How many extra calories do you burn when exercising?

Stick to your recommended calorie intake & you'll likely burn off most of this through normal living, but when it comes to exercise, it depends what you do!


Asked by: Anonymous

A healthy man aged 30, who is 5ft 10in tall (1.78m) and weighs 11 stone 7lbs (73kg) burns a little under 1700kcal every day just sitting on the sofa watching TV. Ordinary physical exercise, such as walking, climbing the stairs and putting the shopping away in the fridge, adds another 340kcal per day. An hour of high-impact aerobics will burn around 500kcal and an hour of hard weight training is worth about 250kcal. If, after a long day at work, neither of these appeal, consider that you can burn 175kcal with an hour of sex!

Subscribe to BBC Focus magazine for fascinating new Q&As every month and follow @sciencefocusQA on Twitter for your daily dose of fun science facts.

Subscribe to BBC Focus magazine for fascinating new Q&As every month and follow @sciencefocusQA on Twitter for your daily dose of fun science facts.