Posted: 02/09/2007--25/11/2008 || Rate this Article: 3 || Views|| Sign In || Register ||Hello Guest
Yes, it's true that weight training with cardio will be much more effective in overall fat loss than just doing cardio alone.
In fact, there's several reasons for this and before I dive into them, let's make it clear that if you trying to burn fat and not doing weight training as part of that, you are really taking some big steps backwards.
Have you ever wondered why some people seem to burn more fat and at a faster rate? You seem them in the gym, they don't spend a lot of time doing cardio or weights but they seem to lean up quickly.
What do you do?
Why you do more cardio right? Burn more of those calories off. Pretty soon you are close to 2 hour sessions but that's okay.
Wrong!
Fact: An important key to the entire process is weight training.
If you don't train with resistance during this time, it's entirely possible some of your "loss" will be from lean muscle tissue. That's a big mistake.
And if you do lose a lot of weight too quickly (too much cardio, starvation diets) you will end up losing a majority of your weight thur lean muscle tissue. In just a second, I'm going to tell you why that's how you can really screw up your metabolism and it's exactly the opposite of what you want to do.
Fact: Weight training is the single most effective form of exercise for long term fat loss and lean muscle preservation.
When you incorporate weight training into your fat loss program, you are ensuring that your gradual body fat reduction comes from fat tissues and not lean muscle.
For starters...
Aerobic exercise is great for cardiovascular fitness and as a metabolic boosting tool and creating new pathways for nutrients. But it's simply cannot build muscle to the extent that weight training can.
Frankly...
If all you do is cardio for your fat loss goals plus a solid nutrition plan, you can drop a lot of lean muscle mass as well and end up lowering your BMR (basal metabolic rate).
So what?
If you lower your BMR by losing more muscle it means you have to exercise MORE to burn more calories!
That means more gym time, longer cardio sessions than the person right next to you who does some simple but effective weight resistance exercise as part of their overall "fat loss program."
On the other hand, if you do some weight training as part of your program and you gain some muscle, you are burning more calories all the time. Even at rest!
This means that the more muscle you have, the higher your metabolism will be and the more calories you burn all the time.
Before you think "but I don't want to bulk up," that's not even part of the plan.
Simply engaging in some form of moderate weight resistance program will help you build and maintain the muscle and help you burn more of the fat.
You end up having a higher BMR, a faster metabolism and less fat without having to spend more time in the gym.
So it all adds up to this...
An important key to the entire process of burning fat is weight training.
Make sure that your "fitness" program always includes some form of weight training.
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