I have very muscular legs and would like to make them a little less bulky. I've heard that running long distances is one of the fastest and most effective ways to lose alittle weight. So, if I ran 3 miles in the morning and 2 or 3 at night time, would this help?

Long distance running is a good way to lose fat AND muscle. But sounds like you wouldn't mind burning some muscle to make your legs less bulky...

Nope, thats not too much of an issue as long as my legs are still toned. For Christmas I got an elliptical machine. I tested it out today by running 2 miles. It said that it took me about 50 minutes going at 2.5mph to run 2 miles and burn 740 cals. Does this make sense? At the ellipticals at my school i usually run at about 7.0mph and it takes me about 9mins per mile while burning about 100 calories. Can someone explain this?

Don't ever believe what those machines say about how many kcal you burn. 700 is a huge amount of kcal, you'd have to be absolutely exhausted afterwards if you burned that amount of kcal... On top of that running burns more kcal than an elliptical.

So how do I know how many calories i've burned by the end of my running??
And also, i've been reading messages around these boards and people are saying that they loose 1000 calories at the gym alone. How can they do that? That seems like an unbelieveable amount of calories to be lost just at the gym.

Well, maybe you can try the site www.caloriesperhour.com.
1000kcal is possible, but not in one hour I'd think, two hours is more likely. Unless they do some incredibly intense workout and/or aren't small people (the more you weigh, the more kcal you burn for the same amount of exercise)

is kcal the same as cals?

Well, just to get technical... Everybody talks about calories, but actually they mean kilocalories. So kcal means the calories people commonly talk about.

. I tested it out today by running 2 miles. It said that it took me about 50 minutes going at 2.5mph to run 2 miles and burn 740 cals. Does this make sense?

Nope, no sense at all. THis isn;t uncommon with the home versions. The ones in the gym are a better estimnate but STILL way overoptimistic.

The 2.5 mph rate is a pleasant walk. At 50 minutes for someone walking 3 miles per hour a decent estimate is 160 calories (kcal.). The elliptical uses more muscles and requires a slightly higher leg lift but you can see how far off base the 740 calories estimate is.

These machines ALL overestimate becasue it's a good selling tool..."Look only 10 minutes and you burn a week's worth of calories":D:D:D:D

Thanks Lenin and Starofglass. However, when i'm on the elliptical it doesn't seem like i'm at walking pace. I'm clearly jogging. Do you think that the reading could be off? and is there a way i could calibrate it fix whatever is wrong with it?

It probably feels like jogging because of the type of movement. I personally hate the elliptical :D
I don't think you can fix the calorie counter or anything. You might look up how much kcal are burned on an elliptical on www.caloriesperhour.com.