTHER GPS units. That doesn't make it accurate - it's still just an educated guess.

    This.

    You could ride one day with a 20mph headwind, do the same ride the next day with a 20mph tailwind, half the effort, and yet you'd appear to have burned more calories.

    Anyway... WGAS? I take training pretty seriously, but can't say I pay any real attention to calories burned!
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    I'll take you pretty seriously in a minute :lol:
  • weeksy59
    weeksy59 Posts: 2,606
    njee20 wrote:
    Anyway... WGAS? I take training pretty seriously, but can't say I pay any real attention to calories burned!

    People who are trying to lose weight ? it's quite important as obviously less calories than you consume in a given week will produce weight loss.
    Salsa Spearfish 29er
    http://superdukeforum.forumatic.com/index.php
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    I'll take you pretty seriously in a minute

    You haven't got a good serious taking in you :-D
    People who are trying to lose weight ? it's quite important as obviously less calories than you consume in a given week will produce weight loss.

    Common sense? I lost a chunk of weight over a reasonably short period, look at what you eat - seeing as we're not talking about the absolute world's elite here who are already running 4% body fat there are obvious wins. If you get in from a ride, having burned 1000 calories and eat a stick of lard (exactly 1000 calories worth) it's not gonna help. If you come in, having ridden for a couple of hours, have some chicken pasta and a couple of pints of water, you'll see results.
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    I also think it's fair to say that if you assume 4,800 calories on a 3 hour ride, you really aren't going to lose weight :lol:
  • weeksy59
    weeksy59 Posts: 2,606
    njee20 wrote:
    I'll take you pretty seriously in a minute

    You haven't got a good serious taking in you :-D
    People who are trying to lose weight ? it's quite important as obviously less calories than you consume in a given week will produce weight loss.

    Common sense? I lost a chunk of weight over a reasonably short period, look at what you eat - seeing as we're not talking about the absolute world's elite here who are already running 4% body fat there are obvious wins. If you get in from a ride, having burned 1000 calories and eat a stick of lard (exactly 1000 calories worth) it's not gonna help. If you come in, having ridden for a couple of hours, have some chicken pasta and a couple of pints of water, you'll see results.

    Agree 100%. However it's nice to have a decent estimate of how many you've burned so you can visualise what you're roughly able to eat and stay in defecit.
    Salsa Spearfish 29er
    http://superdukeforum.forumatic.com/index.php
  • njee20
    njee20 Posts: 9,613
    But then my point was that if you assume an arbitrary 600 calories/hour isn't that better than a computer saying 1200/hour?
  • weeksy59
    weeksy59 Posts: 2,606
    I guess.

    FWIW, my Garmin gave me 787 for my 1 hour spinning/boxing/weights session today.

    I'm not having a celebratory chocolate muffin though as i'm too darn fat.
    Salsa Spearfish 29er
    http://superdukeforum.forumatic.com/index.php

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