Cardio than Weights?

Azdak

kalysta23 wrote: »

I've read you can burn more calories during strength training if you do at least 20 minutes of medium to high intensity cardio before you lift because your body will burn calories at a higher rate for a period of time after doing cardio. I've also read you will burn more fat if you strength train first then do cardio because your body will have burned through its glucose and glycogen storage during strength training so your body will have to use fat as its energy source.

Is any of this true? Does it make a big difference?

I am 5'5" and 118 lbs. My goal is to decrease body fat and increase lean muscle.

There was one study that suggested that doing some cardio before strength training resulted in a modestly higher calorie burn and EPOC. However, to my knowledge, that effect hasn't been shown in other studies, so it should be considered with caution. In any case, the difference is likely not enough to justify changing anyone's workout.

All the talk about fasted exercise or doing weight training first to burn more fat is mostly wrong. Even when those types of intervention change the exercise fuel substrate mix to increase the % of fat burned, it has no effect on overall fat loss.

From a practical standpoint, the supposed "negative" effect on weight training from doing cardio first is overstated IMO. Doing a lot of cardio first does have some negative effect, but it's modest. People tend to talk about these things like it's all or nothing. However, the average person can lift heavy after doing cardio, lift safely, and likely not see that much difference in results. Lifting weights uses different energy systems and recruits muscle fibers in different patterns.

The order of your exercise, if doing concurrent training, should be based on goals and personal preference. There is no right or wrong way to do it.

Joel33mfp

Body builders do a lot of things that are not correct for athletes or the normal person that's true as they are working for show... As far as lifting before weights... If you're lifting heavy for your legs or not heavy, but a leg day that's going to kick your butt then cardio after is the way the go as you may be to tired to keep good form. On those days I use the row machine for my cardio as I can get my upper body into it. Other wise it depends. There are times I run a 1/2 mile then do 2 set of body weight exercises and repeat until I have 3-4 miles. I hate running and this breaks it up nice and lets me push harder for the small bursts.