For many, beer tastes good! It’s fun to drink on almost any social occasion, but unfortunately, it’s not all that good…
Even though there are studies that suggest beer may be good for you if consumed in moderation, everyone can agree if we drink more than 6-7 per week, those benefits quickly disappear.
It’s all about balance! The good news is that you can paddle because you enjoy it but you may also don’t feel as bad having a beer with dinner or at the weekend with friends.
How Much Beer Will You Earn while paddling?
It will depend on a number of different factors, especially which distance or time you’re going to paddle, but let’s try to put it all together.
Remember that this is by no means scientifically accurate. These are just general estimates based on a few key factors. First, how many calories do you burn while paddling?
Let’s take the next statements as an example: According to USA CDC’s data, the average weight measured in US adults, male and female, aged 20 and over is:
Male – 199.8 pounds (90.8 kilograms)
Female – 170.8 pounds (77.4 kilograms)
Granted, this probably won’t give you much insight into how much you’d burn kayaking – unless your current weight is within the average values stated above, that is.
But if you’re interested to see how many calories kayaking burns per minute on average, here’s what you’d get by using these numbers in the equation:
The average 90.8-kilogram adult male, kayaking at light effort, will burn (2.8 x 90.8 kg x 3.5) / 200 = 4.5 calories per minute.
The average 77.4-kilogram adult female, kayaking at light effort will burn (2.8 x 77.4 kg x 3.5) / 200 = 3.7 calories per minute
How Many Calories Burned In One Hour Of Kayaking?
If you weren’t sure why I insisted on talking about calories burned per minute so much, this next section would provide some clarification. It’s finally time to see how many calories you can burn while kayaking for an hour – and the equation will be as simple as:
Calories per Hour = Calories per Minute x 60
And there you have it!
You know exactly how much you’ll burn per hour, based on different factors – including your weight, gender, and effort, as indicated by MET.
Using the examples above, you can expect to burn:
Light Effort | Moderate Effort | Vigorous Effort | |
Male | 269 | 553 | 1192 |
Female | 227 | 471 | 1101 |
So, to sum it up:
- The average 90.8-kilogram adult male can burn between 269 and 1192 calories per hour of kayaking, depending on the effort.
- The average 77.4-kilogram adult female can burn between 227 and 1101 calories per hour of kayaking, depending on the effort.
The next thing we have to consider is how many calories are in each beer.
Men’s Health UK recently released a nice beer calorie guide, and here’s their breakdown of calories in different beer styles:
- Bitter – 180 calories
- Mild bitter – 142 calories
- Pale ale – 182 calories
- Brown ale – 160 calories
- Stout – 210 calories
- Lager – ordinary strength – 170 calories
- Lager – premium – 338 calories
- Dry cider – 190 calories
- Sweet cider – 220 calories
- Vintage sweet cider – 580 calories
The Beer Calories
The average beer has about 160 calories so it’s not difficult to see how adding 1 or 2 to a meal could easily set you over what you’re “supposed” to be consuming every day. Extra calories aside, when you’re drinking beer, your liver is being forced to focus on burning alcohol instead of burning fat so it’s even easier to pack on those extra few pounds.
Balanced Paddling
So with beer adding weight to the equation, you have to find something to balance out the other side. Consider paddling!
In short: the beer adds calories and paddling burns them. Sure, it may not be the best exercise for weight loss, but isn’t necessarily about weight loss, it’s about balance.
According to Water Sports Whiz article ,paddling burns 2.1 times more calories than walking the same amount of time so it’s easier to balance out those liquid calories a bit faster than normal daily activity.