By Aaron Boike, B.S. Kinesiology, ACE Certified Personal Trainer
“How do I exercise to lose weight?” is one of the most common questions Trainers get when visiting with members at our Affiliate Locations around the metro. Everyone wants to know the “secret sauce” to get the pounds to melt away. I’m a firm believer in lifestyle change as the key to long term and successful weight loss. I’d be lying to you if I told you that you can’t exercise the pounds away, but I’d also be lying to you if I told you that you’d be able to keep them off with exercise alone. That being said, there is a key set of rules to live by when building an exercise program to help you lose weight.
- Think About the Long Term – When building your program, you want to think sustainability and consistency. Is the program you’re building realistic to keep up over the long term? If you can’t say yes to that question without any doubts, you might want to re-look your program and find a commitment that is more sustainable for you. Doing three consistent workouts per week over a year is going to yield much better results that than pushing yourself to do six or seven and giving up due to burnout.
- Incorporate BOTH Resistance Training and Cardiovascular Training – This is where so many of us go wrong. We focus on getting into the gym simply to see the number of calories burned on the treadmill or elliptical hit the highest number possible. A long term sustained approach to weight loss doesn’t focus on calories burned alone, but also on metabolic health and body composition improvement. When you weight train your body has a short term responses that aid in weight loss, including; increased insulin sensitivity, blood sugar control, and muscular recovery. The real benefit of weight training comes over the long term with an improved body composition (more muscle, less fat), meaning your metabolism is higher at rest and you have an easier time keeping losing weight and keeping it off.
- Try Interval Training – There is a small mountain worth of research that has come out in the past decade that shows that interval training burns more fat than steady state workouts. Interval training is the act of cycling between “recovery” periods and “intensity” periods, Interval training can be as simple as throwing in a few high intensity bouts of 1-2 minutes into your workout. My favorite interval routine for beginners involves taking a workout duration they are comfortable with, say 30 minutes, and having them mixing in five 60 second “bursts” where they bump up the intensity to something they can sustain for no more than one minute, and then resuming their workout as normal. See our blog on interval training for more research and tips on including it in your workout plan.
- Find Ways to Increase Daily Activity – What opportunities do you have to be more active outside of your workouts? Easy examples can be taking the stairs, parking in the back of the lot, going on bike ride with your kids instead of watching TV, or giving your dog some extra TLC with a second walk daily. These additions help you lead a more active lifestyle and burn more calories throughout the day, leading to longer term and easier to sustain weight loss.
- Have a Plan to Improve Your Nutrition – I know this is an article on how to exercise to lose weight, but nutrition simply can’t be an afterthought when it comes to long term weight loss. Instead of thinking about going on a “diet plan,” focus on making small changes that improve your nutritional habits. One of my favorite things to have new clients do is focus on adding 2-3 more servings of veggies and fruits into their day. Other easy examples include; packing your lunch instead of going out, replacing your vending machine habit with a healthy snack from home, or adding a healthy after dinner snack that keeps you away from the junk foods. I also find it very helpful to track your nutrition using an app, such as MyFitnessPal. These apps make tracking your calories and nutrition very simple and help you stay accountable to your nutritional goals.