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don't really think there is anything wrong with your heart rate monitor, other than you may have to adjust the settings (more on this at the end)
now as to taking more work to burn more calories ... well it all depends on what you mean by "more work", if you mean "more output" you're correct, if you mean "more effort" you're not
what do I mean by "output", let's say you have treadmill and you set it a certain speed and run (or walk) on it for a certain amount of time (think of say 4 mph for an hour), if you did this a year ago and you do this now (when you're in better shape), you would have burned more calories a year ago, why because you're more efficient now that you're in better shape, if you measured your average heart rate a year ago and compare it with now while covering that 4 miles in exactly one hour, last year's would have been higher and the expended calories would have been higher, so the output is the same but the effort is lower now (it's easier) and thus the calorie expenditure is lower
this is without taking into account any weight loss, if for some reason you shed 20 pounds since last year then that's 20 less pounds to carry for that hour and even fewer calories expended
turn this experiment into an "effort" workout and the results are different, say instead of fixing the treadmill speed you fix your heart rate zone, that is you adjust the treadmill speed so that you are 65-70 percent of your maximum heart rate for the entire hour, two things will happen -- 1) the speed will be higher now that you're more fit and 2) the calories burned will be a little higher, say a year ago that 65-70 percent HR max you could only go 4 mph (a brisk walk), now you might be able to go 6 mph (a moderate jog), so a year ago you could only cover 4 miles in an hour, now you can cover 6 miles, also you will have burned more calories, why because it takes more work to more your body 6 miles than it does to move it 4 miles (assuming you're the same weight), same amount of perceived effort on your part but because you're body is more efficient you produce more output and burn more calories in the same amount of time
how do you account for this with a heart monitor, my monitor (a Polar F6) has several user settings ... height, weight, age and a couple of others -- resting heart rate and VO2 max, as you get fitter (is that a word?) your resting heart rate goes down and your VO2 max goes up, and so you may need to adjust these numbers accordingly, resting heart rate is easy you just strap on your heart rate monitor while at rest and observe what it says, VO2 max is more complicated, but if you "Google-it" on the web there are several sites that discuss ways to estimate it without having to be hooked up to a bunch of expensive machines while on a treadmill
sorry if this reply is a little technical, in a nutshell instead of always covering the same distance in the same time for your workout, you want to workout at the same level of effort (this is where the heart rate monitor comes into play, shot for the same heart rate zone for the same amount of time or longer) and what you will find is that you will cover more distance at a faster speed
Mike
Your post makes sense....the only problem I have with convincing myself that my HRM is right is that we're only talking a difference of 6 months, and I sadly have not lost that much weight since the time period I am talking about. I have pretty much yo-yo'd the same five pounds for the last several months....wow, that's bad. But yeah, so would my calories burned be THAT much less than what they were during the summer given the fact that I really haven't lost that much since then?
