Calories Burned Cross Country Skiing Calculator

An average skier will burn around 83 calories a minute. This equates to 498 calories an hour. However, professional-level skiers can burn 20 calories a minute. This makes skiing a highly effective form of weight loss. There are also several mental health benefits associated with the sport. 

How Many Calories Do You Burn During Cross-Country Skiing?

Skiing is a total body pursuit that recruits everything from the quads, shoulders, back, triceps, glutes, and abs. 

Due to the number of muscle groups involved, cross-country skiing is a great way to burn calories and improve your cardiovascular fitness. 

The average skier will burn around 83 calories from every ten minutes of skiing. Therefore, an hour of skiing will burn a whopping 498 calories. 

How Many Calories Do I burn Cross Country Skiing For 20 Minutes?

Most recreational skiers will burn 166 calories from 20 minutes of cross-country skiing. However, the number of calories burned will depend on whether you’re skiing up or downhill. 

A proficient, well-trained skier, though, can burn around 20 calories a minute from cross-country skiing. That’s the same rate of calorie burn as running a mile in five minutes! 

Depending on whether you’re on an incline or a decline, it’s possible to burn 400 calories during a 20-minute bout of cross-country skiing. This makes cross-country skiing an extremely efficient way to shred calories and lose weight. However, you have to be a near-professional level skier to reap these benefits. 

Is Cross Country Skiing a Good Workout?

Skiing offers a great workout and a fun alternative to more conventional forms of exercise such as jogging or weightlifting and is a great way to burn calories. 

There are, however, several other benefits to skiing other than its obvious fun factor. These include, but are not limited to:

Co-Ordination 

Skiing requires you to use multiple muscle groups at a time. Using the poles will work your shoulders, chest, triceps, and abs, whilst using the skis will require engagement from the hips and legs. 

Cardiovascular Health 

Traveling long distances on your skis will most certainly tire you out and work on your cardiovascular fitness. Elite-level skiers are some of the fittest athletes around, and even a 30-minute session will leave you gasping. 

Mental Health Benefits 

The benefit of skiing isn’t just limited to the physical realm, though, as the beautiful landscape it tends to take place in is great for your brain. 

Being situated in nature triggers endorphins in your brain and physical activity boosts them further. Add the social element of skiing and you have a recipe for superb mental health.

Vitamin D exposure is great for you too. All in all, the mental health benefits of skiing are on par with its physical ones. 

Is Cross-Country Skiing Good For Weight Loss?

Cross country skiing is great for weight loss, however, it may not be the easiest way to achieve this target. 

For one, you may not live in a geographical area suitable for skiing and you may find the cost of a skiing vacation a little too steep. These are perfectly valid reasons to go with another form of exercise that is more suited to the area you live in. 

Skiing equipment is also expensive. If you’re an avid skier who performs regularly, then this may not affect you but for some, the cost of the equipment may be off-putting. 

There are several variables when it comes to weight loss. Whilst the athletic endeavors of skiing are certainly plentiful, its expensive nature and dependency on location make it a niche-level form of weight loss compared to other, cheaper forms of activity. 

Final Thoughts

Skiing is a fun, engaging way of participating in sport. Not only are the physical health benefits extremely good, but the sport also has a myriad of mental health benefits going for it, too. 

If you’re lucky enough to live near a ski-friendly location, then be sure to jump on the skiing bandwagon and reap the rewards for yourself. 

However, the costly nature of ski holidays combined with the equipment costs can be alienating for some. There are certainly cheaper, easier ways to lose weight, but few activities can match the muscle engagement and calorie burn rate of skiing.