Rocket Sportive calories burnt - Garmin vs Strava

pedarby

Rode the UKCE Rocket Sportive this morning and other than it being a little chilly, it was a really good ride.

On syncing my garmin 520 with Strava after finishing I happened to notice that my Garmin (which knows my height and weight) recorded 3,661 calories burnt, whereas Strava, on reviewing exactly the same ride date has a calorie burn of 1,876 - quite a big difference.

Distance ridden 62 miles, time 4hrs 20.

Why such a difference between the two? 3,661 sounds high to me...

Man Of Lard

Hold your finger in the air, guess the number of calories you exerted - you have as much chance of being correct as Garmin, Strava, Myfitnesspal, Mystic Meg, ... All rely on guesses about what an average person of your dimensions will exert (and you're as likely to be below that average as above it)

drwae

If you're that interested, ingest food of a known calorie content until you stop feeling hungry for more than an hour. I find it's more accurate .

mike1-2

It was bloody freezing. Take the higher number and times it by 10. This is the true number for getting out of bed this morning, I very nearly bottled it myself.

ugo.santalucia

They are both meaningless, but the Strava one seems more realistic... the Garmin one is very wild

DavidJB

Only accurate(ish) with a powermeter.

milemuncher1

The Garmin is notoriously bad at giving accurate data without a barrage of data from various sensors ( HRM, Cadence, Power meters etc.) The Strava result will probably be closer to the truth. Work with 23 Kcals per mile as a benchmark, and you'll probably be about right. The Garmin assumes a uniform pedaling effort, where as most people expend little or no energy on the downhill bits, but are going much faster, this confuses the Garmin.

alex222

If I have a heart rate monitor on I find Garmin and Strava show similar calorie numbers. If not then the Garmin throws out very high numbers.
Like most the others above I find calorie numbers meaningless anyway.

keef66

Ditto. My Garmin seems to give sensible estimates of calories burned if it's paired with my HRM, but on the odd occasion I've forgotten the HRM (and can't be arsed to go back for it or faff around disturbing my carefully chosen layers of clothing) it goes wildly over the top.

But TBH I'm only ever interested in the distance and the temperature...

milemuncher1

Alex222 wrote:

Like most the others above I find calorie numbers meaningless anyway.

Calories used ( or more accurately speaking ) calorie burn rate, are quite important numbers for me personally. If I'm on a long ride, the calorie burn rate is useful to try and make sure I don't start getting wobbly before any planned feed stops, and that I've got enough stuffed in my pockets, for a particular planned route.

kayakerchris

If I'm on a long ride, the calorie burn rate is useful to try and make sure I don't start getting wobbly before any planned feed stops, and that I've got enough stuffed in my pockets, for a particular planned route.

Sorry but this makes no sense. The calories without a powermenter, accurate weight including bike weight, cadence, HR, etc are simply a guess and useless for telling you how much to eat!

Get used to riding further with less food.

milemuncher1

kayakerchris wrote:

If I'm on a long ride, the calorie burn rate is useful to try and make sure I don't start getting wobbly before any planned feed stops, and that I've got enough stuffed in my pockets, for a particular planned route.

Sorry but this makes no sense. The calories without a powermenter, accurate weight including bike weight, cadence, HR, etc are simply a guess and useless for telling you how much to eat!

Get used to riding further with less food.

I use power meters, and I know my FTP. Therefore I can gauge fairly accurately when I'm in the requisite 'zone' for a particular ride ( most rides require majority zone 2 for me personally) but it's still useful to have the calorie rate figure as a sanity check. Does that make sense now?

Briggo

Calorie monitoring is not a pointless exercise at all, as mentioned it can give an idea of when to fuel.

You need to ensure you have a HRM for at least some reasonable guestimation.

I've been using a HRM and an Edge 800 or 810 for last couple of years and with that and myfitnesspal I can monitor my calories in and out to aid with ensuring I'm maintaining my weight. It's pretty damn accurate because if I over eat what garmin says I've burnt for a few days I put on weight (few hundred cals each day not 000's) and vice versa then I lose weight, this is after the exercise which I usually do daily.

You can do it without but it's more of a faff and it's scary sometimes how many cals are in some foods.

Strava and Garmin are way different, I experimented by followed Strava (which ignores all HR Data) and I quickly started to put on weight.

burnthesheep

The most enraging thing to me is variations between GPS products (Garmin x to Garmin y to Cateye Z) versus the Strava elevation.

If Strava uses existing GPS points/elevations WHY the flying fuc* is the planned Strava route often 50% more elevation than once you go ride said route on the exact same path?

I could understand an actual ridden route elevation varying between a real GPS and the app. I'm talking about app versus app for a planned route vs. ridden route.

BS.

BrianW25

I ride with hr sensor and a power meter and my garmin still has over 1/3rd more calories than strava.

I only use the calorie factor to judge how much cake I can eat at the cafe stop now

chris_bass

best advice if trying to lose weight is to use as many calorie trackers as possible and always pick the lowest one, it won't be accurate but the best number for you goal.