Metabolic Rates for a Young 150 Pound Adult


Activity Calories per hour Calories per day
Sleeping 52 1239
Lying awake 56 1352
Sitting up 70 1690
Standing 122 2929


If you ate a 350 Calorie candy bar you would have ingested enough energy to keep a 100 watt bulb lit for over 4 hours. If you wanted to work off those calories by doing something over and above standing around you would have to do the activity shown below for the number of hours in the right hand column.

Activity Calories per hour Hours to work of 350 calories
Walking 202 4.4
Bicycling 357 1.5
Shoveling 432 1.5
Swimming 516 1.1
Skiing 704 0.6
Running 845 0.5

The nominal maximum amount of work one can do continuously over and above basic living, is about 3000 Calories worth ---- the equivalent of keeping a 150 watt bulb lit, all day and all night