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The amount of calories burned is based on my intensity and amount of time spent doing the activity. It'd not about being athletic, it's about having endurance.

The amount of calories burned is based on my intensity and amount of time spent doing the activity. It'd not about being athletic, it's about having endurance. I don't consider myself fit. But I think the day with my most energy expenditure was when I spent a day just walking around New York City, 20 miles in about 10 hours. Both quantities seem like high numbers but the average speed is 2 miles per hour. It's hard to walk that slow intentionally. I had my heart rate chess strap on the whole time and I averaged in the 150s and hit a high of 185bpm when I was rushing to make an dinner with a friend. That is about 1800+ calories burned. But then I have had days when I did 7+ mph for an hour each on a treadmill and elliptical and a 60 minute group yoga class in the middle and my max hr hit 208bpm. I estimated that I spent a minimum of 1200 calories that day. I have had a few months of going to the gym twice a day for 90 minutes each. I am 6'1" and am around 230lbs, 25%+ body fat. I am not fit, I can't run a mile at more than a jogging speed without getting tired. I realized that I will need time to get to athlete level performance so instead I focused on the endurance. I would say hitting 600 calories in 90 minutes is possible by everyone that's fit enough to walk/jog for that amount of time, a minimum average of 4.0 mph and at least 30 minutes at above 6.5mph. Being a non-athlete would mean you take 15+ minutes walk/rest between each 10 minute jog. I can comfortably say even now, after I took a long break from working out due to covid, I can do a 30 minute class/jog then do 30 minutes in the evening and over 2 weeks work my way back up to 90+30. An hour of intense activity is 400+ calories as long as it's a cardio/high repetition centered session. To answer your question, I think a 90 minute session with 600+ is reasonable and then 200+ calories in a 30 minute evening session. The evening doesn't have to be intense, it could be stretching and yoga so you reduce the risk of injury. Yoga might need to be closer to an hour though because it might be harder to hit 200+ calories in just 30. The difference between the actual calories burned and your goal of 1000 can be made up by taking care of your diet. 200 Calorie deficit with 600 calories burned during a workout is a sustainable lifestyle. Some people say that exercise isn't the solution to weight-loss but I think that isn't completely accurate. If you work out intensely, you will feel more hungry and your diet would get worse even if you feel like you are eating the same amount. Diet without exercise feels so draining because you don't feel any sense of accomplishment from not eating, just hungry. Accomplishing goals of working out longer are measurable.

nradov 5y ago
Walking at 2 mph shouldn't cause a 150 bpm heart rate in a healthy adult. Either your heart rate monitor was faulty or there's something wrong with your cardiovascular system. There's a lot of normal individual variation in heart rates but seriously 150 for casual walking is abnormal.
- knaik94 5y ago
  There wasn't a moment in time where it was casual walking at exactly 2 miles per hour, I was simply describing an average if you consider the total distance over total time. I was also going up and down a lot of elevation and stairs on that day. I think you would agree that walking up stairs would sufficiently elevate your heart rate to 150+ bpm easily even if you are going slower than 2 mph. Thank you for your concern though. I had an EKG done at my annual physical and spoke with a medical professional about how my maximum heart rate has been 218 bpm during a specific gym session, no caffeine or other stimulant use. I use a polar h10 with the pro strap and have seen 210+ over multiple gym sessions. He said don't worry about it. Resting heart rate and how quickly you return to your resting heart rate after exercise is the main measures of health and fitness. And just to be clear, pushing myself to a very high heart rate was very much intentional, I was very aware of my breathing and watching the reading on a second by second basis and not pushing myself to any sort of injury. I was able to do yoga that evening and do a less intense 90 minute workout the next day. Pushing myself in that way isn't a thing I do regularly. https://imgur.com/a/yfV8FYc https://imgur.com/a/yfV8FYc As you can see it's relatively smooth as it's over an hour, no sudden spikes in my heart rate. This was on a stationary bike. This was recorded on a different day, not the 20 mile day. 150/218 puts 150 at 69% which is comfortably in the aerobic/light HR zone for me. I calculated my max HR to be 2.6 standard deviations away from the average based on https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0735109700010548 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S073510970... . My resting HR is in the mid 60 to low 70 but has been creeping up over covid since I stopped exercising. I guess the average person doesn't have as high of a max HR and so the 150 would be off. For most people beginning their fitness journey, worrying about HR zones is pretty far down on the list of priorities.

nradov 5y ago

Walking at 2 mph shouldn't cause a 150 bpm heart rate in a healthy adult. Either your heart rate monitor was faulty or there's something wrong with your cardiovascular system. There's a lot of normal individual variation in heart rates but seriously 150 for casual walking is abnormal.

knaik94 5y ago
There wasn't a moment in time where it was casual walking at exactly 2 miles per hour, I was simply describing an average if you consider the total distance over total time. I was also going up and down a lot of elevation and stairs on that day. I think you would agree that walking up stairs would sufficiently elevate your heart rate to 150+ bpm easily even if you are going slower than 2 mph. Thank you for your concern though. I had an EKG done at my annual physical and spoke with a medical professional about how my maximum heart rate has been 218 bpm during a specific gym session, no caffeine or other stimulant use. I use a polar h10 with the pro strap and have seen 210+ over multiple gym sessions. He said don't worry about it. Resting heart rate and how quickly you return to your resting heart rate after exercise is the main measures of health and fitness. And just to be clear, pushing myself to a very high heart rate was very much intentional, I was very aware of my breathing and watching the reading on a second by second basis and not pushing myself to any sort of injury. I was able to do yoga that evening and do a less intense 90 minute workout the next day. Pushing myself in that way isn't a thing I do regularly. https://imgur.com/a/yfV8FYc https://imgur.com/a/yfV8FYc As you can see it's relatively smooth as it's over an hour, no sudden spikes in my heart rate. This was on a stationary bike. This was recorded on a different day, not the 20 mile day. 150/218 puts 150 at 69% which is comfortably in the aerobic/light HR zone for me. I calculated my max HR to be 2.6 standard deviations away from the average based on https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0735109700010548 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S073510970... . My resting HR is in the mid 60 to low 70 but has been creeping up over covid since I stopped exercising. I guess the average person doesn't have as high of a max HR and so the 150 would be off. For most people beginning their fitness journey, worrying about HR zones is pretty far down on the list of priorities.