They don't lose weight from sex
Does sex burn a lot of calories?
Kirill Stasevich, CompulentaThere is little that can argue with sex in terms of the number of myths, superstitions and other things in the same spirit.
For example, everyone has probably heard about a man who died because his heart could not stand too violent intercourse, from which it is usually concluded that sex is a serious test for the heart.
To check if this was the case, in the 1950s, scientists undertook a number of studies that may have been very confusing to those who participated in them: having hung volunteers with all sorts of sensors monitoring the cardiovascular system, they were asked to perform sexual intercourse. As a result, it turned out that the heart rate during the process does increase, but very moderately.
These experiments continue to this day, and, for example, in 2008, it was found that during orgasm, a man's heartbeat increases by 21 beats per minute, and a woman's heartbeat increases by 19. Approximately the same result can be achieved by performing the warm-up exercise "Jack the Jumper", when you need to jump up and swing your arms and legs at the same time. That is, the probability that sex will bring you to the grave is very low – unless, of course, you have an exceptionally weak heart.
Another myth related to the physiology of sex can be called "sex and calories": it is believed that this kind of exercise unusually mobilizes the energy metabolism and allows you to burn at least 100 calories at a time. At the same time, according to Antony Karelis from the University of Quebec in Montreal (Canada), so far no one has directly checked the "energy cost" of sex, so "100 calories per session" is to a certain extent theoretical fantasies.
Mr. Karelis and his staff undertook to eliminate this white spot in the physiology of sex. They invited 21 young couples to participate in the experiment, who first had to run along the track for half an hour, and then, after returning home, have sex. The subjects were given special bandages with sensors attached to their hands. These sensors measured the number of calories and the metabolic equivalent of the load. The observations lasted a month; sex was prescribed to be engaged at least once a week; all the subjects had to fill out a questionnaire, according to which it was possible to assess their subjective assessment of their own condition, both physical and psychological.
In general, as the researchers report in PLoS ONE (Frappier et al. Energy Expenditure during Sexual Activity in Young Healthy Couples), sex caused a fairly moderate expenditure of energy: if we take the metabolic equivalent of a load in a calm sedentary state per unit, then during sex this parameter was 6 for men and 5.6 for women. This corresponds to a walk uphill or a game of lawn tennis.
The aforementioned half-hour treadmill made you spend more energy: in men, the metabolic equivalent of the load was equal to 8.5, in women – 8.4.
The calorie consumption for running turned out to be as follows: 9 calories per minute for men and 7 calories per minute for women. Sex, in turn, burned 4 kilocalories per minute in men and 3 in women. The time spread in the case of sex, of course, was different, from 10 to 57 minutes, but on average it took 25 minutes.
In general, for men, the very "100 calories per session" came out, but this is not a minimum, but an average value. That is, the treadmill also has an advantage in terms of calorie consumption. (However, the researchers emphasize that some men managed to spend more energy during sex than on the track.)
However, sex still burns some amount of energy, just do not overestimate its effectiveness in this matter. If we compare sex and the notorious treadmill, the former has one important advantage: having sex is more fun and more enjoyable than mechanically winding kilometers.
Based on the materials of the New York Times: Sex as Exercise.
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