Before I get any hate mail or any rants and raves from people calling me an idiot, let me clarify. Cardio does work to lose fat. That’s obvious. Cardio is great for general health, heart health, and just getting you up off your butt. However, when it comes to losing fat quickly, especially for busy moms and dads, cardio workouts are very, very overrated. Is that sacrilegious for a personal trainer to say that cardio is overrated or doesn’t work?

I don’t think so. In my personal opinion, it’s lazy and uninformed personal trainers, nutritionists, medical professionals and any other health-related professional who are the ones who should be ashamed and feel stupid for not doing the work and actually help the people who come to them seeking assistance. Before I burn anymore bridges, let me go over a few of the reasons why cardio workouts for fat loss are the most overrated type of exercise known to man (followed closely by crunches).

1. Traditional cardio workouts for weight loss are a huge time waster.

When you think of cardio for weight loss, how long do you think you need to do it? Most people that I come across tend to think you need to do it for a minimum of 30 minutes and some even go so far as to say you need to do it for 60-90 minutes A DAY to get any sort of weight loss benefit. Do you really have 60 minutes of free time to devote to an ineffective cardio workout?

2. Adaptability.

Your body is very smart and it adapts to whatever form of exercise you throw at it. That’s one of the reasons you should change up your workout every few weeks, but this is especially true when it comes to cardio workouts for weight loss. Let me give you a few numbers to consider. Let’s say that you traditionally do a cardio workout for around 45 minutes 3-6 days a week and that burns roughly 400 calories. Sounds good, right? But the thing you don’t realize is that every time you do that workout, your body is adapting to that workout, which means you burn fewer and fewer calories every time you do it. Read the rest of this entry »

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Doing cardio just for the sake of doing cardio is a plan for failure. Without a clear goal, it’s going to be tough to know where you are, and if you’re progressing. Many people – both bodybuilders and the untrained – begin their cardiovascular training with a very unclear path in front of them. They know they want to lose some of the fat on their body, but other than that, it’s hard for them to quantify where they’d like to be, or even where they currently are. You can avoid this pitfall by taking measurements of your waistline with a tape measure, and having a body fat percentage analysis completed at your local gym or fitness center. Then you’ll be able to set realistic fitness goals for your cardio. Realistically, a man should want to get down to 7 or 8% body fat, and a woman should aim for 9 to 12% body fat. Take a test every 2 to 4 weeks to measure your progress, but no more frequently than that. Otherwise, the daily fluctuations may cause premature feelings of success or failure.

Mix it up

Variety is the spice of life. While it may make for easy planning to write “30 minutes elliptical machine” on your morning to-do list, actually following through with this repetitive and tedious task may not be nearly as easy. However, if you plan out a variety of activities for cardio, you’ll be much more likely to quit out of boredom.

Train early

Cardio training should be completed immediately after you awake in the morning, on an empty stomach. Wake up, stretch out, urinate, grab an ice cold bottled water, turn on the television (the news or sports works great) and complete your cardio training before you consume a single calorie. This will ensure the energy being spent comes from fat stores in your body, not carbohydrates in your bloodstream.

Granted, this isn’t always the rule. Read the rest of this entry »