If you want to lose weight, do you have to jog? That’s not true! To lose pounds, you can use lighter methods without much effort. We’ll show you which ones.
There are two types of people in this world: those who love cardio – and those who hate it.
If you’re one of the latter and trying to lose weight, there’s good news for you: Endurance training is not absolutely necessary for weight loss.
Lose weight without jogging? Yes, it works!
“I don’t think endurance training is absolutely necessary,” exercise physiologist Rondel King told Popsugar.
“What matters instead is how much energy is put into the body – and how much energy we burn off.”
Although cardio can help with weight loss, Rondel says, there is another form of exercise you can do lose weight and at the same time build muscle mass could: weight training.
Differences between endurance and strength training
“The cardio exercise would definitely increase cardiorespiratory fitness (Editor’s note: refers to how well the breathing and blood circulation are able to carry oxygen around the body) and it would make you more efficient in general,” said Rondel.
Strength training, on the other hand, would lead to more muscle mass – and ensure that metabolism and energy expenditure are increased at rest.
How it works? “The increase is caused by the fact that muscle is the most metabolically active tissue in the body,” explains the expert.
The bottom line: the more muscle you have, the more calories you’ll burn.
To understand this better, Rondel offers an analogy: “Think of your muscles as little furnaces that burn energy – and also store it.”
So adding strength training to your workout routine will help you lose weight, but it’s extremely important to monitor your calorie intake as you do so.
Your calorie deficit is crucial
When it comes to the amount of calories you burn, the expert says it’s all about finding the right balance. If you are very active, you will need a larger number of calories in order to be able to carry out all activities in the best possible way.
On the other hand, if you don’t exercise a lot and eat an excess of calories, this causes a positive energy balance: “You then eat calories that you don’t use up,” says Rondel.
If these calories are not used, they are stored as fat. It is therefore important to achieve a calorie deficit.
Calculate your energy requirements quickly and easily with the FIT FOR FUN basal metabolic rate calculator.
If you’re very active and your dietary calorie intake is low, you’ll lose weight in the form of fat — or possibly muscle. To prevent this muscle loss, you should be careful not to eat too few calories, then you have enough energy for activities that in turn promote muscle building.
The expert explains that “in general, the activity has to be higher than the energy you take in” when trying to lose weight.
To find out the exact amount of calories you need, Rondel recommends taking a resting metabolic test and consulting a nutritionist to create an eating plan tailored to your goals.
At the end of the day, there is no one form of exercise or diet that will help everyone lose weight.
