Does anyone have an equation or rubric to use to calculate calorie burn for distance/vertical? I am consistently having trouble managing my calorie intake, and so I thought first step would be to figure out how many calories I am burning. I am 225 pounds and wear a 35 pound pack when fully loaded.
I understand that differences in terrain and type of climbing make a difference, but is there any basic formula to ballpark it?
Many thanks.
For several years, I was involved in extensive discussions of this subject on the WPS board, Richard Piotrowski's old board, and the San Gabriel Mountains board. But it's been a while (~3 years). I have lots of material on this at home, but here is what I was able to resurrect quickly.
In an old discussion on the WPS Message Board of hiking energy expenditure , I offered the following rule of thumb:
energy used (in Calories) = 0.6 * weight (in pounds) * distance (in miles) * (1 + 8.8 * grade)
This formula is based on data I gathered from various Web sites about 8 years ago. I have since found other data that do not agree perfectly, but this is a decent start. This works for hiking on level ground or uphill. I can make a quasi-derivation of this formula from basic physics, albeit with a fudge factor or two garnered from the literature. We'll save that, and the discussion of downhill walking, for another time.
So,
Power (in Calories/hr) = 0.6 * weight (in pounds) * speed (in mph) * (1 + 8.8 * grade)
or
Power (in Calories/hr) = 0.6 * weight (in pounds) * [speed (in mph) + 1.7 * rate of elevation gain (in 1000s of ft/hr)]
