If you are serious about losing weight this is a must-read article because I will be reviewing what you definitely need to be doing to burn fat and lose weight and I will also go over common misconceptions about exercising for weight loss.
Sadly there is so much misinformation out there about being healthy and losing weight that most people that come into our office are totally confused about what they should be doing to facilitate their weight loss and become healthy.
Today we are inundated with infomercials on television promoting the latest and greatest exercise routine and trendy diet program. We are also subject to advertisements in the magazines, newspapers and even on the radio and yes even on the computer and Internet.
Some of the information and some of the programs that are out there do have some merit. However, the majority of them are just designed to take your money. So now that I got that off of my chest let me start by saying that there is no perfect weight loss program or exercise routine for everyone. What works for you might not work for your brother or sister or your friends and vice versa. So this means that there are general guidelines that each of us should be following in order to achieve our physical fitness and physique goals but often times these guidelines have to be tweaked to work specifically for you.
If your goal is to lose a significant amount of weight the only real surefire exercise routine is cardiovascular exercise. This means that each and every day, yes that is right seven days a week you should be doing some type of cardiovascular activity.
I prefer to ride a bike. When the weather is nice I can bike ride outside and when it's cold and raining and snowing here in Philadelphia I ride a stationary bike in the house. Now your activity might be different you might like to take an exercise class, you might like to do an exercise DVD in the convenience of your own home, you might like to walk on the treadmill or walk around the neighborhood with family or friends or you can do any other activity you like, just do it.
Here is the secret to losing weight and burning fat so please pay attention.
Now in order to achieve fat burning you must perform a cardiovascular activity between 65% and 70% of your maximum heart rate. This is how will calculate that: you subtract your age from 220 and then times that .65 and .70 and that gives you 65 and 75% of your maximum heart rate. For example I am 49 years old so you would just subtract 49 from 220 and that gives you 171. You then multiply one 71 x .65 and that gives you 111, so this means that 65% of my maximum heart rate. In order to calculate 70% of the maximum heart rate I would just multiply 171 by .70 and that gives me 119.
So when I am performing my cardiovascular activity I want my heart rate to be between 111 and 119. That is all I would have to do in order to achieve weight loss and fat burning. For the first 30 minutes of riding a bike with my heart rate between 111 and 119, I will just be burning the sugar that is in my bloodstream and making my heart really healthy but from minute 31 on is when I will be fat burning.
This means that in order to actually lose weight I have to perform this exercise activity for 60 consecutive minutes.
With this method we are not concerned how fast, how hard and how intense we are actually exercising; we are just concerned with keeping our heart rate between 65% and 70% of your maximum heart rate. So I highly recommend that you use a heart rate monitor when doing this exercise routine.
If you are not able to perform any type of cardiovascular exercise for 60 straight minutes then just do what you can and over the course of time work your way up to 60 consecutive minutes.
With this routine we are not looking to lose 100 pounds in 30 days. We are trying to lose weight in a safe and healthy way and this will enable us to maintain this weight loss for the rest of our lives.
The only exercise machine that I do not recommend for this type of exercise routine is an elliptical machine. An elliptical machine is fantastic for high intensity bursts of exercise. An elliptical does definitely have its place in your exercise routines by not at the beginning when you were really trying to lose weight and to lose inches.
There will come a time when you hit a plateau and the weight loss stops. When this happens then it is time to start doing more advanced type of exercises for which the elliptical machine is fantastic and I am talking about doing short bursts of high intensity exercise.
The short high-intensity burst of exercise routines will help you develop nice lean muscle.
By I have always found that it best to lose as much weight as possible in the beginning doing the 60 minutes of cardiovascular exercise and then go into the more short burst high intensity exercise.
This is because through my years of personal training and also through my consulting with multitudes of patients I have learned that it is difficult to burn fat – lose weight and build muscle at the same time. Sadly I have found that if you try to do both at the same time you just wind up getting bulky.
I hope you found this article helpful. If you have any questions or would like a personal consultation in our Philadelphia Medical Weight Loss Facility just call us at 215-821-7336.
Medical Weight Loss Philadelphia
7439 Frankford Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19136
(215) 821-7336
