The FastDay Forum

Hi all,

I'm interested if anyone has a good reference for working out how many calories they are burning through various exertions & exercises?

I'm interested as I want to separate the change in my weight caused by 5:2 and by exercise (if any). I'm finding this hard to do as I fast and exercise on the same day (today).

I'd be particularly interested in references that cover a wide range of activities, as although I occasionally jog I struggle to motivate myself unless it's 'exercise with a purpose' so prefer team/ competitive sport. After work tonight for instance I am doing 1hr of football training followed by 1hr of netball training.

Also, I'm currently doing a fair amount of DIY at the minute having just bought my first house and can see a change in the shaping of my arms...so is it fair for me to count DIY as exercising? I was exhausted the other day hand-stripping paint off a door frame!

Hi loseitlyd and welcome,

I'm sure others will be along soon and give you loads of sites to log onto but I know that 'Myfitnesspal' app gives calories burning values for various activities.

Not sure if diy will cause you to lose any weight but all that bending, stretching, climbing on and off ladders etc will certainly help to tone you up as well as keep you more supple and the best bit is it will make your new home look as fabulous as you at the same time, how good is that?

Good luck with both projects and keep us posted,

Ballerina x

I just Googled your question and this link was the first of many that came up
http://www.bhf.org.uk/heart-health/prev ... lator.aspx

I hope that helps

[carieoates]

Hiya loseitlyd. I use my fitness pal to log my exercise and it does have things like housework on there, which I don't include personally. But saying that we all burn different amounts whilst probably doing the same thing...so I suggest getting yourself a fitbit, lots of us on this forum have them and enjoy seeing just how much we burn versus what we consume. We also see how fitter we can become via the activity logs. You can take a note of your cal usage before and after your activity then you'll know exactly what you're burning. I have a fitbit one which I bought used on ebay, so it needn't be a massive outlay. Hope this helps. And good luck.

I've been hitting the gym in a big way and here's what I've learned!

15 mins on treadmill at an incline of 7 and a speed of 3.5 burns 120 cals.
10 mins on cross trainer at incline of 7 burns 100 cals.
1 hour on treadmill with no incline at speed of 3.8 burns 150 cals.
30 mins spinning class burns 100 cals.
45 mins AquaFit class burn 100 cals.

I've been trying to do either spinning and aquafit as my cardio and fat burn before doing a programme of weights, or the treadmill/cross trainer followed by weights.

When I started going to the gym first I was a bit disappointed by how few calories i was burning with such hard work if I'm being honest. I couldn't believe that I had spent an hour on the treadmill and only burned off breakfast!! But I'm starting to realise that burning off some is better than none at all, which is exactly what I'd been doing!

Here's an online calculator also.

http://www.self.com/calculatorsprograms ... ning_house

Supposedly I've burned off over 700 calories just doing general housework today...and I'm still gonna hit the gym!

Dunno how useful this is but here you go!

Activity /Calories burnt in 1 hour*
Walking at a moderate pace 287
Hoovering 193.7
Dusting 173.6
Painting, Inside Projects 66
Gardening, Weeding 287.8
Mopping Floors 193.7
Car Washing 234
Cleaning Windows 180.3
Ironing 113.1
Wallpapering 133.2
Chopping Wood 415.5
Walking up & down stairs, moderate 516.3

* Values are based on a 37yr old female, 5ft 5, weighing 12 stone.Those who weigh more than this will burn more calories; those who weigh less will burn fewer calories.
(from weightlossresources.co.uk)

Hi and welcome:

Sound like you have a nice choice of calculators (above). Here is another one if you'd like: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/exercise/SM00109

Your TDEE includes your activity level. I doubt you will be able to distinguish between exercise weight loss and diet weight loss. Exercise is such a small, small part that one small snack will wipe out most of the calorie usage of exercise.

This might put it in perspective: 5-2-diet-chat-f6/topic6543.html

Good Luck!

Personally I think wearing a heart rate monitor is the best way to measure calories for any activity in the gym or any where else.
In the gym I find that if I run on the treadmill the calories used shown by the equipment as about a third higher than my HRM gives. I put my weight into the gym equipment but it does not used my height of my heart rate to calculate calories. Interestingly when I use the map my ride app for cycling that always comes very close to my HRM for calories burnt. I aslo find that my fitness pal over estimates calories for most activities.

Sparkpeople has a large resource for exercise on their app or at the website. You can log your activity. It records the data, gives you charts, etc and it is figured in with your height and weight.

That being said, there is a lot more benefit than just the actual calories burned. Increased health. Increased metabolism. Endorphins. After exercising, I feel better and the body continues to burn calories at a higher rate even after stopping the exercise.

Thanks for the massive response everyone, lots of useful info!

I am already using the Fitnesspal app for food, didnt realise the exercise part of it allowed you to search for different exercise types, that's really useful.

Also thanks for the links to activity approximate values on the web. I know that all the scraping I've been doing not only has given me arm ache, but has made me sweat whilst doing it, certainly feels like exercise!

Will look into these Fitbits, having a quick look on the site intrigues me, it's interesting how they can also monitor sleep too...

[carieoates]

Thanks for the massive response everyone, lots of useful info!

I am already using the Fitnesspal app for food, didnt realise the exercise part of it allowed you to search for different exercise types, that's really useful.

Also thanks for the links to activity approximate values on the web. I know that all the scraping I've been doing not only has given me arm ache, but has made me sweat whilst doing it, certainly feels like exercise!

Will look into these Fitbits, having a quick look on the site intrigues me, it's interesting how they can also monitor sleep too...

Yay maybe another fitbit convert. We have our own 5.2 forum on there....