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Calorie Calculator - Edge 530 with HR vs HR with Power Meter

6855500
over 3 years ago

Hi. I have recently bought myself a Garmin Edge 530 and more recently a stages left only power meter. I had a couple of rides recorded with the HR strap only and the calorie's burnt seemed pretty standard. 

a 2 hour, 45km ride burned 1750 calories. When I did the exact same ride with my power meter at a higher intensity, it says 980 calories burned. I calibrated and performed a zero reset on the PM before setting out for the ride. 

What is the reason for this huge variance and what is more accurate to use? Is there a way to turn off the power meter for calorie burn calculator? 

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    Power meter's calculation is more and more accurate than HR one. Why do you want to turn off PM's calculation?

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Cihat

    Okay thank you for the feedback. Was only looking to turn off PM calculation if it was less accurate than HR. But if PM is more accurate, then I guess I have to work harder

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Cihat

    It just seems crazy to me that there is such a difference. My weight was more or less the same for both rides and the ride with the PM was more intense. Seems weird that it was nearly half the calories burned than with HR only. 

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    PM will generally give a more accurate calorie count than HR.

    And 950 calories per hour sounds way too high for road riding at an average 22.5 kmh.

    Using the age-based default maxHR rather than your personal maxHR can be one source of inaccurate calorie estimates. 

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    A power meter measures your power output.  If we know the power we know how much energy you are using to create that power.  If we know how much energy your are using we can make a good estimate of how many calories you burn to output that energy (people are about 20-25% efficient).

    Without a power meter any calories number is just a guess.  It will be an educated guess based on various inputs but still a guess and cannot be trusted.

    This is why the only way to have a good estimate of calories burned is by using a power meter.