Putting on additional weight puts you at high risk for a lot of health problems. To help lower your risks, you have to acquire a weight loss program you can use that is simple and fun. Losing weight not only lowers your risk of acquiring health problems but it also helps you have more energy and stamina so you can achieve more during the course of a day. With regular exercise and a healthy diet, you’re on your way to being a happier, healthier, livelier you.
Cardiovascular Fitness
One effective way of losing all-over fat from your body is by engaging in a weight loss cardio workout. What is a cardio workout? Cardio workout involves any form of exercise or activity that increases your heart rate up to a particular level for a particular period of time. Your body slips into its “fat burning zone” upon reaching your target or training heart rate. By maintaining your heart rate, you help make your body stay in its “fat burning zone” longer, resulting in more fat burned. Apart from being an excellent way to burn calories, a weight loss cardio workout also makes your heart stronger, increases lung capacity, induces better sleep, and helps manage stress levels.
Wherever you like
To help you maintain your weight loss cardio workout, try to determine in which setting are you most comfortable in doing them. Some people prefer the certain degree of rigidness that a fitness center can provide while some prefer to engage in outdoor physical activities rather than use exercise machines. Figuring out which setting you like better can help motivate you to stick to it.
Indoor or Outdoor
Whatever setting you are more comfortable in, there are a number of great cardio exercises that you can incorporate to your weight loss cardio workout to make them more effective. If you choose to stick to a fitness center, then the elliptical machine, stair climber, and treadmill are excellent choices for your workout. The elliptical machine makes people feel that they burn more calories on it compared to any other machine for the same duration of time and is good for your joints as it doesn’t cause too much impact or stress. The stair climber is best for working out larger leg muscles while the treadmill is great for running indoors and for beginners. If you choose to do your weight loss cardio workout outdoors, then jogging, swimming, and bicycling would suit you best. Jogging makes for an excellent cardiovascular workout but can be quite stressful for your joints while Swimming and bicycling help build muscle endurance and strength without stressing your joints.
When should you do cardio?
Because a weight loss cardio workout is great at burning calories, you would need to do it almost everyday. Some claim though that it is best to do your cardio workout in the morning, before you eat breakfast. Why? Because doing cardio workouts on an empty stomach makes your body burn your fat stores as opposed to doing cardio after you’ve eaten something which just makes your body burn up what you just ate.
Mix it up
It has been shown that high intensity cardio workouts burn more fats and calories but that doesn’t mean that low intensity workouts barely do anything for you. There are no hard and fast rules regarding which one is more effective to achieve best results. In fact, some physical trainers have recommended the use of both low and high intensity workouts alternately. You can mix them up by doing a low intensity weight loss cardio workout one day and then doing the high intensity ones the next. You can also mix them up by integrating the two levels of intensity in one workout.
Balanced Diet
As with any fitness regimen, to achieve best results with you weight loss cardio workout, try to incorporate it with a balanced diet. For high intensity cardio workouts, make sure to have some protein in your body. Make sure however to eat two hours before your workout and not again until an hour later after you’re done. It is important not to eat anything less than an hour after your workout because that it the time that your body is burning fat. Eating anything will disrupt the process, and possibly rendering your workout useless.
