Heart Rate Monitors and calorie expenditure

[jacqued]

Hi,
I just bought a Polaris M32 HRM. I used it for the first time today. I was just wondering if anyone knew how accurate the calorie counting feature is on these. I guess I have a hard time believing that I just burned 549 calories doing Muscle Endurance and CTX Kickbox. It would be nice though if it was right

Jacque

 

[smoogy]

If you did both these workouts back to back, I find that very easy to believe. They are very similar to my numbers. ME, although a weight training workout has a lot of step ups & other leg exercise, that tend to keep your heart rate on the upper end. Combine that with 30 minutes of CTX KB, it's very feasible. You also have to take into account your height and weight and your cardiovascular fitness level.

Marla

 

[Fit_mommy]

Marla or anyone else who knows...

As your cardiovascular fitness improves, your cals burned decrease, right?

Thanks!

 

[aila212]

Hi Jacque,

I have a Polar M32. I haven't used it for weight training, but have used it with most of my cardio. I wear it when I spin and found that my bike reads that I burn an extra 40-60 calories than the HRM. I'm not quite sure how accurate they are, but it gives me a rough idea of what I am burning. I have used other HRM's & this brand seems to be the most accurate for me.

HTH

 

[Miss Lee]

Great question, Wendy. I don't know if the calories you burn decrease with improved cardiovascular fitness, but I do know that the more you weigh, the more calories you burn, and as you loose weight, the number of calories you burn decrease. My guess is that CV fitness is somehow related.

Michele

 

[smoogy]

I'm sure they do Wendy but I also look at it this way (in case you are getting bummed out about the idea), and I'll give you an example. If you started out huffing and puffing to C&W and burned X amount of calories, once that was easier you moved on to say RS or SB and could easily burn more calories.
Or, you may increase your intensity in other ways such as increasing number of risers or adding more power moves etc,.. So it's just my opinion that you can continue to burn a decent amount of calories no matter how fit you are provided you continually challenge yourself.

Marla

 

[jacqued]

Marla and Aida thanks for the replies. I'm happy as long as it's somewhere in the general ballpark. It doesn't have to be exactly right. Just as long as I have some idea where I'm at. I'm interested to see how it registers when I do an all out cardio workout. My heart rate was really up and down with the weight training.

Jacque