Pilot Cycle Computer

A calorie in nutritional terms is a Kcal

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calorie

Multiply by 1 to convert from Kcals to calories

In article <[email hidden]>,

POHB said:

A calorie in nutritional terms is a Kcal

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calorie

Multiply by 1 to convert from Kcals to calories

No. Do not do that.
1 Kcal = 1000 calories.
However folks who write about energy equivalents of food
started referring to Kcal as calories. The usage cannot be
changed. The confusion will continue.

It is now necessary to closely examine each usage of
`calorie', and decide when Kcal is actually the unit of
measurement.

--
Michael Press

In article <[email hidden]>,

Michael Press said:

No. Do not do that.
1 Kcal = 1000 calories.
However folks who write about energy equivalents of food
started referring to Kcal as calories. The usage cannot be
changed. The confusion will continue.

I believe there is some disconnect here.

I originally posted:

After a 55 minute ride at with an average cadence of 73rpm and an
average heart rate of 133bpm, the Pilot gives me a reading of 438Kcal.

If 1 Kcal = 1000 calories, would that not mean that I expended
480,000 calories which is clearly impossible?

Or...have I once again screwed up the math, which is totally possible?

;->
bob

Your confusion comes from the fact that there is a difference between a
calorie and a Calorie (note the small c and big C - I'm not kidding!).

1 Calorie = 1000 calorie
1 Calorie = 1 kcal

so you burned 438 kcal or 438 Calories = a little less than two mars
bars

Your confusion is understandable (if not regretable) as in a lot of
cases the nutritional value displayed on the back of food packets
references calories when they really mean Calories...

P.S. your Pilot is only estimating your energy expenditure, effectively
by estimating the work done (measured in kjoules) and converting your
estimated kjoules to kcal. It performs this conversion using an
estimation of your metabolic efficiency. The only definitive way that
you would know how much work you performed would be to use a power
meter (power measured in Watts). Watts are also joules/sec and ...
.... just enjoy those mars bars.

In article <[email hidden]>,

Rik O'Shea said:

P.S. your Pilot is only estimating your energy expenditure, effectively
by estimating the work done (measured in kjoules) and converting your
estimated kjoules to kcal. It performs this conversion using an
estimation of your metabolic efficiency.

Many thanks for your very clear explanation of this rather confusing
subject.

If you are interested, I have found several formulae for determining
calorie burn. For instance, this one:

Bicycling magazine.

First, note the average speed of your ride (20 mph for example).

Second, find the coefficient of that speed in the table below (.0891 cal
burned per minute) and multiply that coefficient by your body weight (180
lbs for example) for a calories burned per minute total of 16.038.

Finally, take that number (16.038 cal per minute) and multiply it by the
number of minutes ridden (60 for example) for a total of 962.28 calories
burned in a 60 minute ride at an average of 20 mph for a 180 lb rider.

(.0740 x 180 = 13.32 x 60 = 799.2 cal/hr) or 13.31 cal/min.

Avg. Speed Coefficient
(mph) (cal per lb per minute)
8 .0295
10 .0355
12 .0426
14 .0512
15 .0561
16 .0615
17 .0675
18 .0740
19 .0811
20 .0891
21 .0975
23 .1173
25 .1411

***********************************

I took this and five other formulae and came up with these burn rates
for my age & weight & speed:

12.10 Cal/Min
600 Cal/Hour or 10 cal/min
782 Cal/Hour or 13.03 Cal/Min
(.0740 x 180 = 13.32 x 60 = 799.2 cal/hr) or 13.31 cal/min
15.28 Cal/Min or 917 cal/hr.
1,067 Cal/Hr or 8.89 Cal/Min

I totaled and averaged these for myself and came up with an caloric
burn rate of 12.10 Cal/Min.

My 55' ride would therefore come at about 665 calories burned.

The Pilot read 438, so think I will play around with the age and
weight I entered until it gives me a burn rate of 726. I did that on my
other HRM by upping the weight from my genuine weight of 180 lbs.

Again, thank you for the clarification,

bob

Gunni's soigneur
__o
_ \<_
(*)/(*)

In article
<[email hidden]>,

R. Gerard said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

Michael Press said:

No. Do not do that.
1 Kcal = 1000 calories.
However folks who write about energy equivalents of food
started referring to Kcal as calories. The usage cannot be
changed. The confusion will continue.

I believe there is some disconnect here.

I originally posted:

After a 55 minute ride at with an average cadence of 73rpm and an
average heart rate of 133bpm, the Pilot gives me a reading of 438Kcal.

If 1 Kcal = 1000 calories, would that not mean that I expended
480,000 calories which is clearly impossible?

Or...have I once again screwed up the math, which is totally possible?

1. I was not replying to your article.

2. You originally posted
<[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

I have a Pilot cycle monitor/computer that computes calories in Kcal.

There appears to be no way to change this to read calories vice Kcal
so I went online trying to find how one converts Kcal to calories and
none of the online calculators makes any sense to me.

After a 55 minute ride at with an average cadence of 73rpm and an
average heart rate of 133bpm, the Pilot gives me a reading of 438Kcal.

Can some kind soul take pity on a math idiot and tell me how to
convert this to "normal" calories.

3. Kcal is the measure that food people call calories.
Where the computer reads Kcal, think of Kcal as calories
commonly used to talk about the energy in foods.

So where a diet doctor will say that a dish of pudding
contains 300 calories, a food chemist will say that it
contains 300 Kcal.

4. If you are counting calories because you are concerned
over nutrition and eating habits, you may consider a book
called _Potatoes_Not_Prozac_ by Kathleen DesMaisons. An
excellent work wherein she never mentions calories.

5. I see that you use Mac OS X. Do you know about the
utility called units? Open a terminal window and type
'units'. Here is a sample session:

4$ units
500 units, 54 prefixes
You have: meter
You want: inch
* 39.370079
/ 0.0254
You have: kg
You want: lb
* 2.2046226
/ 0.45359237
You have: parsec
You want: lightyear
* 3.2616334
/ 0.30659484
You have: hp
You want: kcal/hr
* 641.18648
/ 0.0015596087
You have: c
You want: furlong/fortnight
* 1.8026175e+12
/ 5.5474886e-13
You have: minute
You want: newyorkminute
unknown unit 'newyorkminute'

--
Michael Press

Quoted message said:

5. I see that you use Mac OS X. Do you know about the
utility called units? Open a terminal window and type
'units'. Here is a sample session:

Google does a half decent job too:
Just type in the search box e.g.

100 meters in inches
returns
100 meters = 3 937.00787 inches

Funnily enough one of the examples here
http://www.google.co.uk/help/features.html#calculator
is about calories, you ask for Calories and get back kilocalories:

160 pounds * 4000 feet in Calories
returns
(160 pounds force) * 4 000 feet = 207.390891 kilocalories