Logger Blogger

People often question which is better for burning body fat, low or high intensity cardio exercise. The answer is, both will burn body fat, but which type of cardio exercise works better to burn those fat cells.

How your body reacts to different forms of exercise has been studied by many scientists. It was first discovered that high impact cardio burns glycogen (carbohydrates stored in your liver and muscles for energy). In contrast low impact cardio is believed to burn more fat then glycogen stores in your body.

This is not necessarily true as we have many obese people that are working out regularly by doing low intensity cardio like walking in the hopes that they are burning fat calories. It doesn?t quite work that easily.

While burning lots of calories can be more easily achieved by doing high intensity cardio, it can also burn fat stores as well. Low intensity cardio like swimming and walking does burn more fat cells than calories.

What?s even better is that when your glycogen stores get low (from high intensity exercise) , later the carbohydrates in the food you eat will be converted to more glycogen to replenish the stores in your liver and muscles, rather than turning to fat, when they go unused at the time.

What some people who refrain from doing high intensity cardio don?t realize is that high intensity cardio has a lingering effect also. So not only does it burn the energy stores and fat stores at the time of the workout but it continues to burn through them even hours after your workout. Many exercise specialists recommend eating complex carbs right after exercise to replenish your stores.

Again, it bears repeating high intensity cardio is the best for burning more calories for a longer period of time, low intensity does not.

The best way to interject some high intensity cardio exercise is through interval training. You can alternate your walking with bursts of high intensity sprints or jogging. Alternate 5 minutes of walking, with 3 minutes of high intensity cardio, then walking again for 5 minutes to catch your breath. You can work your way up to doing more lengthy high intensity intervals. As you become more fit, the easier it will be. Finish your workout with a nice walking cool down.

One of the greatest benefits of exercise, especially cardio exercise is that it increases your energy. The more cardio you do, the more your body responds to it in a positive way; giving you energy to do more throughout your day. As mentioned above, you body becomes like a well oiled energy burning machine with consistency.

If you?ve never made cardio exercise a part of your life, do it now. The health benefits of more energy and efficient fat and energy burning is outstanding. Start slow and work your way up to a consistent routine of both low and high intensity cardio. A check up with your doctor before beginning any exercise routine is recommended, especially if you have medical issues such as obesity and others. Anybody can get healthier with a steady routine of cardio. Enjoy.

Tags: Cardio //