The best workouts for fat loss are ones that also build muscle tissue. At Iron Fit in San Antonio, TX, we focus on building muscles, since the more muscle tissue you have, the easier it is to lose weight. Muscle tissue requires more calories than fat tissue does, even when you’re not working out. That means building lean muscle tissue can boost your metabolism. It’s one reason we focus so heavily on HIIT and circuit training.
Cardio burns calories, but so does strength-building.
So which one is best? There is a difference. When you’re doing cardio, such as running, the calories come from burning both muscle tissue and fat tissue. That’s not true of strength training, since you’re also building muscles as you burn calories. Compound exercises or whole body workouts that involve several joints and muscle groups are also fat burners, since they involve more muscles. While you need cardio, there are better ways to boost your cardio strength.
Circuit training is one way to go.
You need four types of fitness, balance, flexibility, strength and endurance. Circuit training addresses both cardio—endurance—and strength training. In circuit training, you have between eight and twelve different stations. You work different muscle groups at these stations. You either spend a certain amount of time or a do a specific number of reps at each station and move on to the next, with little resting in between. That gives you a great cardio workout at the same time you’re burning calories and building muscle tissue.
HIIT training make the benefits even bigger.
Both circuit training and HIIT—high intensity interval training—are not specific exercises, but ways of combining exercises to maximize the benefits. HIIT is a type of circuit training, but not all circuit training is HIIT. HIIT varies the intensity of the workout. You workout for a short period at high intensity, followed by an equal amount of time or longer working at a recovery pace. Then revert back to high intensity and repeat. You can do a HIIT version of any exercise, including walking. Not only is HIIT a great way to boost cardiovascular fitness, if you’re doing strength training, it builds muscles fast, while also burning tons of calories from fat.
- When you do HIIT training, it’s easy to modify the workout to your own level of fitness. You can do shorter intervals of high intensity, with slightly longer recovery periods. As you get fitter, the recovery period can become shorter.
- HIIT exercises are more efficient. You get more accomplished in a shorter time frame. By varying the intensity, you’re burning the body’s reserve, plus your metabolism stays high for hours after your workout to repair muscle proteins and replace energy, so you’ll be burning even more calories.
- The body burns fat during HIIT workouts and continues burning that fat store after the workout. HIIT workouts also elevates HGH—human growth hormones. HGH is known as the anti-aging hormone that decreases body fat and increases muscle mass.
- Fat burning exercises don’t have to take a long time. You can get results by just working out three times a week for an hour. If you’re doing strength training, you need to vary muscle groups and give muscles time to heal between intense workouts.
For more information, contact us today at Iron Fit San Antonio