Exercise calorie burn

For the Geeks amongst us

Well what can you do if you've just returned home from the Peak after a Cardio Dance class (and coffee in the village Lounge) and its pouring? Work in the allotments is out of the question as is a walk or even a sightseeing drive.

I got thinking of the question Shams asked me at the end of the class:
“Well how many calories did that burn today?” She knows that I find apps an essential part of my weight loss journey and religiously log food intake using MyFitnessPal and exercise calorie burn using my FitBit Versa. I replied that it was slightly less than last week’s class with a burn of 431 and 3,755 steps.

Perhaps it is the scientist in me and with nothing better to do on a rainy afternoon I decided to analyse some of the exercise data I have logged over the last 15 weeks (a year’s worth would take too long!).

I could bore you with a load of statistics (standard deviations, confidence limits and probabilities) but suffice to say the results were surprising in terms of the significant differences between different types of exercise and the similarities between others.

There are significant differences in terms of calorie burn and steps between different types of exercise:

It is not surprising that Yoga yields fewest steps and calorie burn. This class is for relaxation of mind and body with added benefits in terms of wellbeing, flexibility, balance and strength.

Most surprising is the lowly position of Spin; this class has you thinking you won’t survive to the end and there is always a pool of sweat to clean up under your bike at the end of the class. My only thoughts, in terms of explanation for this result, is that the Spin class is concentrating on only one are of the body (lower) rather that the whole body. In terms of steps you are not moving your hands from the handlebars (apart from reaching for your towel and water bottle). Some on FitBit step challengers cheat and attach their FitBit to their ankle during Spin sessions – I don't)

Results from Gym sessions are very consistent with no significant differences between sessions carried out on different days in terms of steps or calorie burn. In the gym I tend to concentrate on strength exercises using machines and try to cover upper and lower body equally. I could achieve higher steps in the gym if I did more cardio but find this type of exercise boring and monotonous.

Fit4Life classes give a higher number of steps than a gym session and whereas the Wednesday class gives a similar calorie burn to a gym session the Thursday class (Lee calls it the “killer” class) gives a higher calorie burn. At the Thursday class one is encouraged to push yourself to a sensible limit with different levels of difficulty being offered at each station on the circuit.

Tops for both calorie burn and steps is cardio dance and it has the added benefit of being fun and where you can laugh at your weaknesses in terms of balance and coordination.

I would be interested to discuss and compare results with any other geeks out there.