What is the formula for determining how many calories are burned while walking?

[Electrode]

Say you weigh 190 lbs and you walk for 30 minutes at 2.4 MPH at an incline of 4%. How would you figure out how many calories you used up in the process?

The reason I want to know should be obvious enough: I want to write a program to show how many calories I'm burning while using a treadmill. Mine has a calorie readout, but it's only accurate if you're 150 lbs, and I am most certainly not 150 lbs.

 

[MacBaine]

So run enough that you get down to 150, then you won't have to worry about it.

 

[Zorba]

Here is an easy way, not complete, but a good estimate.

You will walk a total of 1.2 miles at 4% grade that means you will gain about 400 feet in altitude. So then you have PE=mgh where mg=190lb so then PE = 190*400 = 79kip-ft Kip-ft is a measure of energy same as a calorie so 79kip-ft goes to ~26 nutritionist's calories. Also for the Work (I will assume that the force to walk is about 30% of your body weight (I really have no idea what it really is)) W=Force*Distance=.3*190*6336=36.1Kip-ft= ~12 nutritionist's calories.

So in total you will be burning about 38 food calories. But of course this doesn't not take into effect all of the energy your body burns in the walking process, like increased heart beat, etc. This is a very basic Dynamics apporach to the problem .

 

[Electrode]

Thanks, but that's not really what I'm looking for. The formula I need is the one where 305lbs, 2.5% grade, 2.5 mph works out to about 10.5 calories per minute.