I noticed that the total calories I’ve burned, displayed in the upper left corner of the zwift window are greater than what the summary claims after I save a ride by as much as 30+ kcal.
Difference between CAL or KJ?
Hi, @L_Wasko, welcome to Forums! I’m Francisco from Zwift Support.
It’s super important to keep track of the calories you’ve burned so you can stay on top of your progress.
To clarify, do the calorie statistics displayed in the Zwift game differ from those in the ZC app, or are they consistent only within the game?
Francisco,
Apparently this is not a new issue. The only calorie display I am aware of is within the game on the upper left corner where watts, heartrate, rpm’s etc are also displayed.
It’s when you finish the ride that the summary on the zwift companion gives values less than what the game displays.
That being said I can’t remember if the calories summarized in the game when you save a ride (pizza slices/calories) agrees with the game posting or the companion app.
Thanks for getting back to me,
Larry
That number is not calories burned. It’s kJ (kilojoules) of work done at the pedals.
The conversion rate should be about 1:1.045, so you’ll have burned approximately 1000 calories when that kJ number reaches 1045.
FWIW, the kJ number should be exact (it’s the area under the line of your power over the course of the ride) whereas the calories number assumes an efficiency of your body of turning effort into power at the pedals of about 25%. As such, the calories burned will always be an estimate.
Hope this helps.
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Ahhhh … I was incorrectly assuming they were using the default fields. My bad.
David,
Thanks for clearing this up. I did not pay attention to the units (kJ).
Regards,
Larry
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