With obesity and
disease increasing dramatically, many fitness experts are recommending walking
for weight loss and fitness. Some are even going so far as saying that walking
is the best way to burn fat and lose weight. I strongly disagree with this and
am going to show you why walking is NOT effective at burning off body
fat.
Yes, you read that correctly...
Walking is NOT effective at burning body fat and if
your goal is fat loss you might be wasting your time. I am not saying that
walking is not beneficial, I am saying that if fat loss is the primary goal,
there are far better choices that will deliver far better results.
The primary benefits of walking are increased blood
flow and circulation, improved recovery, and a strengthened immune system. There
are several reasons why walking in not the best choice when it comes to fat
loss. Here are just a few:
1. Walking does NOT burn a lot of
calories
The lower the intensity of the activity or exercise
the smaller the number of calories burned per unit of time. For example, you can
burn more calories in 15 minutes of bicycling at a high intensity level than you
can in 45 minutes of easy walking.
2. Walking does NOT result in a large
increase in metabolism
Another downside to walking is that because it’s
generally low intensity it results in only a small increase in metabolism that
will only last approximately 1-2 hours after the walk. On the other hand,
metabolism increases are larger and last longer (4-24 hrs or more) when you
perform high intensity cardio workouts.
3. Walking does NOT deplete muscle
glycogen
Low intensity exercise like walking does not
deplete muscle glycogen levels and therefore, later that day if you have excess
calories they will likely be stored as body fat whereas if you deplete the
glycogen the excess calories will primarily be stored in the
muscles.
So why then do so many fitness and health experts
recommend walking for weight loss? One reason is that people don’t want to hear
that they have to work hard so they figure some activity is better than none.
Another reason is that the body burns more fat for fuel when exercising at an
easy pace, however, the total amount of energy used is so small that you end up
burning off little body fat. That’s also why when you choose the “fat burning”
program on your treadmill or bike it has you exercise at any easy level. Yes,
you’re burning fat, but so little that you’d have to exercise at that easy pace
for hours and hours each day.
High intensity cardiovascular/aerobic
exercise is much more effective in burning off the excess body fat. In fact,
several studies have been done to prove this. In one study they compared one
group who did moderate level aerobics for 45 minutes with another group who
performed high intensity workouts for 15 minutes. They did before and after
fitness testing including body fat analysis and found that the group who
performed the high intensity aerobics lost nine times as much body
fat!
Want more proof?
Compare the bodies of a walker, marathon runner,
and sprinter. If you are not familiar with what a sprinters body looks like, it
is very muscular and has little body fat while on the other hand the body of a
walker will likely have the opposite, little muscle and more fat. The sprinter
does little or no low intensity exercise and does primarily short hard bursts of
work while the marathoner overtrains so much they burn off both the body fat and
the muscle and that’s why they tend to look almost sickly thin.
So what should you do then if your main objective
is to shed those excess pounds of body fat?
Two things:
1. Perform some form of high intensity cardio 2-4
times per week
2. Stabilize blood sugar to minimize the storage of new
fat
I know some of you by now are saying “I can’t do
high intensity exercise, I have a bad knee” and don’t worry, I have a solution
for you. The good news is that high intensity is all relative to you and your
current fitness level. For example, fast walking up and down hills may be high
intensity for you... it all depends. So don’t think that you have to start
running or something like that. Just slowly start to increase the intensity of
your cardio workouts while also maybe decreasing the time because you can either
work hard or you can work long.
Also, you can make almost any activity or exercise
high intensity.... here are a few examples:
· increase your
speed
· use an incline or hills
· increase
resistance
· perform intervals ( the most effective method)
Obviously, some exercises/activities or better
suited than others but the point is if you want to burn more fat and make your
workouts as productive as possible you need to increase the
intensity.
To learn more about high intensity cardiovascular
exercise please check out the following articles:
Be sure to also check out my Burn Fat FAST! ebook
and audio program here: www.burn-fat-fast.com - it covers everything from cardiovascular training to strength training
to nutrition and more.
As with any changes to your fitness program be
careful and don’t over do it. Just because high intensity workouts burn more
fat, don’t think that you’ll get even better results by doing it everyday - that
will quickly lead to over-training and a loss of muscle which will only make it
even harder to burn off the fat.
So if your primary goal is fat loss, don’t waste
your time walking and instead focus on progressive, high intensity cardio to
maximize the effectiveness of your workouts.
Jesse Cannone is a certified personal trainer and author of the
best-selling fitness ebook, Burn Fat FAST. Be sure to sign up for his free email
course as it is full of powerful weight loss and fitness tips that are
guaranteed to help you get the results you want. http://www.guaranteed-weightloss.com
