Doubled my steps but not calorie burn?

[giantsizegeek]

I've been using a Fitbit Zip since Feb 2013 and it continues to inspire me to walk.  I love it!

My last two weeks have been pretty good.  I have found a way to walk 20k steps.  I have saved my old Fitbit reports in Evernote to save my progress.  Here's an intertesting thing: even though I've doubled my weekly steps from a few months ago, my calories burned has only increased less dramatically.

For instance, in December I had a week where I walked 73K steps, but total cals burned was 22,324.

Last week I walked was 146K steps, but total cals burned was 28,269.  6000 more cals burned, pretty good, but how come that number isn't higher?  Perhaps some fitness experts could answer that question?

[captmiddy · Accepted solution]

This is actually a fairly easy answer.  I assume you are using your fitbit report which totals your calorie burn for the week.  This report shows ALL calories burned.  Including for the 16 to 20 hours we are sitting or sleeping.  Most of your calories burned each day are due to your normal metabolic requirements such a breathing, heartbeat, digestion and the like.  Based on your weight this number changes.  When you walk or exercise you add calories on top of your daily metabolic usage.  So say you walked 10k steps, this would maybe add 300 calories (this may actually be high) to your day, but you next week walk 20k steps in a day and add 600.  But your normal resting calorie burn for the entire day is 2000.  So you percentage of exercise add is 15% or 30%, so for a full week you burn 14000 just sitting around, adding the 15% takes you to 16100 but adding the 30% takes you to 18200, these do not look like dramatic changes due to doubling your walking, but the reality is it is a big deal.  That extra 2100 calories in a week represent almost a pound.  You may want to do some research on BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate).  It can help explain this to you. 

[giantsizegeek]

Thanks, Capt!  Yes, it does make sense.  Of course it doesn't double as I it includes my total burn for the day including not exercising.   I appreciate you taking the time to write this explanation.

[abb123]

I've been monitoring steps and calorie burn the last couple of weeks.  On a treadmill, I register close to 6000 (maybe a tiny bit more) steps in an hour walking 3.5 MPH.  If your weight were 200 pounds, you'd burn around 350 calories.   Using those numbers and the ones you provided, you can figure out how many steps it would take for you to double your calorie burn.

22,324/350 (number of hours needing walked, based on 350 calories burned per hour) = 63.8

63.8 * 6000 (number of steps * number of hours) = 382,800

So there you have it. If you want to burn an addition 22,324 calories, over and above your normal with 73K steps... you will need to walk an additional 382,800 steps per week, or about 180 miles (based on being 6ft tall)   Good luck with that!

As you can see, this is why you can't out exercise a bad diet.  It is far harder to burn calories by doing extra work than it is to just reduce calorie intake through good dieting. You need about 54K steps to burn roughly 1 lb. worth of calories.   

This is one of the reasons I have started doing a little more weight lifting, because muscle will eat more calories passively. I noticed that people who weight train gain far less weight when they stop training than people who just do cardio.  I have a nice balance of cardio and strength conditioning now.

[giantsizegeek]

That was my hope - to out exercise a bad diet.  I've read about marathon runners who could eat a box of Oreo cookies and not gain weight.  

I like cardio, walking / jogging - always am reluctant to do weight training.  I find it a chore.  Need to find a way to get into it regularly.

[abb123]

Running burns FAR more calories than walking and marathon runners also have a tremendous amount of lean muscle.  

If you were to run 13 MPH (4:36 minute per mile roughly) for 2 hours (26 miles) you would burn over 4,000 calories from exercise alone.  Here is a quick burn rate estimate:

Weight: 200 LB.

Distance: 26 miles

Duration: 02:00:00

Pace: 4:37 / mile

Calories Burned: 3,933

Calorie Burn Rates: 151.25 / mile     1,966.3 / hour    32.77/ minute

You can find the calculator here: http://www.runnersworld.com/tools/calories-burned-calculator

[Dominique]

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@abb123 wrote:

If you were to run 13 MPH (4:36 minute per mile roughly) for 2 hours (26 miles) you would burn over 4,000 calories from exercise alone.

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That would be very close to the world record for the marathon: only a handful of people can run that fast for that long. And none of the folks who can run 26 miles in 2 hours weigh 200 lbs!

[giantsizegeek]

That calculator seems broken or else I misunderstand.  No matter what the pace I put in, the calories burned is always the same.  2 miles at a 5 min mile pace burns the same calories as 2 miles at 20 min per mile pace.

[abb123]

I wasn't trying to give a perfect picture of what marathon runners burn, but rather an idea of the difference between running and walking to burn calories.  And since my previous example was based on a 200 LB person walking, I used the same numbers for running in an attempt to compare apples to apples.

Actually, I believe it would be the world record for a marathon by about 3 or 4 minutes.  

Just to be argumentative though, There are a ton of people who run marathons that are well over 200 pounds.  They don't do it on the olympic stage, but as an example, the Marine Corp Clydesdale winner weighed about 190 pounds and ran the marathon at 2:36.   Just because you don't have a "marathon runners" build, doesn't mean you can't run marathons and be competitive.

Edit: accidentally put 2:36 per mile, meant to put for overall time.  

[abb123]

There is another calculator here: http://caloriesburnedhq.com/calories-burned-running/

The numbers come out pretty similar.  I just googled for it, I have no idea how they come up with these numbers. Heigh, age, etc all play a part in figuring calorie burn, so I dont know what assumptions each site is making.

[Heybales]

Actually, no, only weight and pace has a bearing on calories burn, for running and walking anyway. Other activities may have width (cycling) along with it.

Now good HRM's do use all that info, merely to try to estimate a VO2max to use in the formula's. Cheaper Polar's for instance assume if your BMI (height/weight) is bad (age/gender), then your VO2 is bad.

It's the reason why your fitness level can go up while still same weight, and you maintain the same pace running, but since your HR is now lower, the HRM is thinking you burned less calories.

Better Polar's let you self test the VO2max or enter your own values.

You being man or woman or old or young or short or tall plays a part in how hard your heart must work to provide the oxygen to burn the same number of calories though.

This study shows how accurate the formula's are for walking and running, far better than a HRM is going to give you. Weight and pace is it.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15570150 

This site mentions the most accurate ranges. Now of course if you don't have average efficiency, like you are tall and only learned to lop with huge strides at 60 turnover, ya, calorie burn is going to be higher. Or club foot, or dancing on treadmill, ect.

http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/WalkRunMETs.html

[Jabrat]

I have been jogging running and the calories burned are up there - I can't believe how much leaner I am rock n roll