Burned 3000 calories today?

Or so that's what my new Polar F4 is telling  me!  It's been on nearly 24 hours - I wanted to get an idea what I burn in an average day.  Not that today has been average.  I did work out and burn about 400 calories, which is what both the elliptical and the Polar told me, so that seems right.  But the rest of the day has been sleeping (I wore it overnight) and laying around the house!  What the  H? 

At this rate, I'll be hitting 3500 calories at the 24 hour mark!  Which means that I would be needing to eat 3000 calories.  Again....What the H?

Can somebody please explain to me what is going on and why the Polar is not working for me?  I doublechecked the settings and they look good. 

 FYI, I'm female, small bone structure, 5'7", 160 lbs

Ah, those things you enter your personal stats so it can calculate your BMR... Your body burns calories just by, well, living! And exercising actually raises your metabolism and it slowly tapers off during the day. The "after burn" effect of exercising.

Really, it's a thing many people don't realize. When you enter your stats into lets say an elliptical it is calculating your BMR calorie expenditure and your extra exercise expenditure together. So, (i'm fudging the math here these are not exact figures but just to give you an example) - if I ran on the elliptical to burn 400 calories probably 150-200 of that was the exercise and the rest was well... My body just staying alive.

However, even after I stop exercising the extra after burn effect will also add in with my BMR.

You might want to recheck the personal stats you entered.  Highly unlikely you burned 3000 calories at your height and weight from burning only 400 calories during a workout and then laying around the house the rest of the day.  After burn does burn more calories, but not That many more calories.  I would guess your burn rate for this day is more like 2000 to 2400.

Did you spend very much time in a car?  I was once in a research study that computed calories burned per day and they had a lot of trouble because something in people's car would interfere with the heart rate monitor.  It gave them crazy results (like yours), they ended up telling people to shut it off when they were in the car.

I also believe it's highly unlikely, but I just checked the settings again and they are right.  I'm also very disappointed that I just spent $100 on a contraption that is so wrong.  Also, I was not in a car.  But, I wonder if there was something interfering with it?  The polar F4 has a special feature where it isn't supposed to be affected by other people's moniters, though.

 

I will say that I do have a high resting heartrate.  At least I think it's high.  The lowest I've seen this thing go is into the mid-70's.  A high heart rate is not healthy and something that I'm hoping to bring down by exercising, but could it make it appear that i'm working harder than I really am.  I don't believe that the workout affected anything, because I was already up to a 2,000 number by then.  The weird thing is that the heart rate moniter seemed to be right on during my workout.  The 400 calorie burn for almost an hour on the elliptical seemed reasonable.

Your high resting heart rate could do it. The device doesn't know if you're exercising or not - it only recognizes elevated heart rate.

Does anyone know if there's a way to enter my resting heart rate into the Polar?  Maybe that will help.

in fairness... this device is not intended to be used in this way.

I have a low resting heart rate (in the 30s), but sometimes if I look at my heart rate before or after exercise, I never see it anywhere near that low – 60’s MAYBE. To determine your true resting heart rate, take it first thing in the morning before getting out of bed, with minimal movement prior.

I don’t think you can enter this in to Polar (I have an older high end model), but I think I was able to enter in my lactate/anaerobic threshold heart rate – can’t really remember, and if so, not sure how this would help you (plus, it’s not trivial to determine depending on you).

Finally, my monitor gets triggered to a 220 heart rate by street car /trolley electrical overhead tracks, and electrical transmission towers. Do you live/work/spend time near something like this?

Original Post by lilsmiter:

in fairness... this device is not intended to be used in this way.

 Lilsmiter,  can you elaborate?  I think that what you're saying is that it's only meant to wear during exercise and that's fair, because I found it to be most accurate (following a normal calorie burn) when I wore it while exercising.  I guess that I was just hoping to wear it during the day.  I thought that watching the numbers climb would push me to walk around more at work, take the stairs, etc.  I've found the climbing number helpful in pushing me on the elliptical, so I was hoping for more "inspiration."  Either way, the monitor will help me when I'm lifting to track my calorie burn.  Again, I appreciate the feedback.

6 months too late.

The device isn't intended for an entire day of use.  the amount of calories that it gives say from doing your eliptical (400) isn't just the calories that you sent while on the bike but also accounts for the extra calories burnt after exercise...

SO if it kicks you that little extra burn for what you do all day, your going to get a number that is too high.  (by at least a third.)