What exercise is most effective for fat burning.

Hey guys,

Haven't seen this floating around in forums, so I was just wondering what you all thought was the most effective way to burn off fat?

I know you have to start with eating, and combine that with strength and cardio work outs.

But I was just wondering if any of you had any more tips?

Fred.

1. Nutrition must be good

2. Lift weights (heavy) (check out www.stronglifts.com and read the free ebook)

3. Interval Training and slowly build up to HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training)

It's hard to know where to begin when first starting out, hopefully you'll get some good responses, but remember to do your own research too.

What littlesimongeorge said, in that order.

I found that running everyday for about 20 min. was great for burning fat. I dropped 2 lbs. the first week. I noticed that it was starting to make my tummy flatter as well :) very nice!

 It wasn't a straight run though... it was a total of about 30 min but 20 was running and I took a 1-2 min break and walked whenever i felt like I needed to and did that 6 days a week. I found that it was much easier to stick with  as opposed to running longer 3 or 4 days a week.

 Not that much exercise but it adds up and it was a pretty good start.

The hierarchy of fatloss.

Original Post by floggingsully:

The hierarchy of fatloss.

Yes.

If you want to run like hott suggests, I would actually do the couch to 5k program found on coolrunning.com. I've been doing it for several weeks now, and it's great!

Type in Burning Fat into the search bar in the upper right hand corner under forums.  You will find 100+ links to the very question you asked.

Original Post by floggingsully:

The hierarchy of fatloss.

 x 3

Ask any GOOD trainer and they will tell you that a cardio type work out is the best way to start and the best way to lose weight and fat. Most people make the mistake of jumping on a treadmill and going as fast as they can go. This is a mistake because you can't go for more than a few minutes. The best thing to do is find a speed and incline that you handle for longer periods (at least 30 minutes per day) If you can go for longer, by all means do it. As time goes by and you get in better shape increse the level a point or 2 and increase the incline as well. You'll be surprised how fast you adapt. After that do some light weights, and maybe some machine type work outs (crunches, bench press, etc.) This builds the other muscles and causes them to burn calories, thus burning weight and fat off of your body.

Most important, don't get discouraged! It took time to pack it on and it takes time to melt it off. Just be consistent.

One thing I do to make the gym more desirable is find something there that I enjoy. For me it's the jacuzzi and the sauna. I always save them for after my work out. It's like dessert and keeps me going back and gives me incentive to push through my work out. A good book or some good music on the IPOD helps make 60 minutes seem like a lot less as well.

Hope this helps, let me know.

Actually, a GOOD trainer would agree with the Hierarchy of Fat Loss linked earlier in the thread.  Cardio workouts are great for cardiovascular health and a good way to burn calories, but they also tend to lead people to eat back the calories they burned.  Plus, unless you continually up the difficulty level of the cardio (so that it's always a challenge to you), your body gets used to it (i.e. gets fitter - which is good) and burns less calories doing the same thing.  Cardio is good but, for fat loss, strength training while eating at a deficit is better.

In an ideal world, you want a combination of strength training and cardio to burn fat but if you only have time for one, strength training is more effective (and serves as cardio too if you do it right).  In the real world, do whatever exercise you enjoy because that's the kind you'll keep doing and therefore the kind that will be most effective.

Original Post by elmslady:

Ask any GOOD trainer and they will tell you that a cardio type work out is the best way to start and the best way to lose weight and fat.

The best thing to do is find a speed and incline that you handle for longer periods (at least 30 minutes per day)

After that do some light weights, and maybe some machine type work outs (crunches, bench press, etc.)

All of these points are unfortunately incorrect.

Diet is most important, but after that, lifting is going to be more effective for losing fat (although my heart rate gets up during lifting, so it could be called cardio, since it works my cardiovascular system, but that's just semantics.

HIIT (high intensity interval training) will be more effective than steady state cardio.

There is no reason to waste time with light weights (heavy and light are relative terms, so it's what's heavy for you - typically if you can do more than 12 reps, it's too light). And free weights are better in numerous ways to machines.

But as susie said, In the real world, do whatever exercise you enjoy because that's the kind you'll keep doing and therefore the kind that will be most effective.

Hey fredontoast,

Don't let all of these opinions, and that's exactly what they are, scare you. Sure, if you're able to do high intensity training as a beginner then by all means do it. But don't let people tell you that you're incorrect in doing what you're able to handle. I stick with my original comment. Setting your levels lower and exercising longer will not only burn fat, and get you into better shape, it also won't cause you to need a few days off from being so sore. 

Best advice: experiment and find what suits you. No two people are the same. But pace youself. I've seen too many people burn themselves out doing what these people are telling you to do. Hang in there.

Original Post by waynerdude:

Hey fredontoast,

Don't let all of these opinions, and that's exactly what they are, scare you.

Best advice: experiment and find what suits you. No two people are the same. But pace youself. I've seen too many people burn themselves out doing what these people are telling you to do. Hang in there.

Actually, the OP asked for the most effective method of fat loss.  While he got lots of opinions, Flogginsully linked him to an excellent article with references to actual studies of what's been shown to be most effective.

It's obviously up to him if he chooses to follow the advice in the article (which includes nutrition first - and that's just a lifestyle change, hardly likely to burn him out). 

If the OP is deconditioned, he will see benefits from steady state cardio, however at some point he's going to plateau and hopefully see that running makes you fat.

Agree with ds - also, from some past posts, the OP is interested in building muscle. So his goals are actually in line with prioritizing lifting.

wayner - I saw from another post that you've been doing steady state. There's nothing wrong with starting with what you can do. If you are interested in trying out some higher intensity cardio, there are ways to start slow and work your way up to it.

For me, I prefer lifting, and it happens that that goes well with fat loss (see Hierarchy of Fat Loss). Although I recommend that people do try HIIT, I personally don't do it - I'm a lousy runner, and don't have an area that I can get very high intensity on my bike. I tried jumping rope, but have an issue with the higher impact (plus, my home gym has a low ceiling, which makes jumping hard). Even when I had access to an elliptical, god I hated doing HIIT. So I didn't. When I do cardio now, it's typically a moderately paced bike ride or a walk. Because I like doing that. And I probably would have never tried lifting if I hadn't learned the benefits of it, and would never have realized how much I actually enjoy it.

But when someone asks what is most effective - the answer is what the majority of posters provided.

The best thing you can do for fat loss has nothing to do with exercise. It is nutrition. Six days a week, try to follow a strict eating plan - 5-6 small meals a day getting 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight, complex carbs from whole grains, fruits/vegetables, healthy fats, and a lot of water. Take one day of the week where you have a few moderately sized cheat meals. Once you have your nutrition in check, you use weight lifting and HIIT to help speed up the process. Once you start exercising, you have to make sure to get the right amount of calories. More often than not, people aren't eating enough.

As it has been mentioned, HIIT is the best type of cardio for fat-loss because it is anabolic in nature. It spares muscle and specifically goes after bodyfat. It also speeds up metabolism for a very long time after you are done, so even when you are at rest, your body is burning calories. It also has great cardiovascular training benefits because of the fact that your heart gets into two different ranges - 85-100% in the sprint intervals, and 60-70% during the recovery periods.

As it has also been said weight training is most beneficial when it comes to bodyfat loss and overall body transformation. Over the years, weight training became less important to people in fitness, and everyone started putting more emphasis on cardio for some reason. Today you have more and more people doing hours and hours of cardio per week, while they either skip lifting entirely or do it sparingly.

If you follow a good nutrition plan, lift weights three times per week, and do HIIT you will get really good results.

Woah I really did not expect so many replies! Thank you all!

One thing I guess I should have said is that I'm already doing Jillian Micheals 30 Day Shred Level 1 workout and occasionally the longer "Banish Fat, Boost Metabolism" Workout at home. I'm not a member of the Gym at the moment, but will join one when I hit University, as it's only £70 for the whole year then.

Littlesimongeorge:

My Nutrition is slowly becoming better. I'm working out the foods I don't need and adding healthier ones. I'm counting calories on everything and trying to plan what to eat so that I dont eat more than 2000 a day. As for Weights, I have some 5kg weights, and they are a bit light tbh. But I don't have the money to buy heavier ones. They are quite expensive, but I might go and have a look in the local charity shop to see if any heavier ones are lying about. I think the 30 Day shred counts as Interval Training. However, I'm doing it over 60 and increasing the time I do each workout from 10 days to 20.

Skylar:

I don't think running is that good. I have an injury in my calf from where I was hit by a car a year ago, any more than 10 minutes running/jogging/jump roping or jumping jacking causes it to ache severely.

floggingsully:

I will read your article now and post again with what I think, the support here for it seems to be pretty good.

Elmslady:

I dont have a gym membership yet.

Susiecue:

I love swimming, but I'm so self concsious I wanna lose weight before I go to the pool. So this is what this is for. However, I do love my workouts still. So In the real world I would do it. Also, I should point out I'm on summer hols. I have at least 3 hours free a day to myself where I can workout.

ds1973:

Yeah, I have been doing lifting and I **** love it. I can feel my muscles grow stronger and I wanna do so much more. I need to know more exercises than bicep curls though. Any ideas? Has to be dumbell training though. I have no barbells. I did read some of "Starting Strength" but as I have no barbells... not much point.

vyperman:

Sounds like a good idea. I think I need to work out some sort of dietplan. Any idea where I can do this?

My biggest weakness: Diet Coke. I know it's crap for you, but I'm having real trouble getting rid of it. I guess cause it means I can have something sweet without it  being more than 1 cal a can. I'm having 1 can a day sometimes. So I really need to get rid of it.

floggingsully, I thank you. I may have found my bible. I'm gonna take notes!

Most of it seems like very good advice. Hang in there and be consistent.