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So testing my new Garmin Forerunner 645 smart watch today on a ride ive done a few times using my Garmin Edge Explore and i was surprised to see the Forerunner 645 calculated that i burnt 941 calories
Yet my Edge Explore says for the same ride i did a month ago that i burnt 1814 calories
Distances and elevation along with average speed are not too far apart so why the big difference in the total of calories burnt?
The two pics below are screen grabs from Strava and i know they have their own algorythims for working stuff out
Oh and according to Garmin connect i burnt 991 calories on the ride with the Garmin Forerunner 645 and 1814 calories on the Garmin Edge Explore
One uses hr data, the other doesn't, so the explore is miles off, but even the 645 is a bit of an indication, rather than an accurate reflection.
There's no way you're burning 1800 calories over 30 miles and only 500' of ascent btw.
How do your heart rates compare? Presumably the Edge is using a chest trap vs just the watch?
My Vivosport can be have wildly different heartrate readings depending on how tight it is, how sweaty etc.
The Forerunenr knows more about you so it can guess a bit better. Yes, it's a big discrepancy though. But this is all absolutely a finger in the air so don't worry about it much.
If I hook up my explore to the HR monitor it gives about half the calories burned than without HR on a road ride.
On a mtb ride it's about 30% more when I hook up the HR monitor.
All calorie counting devices are making assumptions - HR removes just one (although it's a big one and as noted not always a bang on measurement anyway). Road/trail conditions, bike type, tyre type etc etc all make a difference.
There’s no way you’re burning 1800 calories over 30 miles and only 500′ of ascent btw.
Yeah ive always known the Edge Explore is off on the calorie count
According to a few websites (Livestrong for example) a 10 mile ride should burn between 400-500 calories
So on my ride should have burnt around 1200 calories over 30 miles
How do your heart rates compare? Presumably the Edge is using a chest trap vs just the watch
No heart rate strap with the Edge Explore, one of the reasons of buying the forerunner 645 was having the heart rate monitor built in so i could get a more accurate calorie count when on the E-MTB, had heart rate straps before and never got on with them
As im trying to lose a bit of extra weight im trying to watch what calories i take in and what i burn
Maybe worth using the average between the two as my actual calorie burn count for the purpose of weight loss
Will be interesting to see what the 645 says for calories burnt when riding the BMX
My Garmin 310xt gave me half the calorie count of a friend I ride with, who also had a 310xt. The difference was he used an HR monitor, when I also used my HR monitor the count was about the same. I guess it's all down to the Garmin algorithm used for calculating calories based on ride stats.
My Garmin Instinct (built in HR monitor) which I started using last year gives a figure on the lower side compared to the 310xt. This figure is more realistic in my view and never gets anywhere near the 2000+ calories the 310xt said I was burning.
I would never take the calorie count as an absolute/accurate figure, but rather just use it as an indicator of how hard the ride was when compared to other rides.
Lies, Damn Lies, Statistics and Garmin Data! 🙂
No heart rate strap with the Edge Explore,
There's your answer.
Maybe worth using the average between the two as my actual calorie burn count for the purpose of weight loss
Use the lower figure
Edit or better still, ignore the extra calories you think you are using and just stick to a flat figure for calories intake.