{"id":1540,"date":"2020-05-18T08:32:36","date_gmt":"2020-05-18T08:32:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/ie\/?p=1540"},"modified":"2020-05-18T08:32:36","modified_gmt":"2020-05-18T08:32:36","slug":"how-to-convert-watts-into-calories-burned-on-the-bike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/ie\/2020\/05\/18\/how-to-convert-watts-into-calories-burned-on-the-bike\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Convert Watts into Calories Burned on the Bike"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cyclists have a big advantage over runners, swimmers, weight lifters, yoga practitioners, and pretty much every other athlete out there in terms of calorie counting. They don\u2019t have to rely on inaccurate calorie calculators or apps. Thanks to watt meters, we cyclists are able to measure the exact amount of the work we\u2019ve done on the bike. So, how do you calculate how many calories are burned during an hour at 200W?<\/strong>
\n<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a simple formula<\/strong><\/h2>\n

All you need to know is the time spent cycling and the average power during that time, and you can get the energy burned using this general formula.<\/p>\n

Energy (Joules) = Power (Watts) * Time (Seconds)<\/strong><\/p>\n

The problem is that you want to know your energy expenditure in kcal, not joules. Note that what is commonly referred to as calories is in fact kilocalories, that\u2019s why the abbreviation says kcal, not Cal. So, we would use a conversion rate of 1 Joule = 0.238902957619 kcal.<\/p>\n

\"\"
We spend a lot of energy on heat production, balance and other things while riding a bike.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Human efficiency is only 24%<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Another problem is that humans aren\u2019t perfectly efficient engines. We spend a lot of energy on heat production, balance and other things while riding a bike. In fact, efficiency of cycling humans is around 25%. We burn 5 joules of energy for each joule delivered to the pedals. That means we should divide the measured joules by 0.25 to calculate the actual expenditure. By coincidence, the joule to kcal conversion mentioned above is 0.2389. So, the last two problems cancel each other out, and we can just swap joules for kcal.<\/p>\n

How to calculate it<\/strong><\/h2>\n

There\u2019s just one last adjustment to make. The fact that we multiplied calories by 1,000 to get our desired kilocalories (kcal) means we also need to adjust time. We will multiply it by 3.6 to get hours. This is the final formula you can use. Just multiply your average power output on the bike by the number of hours you spent riding times 3.6 and there you have it \u2013 the number of calories burned.<\/p>\n

Energy (kcal) = Power (watts) * Time (hours) * 3.6<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
\u00a9\u00a0Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Example: One hour at 200W<\/strong><\/h2>\n

We can now easily calculate the answer to our initial question of how many calories you burn when you average 200W during an hour of riding.<\/p>\n

200 watts * 1 hour * 3.6 = 720 kcal<\/strong><\/p>\n

In contrast, Chris Froome can sustain 414 watts for 30 minutes, which means he would burn more in half an hour than a relatively fit average cyclist in double the time.<\/p>\n

414 watts * 0.5 hours * 3.6 = 745 kcal<\/strong><\/p>\n

Of course, not even these figures are perfect, especially as the human inefficiency factor of 24% is just an estimate. But we can say that these caloric values are accurate plus or minus 4%, which is still a lot better than most calculators and apps that can be off by 30% and often by a lot more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cyclists have a big advantage over runners, swimmers, weight lifters, yoga practitioners, and pretty much every other athlete out there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":96,"featured_media":1325,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"global-categories":[],"class_list":["post-1540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nutrition-training"],"yoast_head":"\nHow to Convert Watts into Calories Burned on the Bike - \u0160koda We Love Cycling - Ireland<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/ie\/2020\/05\/18\/how-to-convert-watts-into-calories-burned-on-the-bike\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How to Convert Watts into Calories Burned on the Bike\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Cyclists have a big advantage over runners, swimmers, weight lifters, yoga practitioners, and pretty much every other athlete out there […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/ie\/2020\/05\/18\/how-to-convert-watts-into-calories-burned-on-the-bike\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling - 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