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Comment by howlin | Hacker News Reader

> Cardio is important for overall health, but you aren't going to burn enough calories for it to be a major source of weight loss.

You need to build the stamina to keep it up. But assuming you can maintain a moderate to strenuous pace for 30 minutes you can burn off a small meal's worth of calories. An hour of moderate running can be around 600 calories for an adult male.

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The same way people underestimate their caloric intake, I think unfortunately a lot of fitness apps and equipment overestimate calories burned. A recent 1 hr peloton class I did said said I burned a little over 1,200 calories. It was nearly 300 more than my Whoop band said I lost. I think both numbers were higher than what I actually did.

In my anecdotal experience my fitness apps generally underestimates calories burned while exercise equipment generally overestimates it. Like how my Garmin watch told me yesterday that I burned 300 kcal from running 10 km which is nonsense. It should be around 600 kcal if you do a rough estimation.

The problem with calorie counting and fitness trackers is that they assume all bodies are equally efficient, a calorie is a calorie but a person is not a person. It’s like driving for 2 hours and trying to estimate how much gas to fill for the next 2 hours without overflowing the tank, all this based on the mpg of a standard car.

Very few people who try to lose weight have the time or the stamina for an hour of strenuous cardio each day. For most people it's easier to not eat the calories than to burn them off.

I've found its easier to mentally separate them. Calorie restriction for weight loss, and cardio strictly for ... cardiovascular health.

Doing cardio for weight loss is fighting against whatever you are doing in the kitchen. It doesn't make much sense, unless you have the time and stamina to do it for the required duration and intensity (for me, weight loss happens only with an hour a day lap swimming non-stop).

Agreed, but ability to adapt to exercise is also very personal. I have a natural endurance for things like running, but other people don't (just like some people can gain muscle mass just by looking at a barbell, while others -- like me -- need to put in consistent, hard work in the gym to slowly build strength.)

I'd agree with that. A 3 hour bike ride in a moderately hilly area burns about 2000 calories, and that's a considerable number to bank. My lowest weight --and counting calories ruthlessly-- was when I was running regularly, even at just 2 or so miles, until my knee started giving me trouble.

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