Experts claim that you need 60 minutes of cardio exercise a day to burn fat…They say that you must be in your “fat burning zone” to get meaningful results…
But what if these experts were wrong?
Or perhaps these experts simply based their opinions on the results of studies done in the 1970’s; studies based on long distance runners.
So let me ask you…are you a marathon runner?
Well even if you are there is no way these results would apply to everyone. I mean to think that is just ridiculous.
The bottom line is that you don’t need 8-10 hours of slow, boring cardio a week to lose fat.
The only thing that standard cardio does is add to your calorie deficit for the day. Not that this isn’t important, but there is a more efficient approach to losing weight.
In fact it is much more time efficient to focus on burning fat and building muscle at the same time.
Bare with me here if this concept seems foreign to you…it is ok you’ve believed the “experts” up to this point. That is not your fault; you thought you were doing the right thing.
But you are looking for the quickest way to lose weight right?
Good, because you can honestly get much better results from three 20-minute interval sessions versus five 45-minute standard cardio sessions.
Add some strength resistance and you’ll shed the fat.
What, you don’t believe me? That’s ok; I think you’ll change your mind:
A recent study was published by the North American Association for the Study of Obesity.
The subjects ranged from 40 to 75 and were instructed to do 60 minutes of aerobic exercise/day for 6 days/week over the course of an entire year.
You would have expected them to lose around an average of 20 – 30 pounds right? I mean that is what I thought anyway…
Well the results will surprise you too then:
The females in the study only lost an average of 4 pounds of fat…
Re-read that and remember that this was over an entire year.
So what about the men then?
Well they didn’t fare much better, losing only an average of 6.6 pounds of fat throughout the study.
We are talking 300+ hours of aerobic exercise to lose an average of 6 pounds.
All of that work for such a small payoff, does it seem worth it to you?
But then I found the results of another study, this one conducted by researchers at Purdue University.
They took 36 healthy men and women (average age of 61) and had them strength train 3 times a week for 12 weeks. Each session consisted of 3 sets between 8-12 repetitions.
The results?
By the end the subjects had gained an average of 4 pounds of lean muscle while losing over 4 pounds of body fat.
The results of this study were huge, proving that you can indeed build muscle and lose fat at the same time, and do so at any age.
You can learn more about how you can do it too here.
A recent study from the Journal of Applied Physiology proved that your metabolism increases after strength training by 10%. But the real key is that your fat burning increases by 100%.
Subjects in the study did a standard 3 set strength training program that focused on multi-muscle exercises.
Because the exercises are focused on multiple muscles, your body expends more energy (i.e. burning calories) in repairing those muscles “post-workout.”
It would of course apply to isolation exercises too, but those aren’t the way to getting the most effective workout in the least amount of time, which is why you are here right — to find the quickest way to lose weight?
This is why strength training is so much more effective than standard cardio; you can’t get this metabolic boost from aerobics training.
If you are interested in learning more you can check out my weight loss boot camp page here, which will show you more about how you can lose weight quickly. There is even a sample workout program if you’re interested.
