Strength Training is More Effective than Cardio for Fat-Loss
Think you have to burn more calories in order to lose fat? You’re kind of right. While cardio might burn more calories than strength training, here’s why strength training has a greater ROI than cardio for fat-loss:
- Cardio only works while you’re doing it. Once you hop off the treadmill or the stair climber, you get no helpful change in your metabolism. Strength training and building muscle, on the other hand, increases your metabolism so you burn more calories all day long. Lean tissue burns 10x’s more calories than the same amount of fat!
- Muscle is where the body stores glycogen for energy. Once your body runs out of storage space in muscle, excess unused energy is stored in fat cells. The more muscle you have, the more storage space you have. That means less calories going into fat storage on your body. Strength training increases your storage space while cardio could actually decrease it.
- Excess cardio without strength training can lead to a situation you know as “skinny-fat.” Not only is this unattractive, it’s also unhealthy. The body has less resilient lean muscle on the arms, legs, and glutes and more high-risk belly fat.
- A new study discovered the effects of strength training on fat cells. After strength training, vesicles of microRNA are released from muscle cells into fat cells. These vesicles prevent growth, so as the muscle releases them, muscles are able to grow. When these vesicles find their way into fat cells, they activate genes that promote the breakdown of fat for energy.
You do need to burn more calories to lose fat. And strength training is the better strategy than cardio for fat-loss because it will get your muscles working for you to burn those calories all day long. There’s only one way to make this happen! Grab your weights, bands, or TRX and stop worrying about the calorie count on your activity tracker!
Related Posts:
Why Women Need to Strength Train
What Should I do First? Strength or Cardio?
What is Fitness? Part 3: Strength
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