Calculators to Personalize Your Fitness Plan

Get Rolling visitor statistics show a high interest in our calculators. Obviously you are as hungry as I am for personalized numbers to guide my lifestyle, health, and fitness goals. For our convenience, I have consolidated a list of my favorite calculators on this page.

• Maximum Heart Rate Calculator (standard)
• Max HR Calculator and Training Targets
  (this is the one that works for Liz)
• Zone Body Composition Calculator (female)
• Zone diet lean body mass calculator (male)
• Calories Burned During [95] Exercise[s]
  (for 3 body weights)
• Skating calories per hr/min by speed/weight
  (chart courtesy of instructor Phil Lenihan)
• * Diet Calculator and Body Fat Calculator
  (daily Calorie and Protein Requirements)
• * Metabolic Rate Calculator (Calorie restricted diet perspective)
• * Carbs/Fat/Protein calculator for Zone or USDA diet plans

Why is it so hard to drop extra weight at 58?

There's another incentive for my calculator quest: the 5 pounds I needed to lose after spending a week with family over the Christmas holidays. When the "calories out -- calories in" formula wasn't in synch with the numbers I was tracking, I began to wonder if my estimated metabolism rate was the culprit. When I did a web search on "metabolism" and "calorie restriction," I found the headline I hoped I wouldn't see ("BMR" stands for Basal Metabolic Rate):

Calorie Restriction decreases BMR while overeating increases it.

Unfortunately, it does ring true for my body, especially considering I have been on the Zone Diet (calorie restricted) for years. Logically, in order for a body to survive on a low amount of fuel, it has to become more efficient with what fuel it does get. This is the major basis for the longevity claims attributed to calorie restriction.

Now I can plan around my true "calories in," which is about 1175 per day at rest. Based on my active lifestyle, I still should never eat more than 1800 calories a day.

Being cold stimulates calorie-burning brown fat

But recent scientific news makes me feel less depressed about my metabolism. Brown fat has been shown to amp up our ability to burn calories when we are exposed to cold temperatures. That explains why I seem to lose a couple of pounds over each ski weekend even though we eat very well on Saturday night. Guess I should have joined my friends at Alpine Meadows this weekend after all!

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* ScientificPsychic.com is the source for three of the calculators. Based on science, it is still a fun web site, with Health and Fitness pages posted right alongside Palm Reading and Paranormal articles. I encourage you to be open minded enough to explore this informative and very entertaining site owned by Anthony Zamora.

Other April 2009 Stories

Camp Rollerblade News - Join me in Hilton Head in May or in Sonoma in June, then try the Florida tour with me in December.

The Godfather’s Love Story – It was 30 years ago this year that David Miles discovered SF skating and future wife Rose.

Social Networking for Skaters - Which one should you join? How annoying is Facebook?

Growing Inline Figure Skating in the US – Sharing programs between ice and inline help expand opportunities for growth.

Bunga™ Pad Protection – Try these new gel pads for bum, bruise and blister protection.

CASkating.com is back! -  Webmaster Dan switched to a better service and rebuilt our database of over 300 skate tours.

Skate Schools Unite! - Come back soon to read my report of the annual USSG Conference.