SS Fitness

Despite what you may have heard, there may be more effective ways to lose weight than cardio. More and more people are realizing this and no longer believe that cardio is the best way to burn calories.

However, if you love cardio, you should still do it! The best exercise is the one you enjoy doing and can stay consistent with. If you have a routine you like, you’ll be more likely to stick to it and see results.

If you’re a distance runner, keep running! But don’t determine your workouts solely based on how many calories you think you’re burning. The number on your smartwatch is only sometimes accurate, and even the best technology can be off.

If you want to lose weight, focus on your diet and incorporate strength training into your routine. Cardio can benefit your overall health by decreasing blood pressure, lowering cholesterol levels, improving blood flow and heart function, and helping control blood sugar.

However, excessive cardio may not be the best for weight loss for a few reasons. Your body will adapt to the stress of cardio, and you won’t continue to progress. The more cardio you do, the fewer calories you’ll burn for the same exercise over time. Additionally, cardio sessions may become more challenging to fit into your schedule, unlike weight training, where you can add weight.

Weight training may not burn as many calories during the session, but high-intensity anaerobic weight training can help you continue to burn calories up to 48 hours after the workout. The more lean muscle you build, the higher your metabolism and the more calories you’ll burn even when you’re not exercising.

Too much cardio can also prevent progress in other aspects of fitness, like building lean muscle. Your body may begin to store fat to help you sustain yourself during long cardio sessions.
Ultimately, weight loss comes down to calories in and calories out. However, how you proceed depends on your goals. If you want to be a distance runner, go for it!

But if you want to live a healthy and sustainable life without dedicating hours to exercise, focus on incorporating a healthy diet and moderate cardio, and find ways to move your body in ways you enjoy.Try to Incorporate weight training as well, but establish a solid calorie maintenance level and aim to get at least 2 hours of strength training and 150 minutes of moderate cardio per week, preferably over three days.

Below, I listed some great studies from professionals that you should check out if you want more information. They put things much more eloquently than I did and are worth reading. Have fun with your cardio or resistance training; remember, the best exercise is the one that you will do.

https://jameskuhnnutritionfitness.com/articles/2016/1/11/how-much-cardio-should-i-be-doing-for-fat-loss

https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=0cbf5f2698df8e2978fb865ec937dba1acd7156e#page=430