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There’s plenty of alphabet soup out there – I see more than my share of it at work, where it seems like there’s an endless stream of acronyms, callouts and outlines. But this post is about number soup – specifically, the number soup I’ve been encountering in trying to quantify the benefits I might be deriving from running.

Though I’ve been running consistently since the snow stopped this spring (and sporadically through the preceding winter), I’ve only recently resumed wearing my heartrate monitor – and using its various functions – in the last couple of weeks. Among those functions is a calorie counter – you enter your age, sex and weight, and it calculates the calories you’ve burnt during a given workout.

Today, after running our standard 3.78 mile course in 37:02 (for a mildly disappointing average pace of 9:51/mile), my HRM proudly proclaimed that I’d burned 739 calories. Not bad for a lunchtime run!

But then I got home tonight, and decided to do a sanity check – and hence started my batch of number soup. I compared my HRM’s calorie count against three other calculators, which put me at 542, 583 and 551 calories respectively. So now the question is: who’s right? The online calculators take more personal factors into account than my ride-along instrumentation, but they’re still ultimately limited to calculating based on linear distance traveled, presumably without elevation data. Though it might seem outvoted, my HRM can watch my heart rate as I run, so it’s better-attuned to my actual level of effort. But it’s still banking on a calorie burn rate that’s based on fewer factors.

This is about the point where the runner in me had to remind the geek in me that … it doesn’t really matter. What does matter is pulling on those running clothes, getting outside, and enjoying the road under my feet. What does matter is strapping on those running shoes and getting a regular dose of natural antidepressant. What does matter is running because I. want. to. run.

One foot in front of the other. Reverse. Breathe. Repeat.