Cardio vs Strength Training

alexandriapatton

I was actually where you are at, stuck at 145 a week ago for about 3 months. I was losing weight steadily up to that point. I did cardio three times a week, a long run, shorter speed run and fast mountain hills as well. I also recorded each and every food and made sure I ate about 1300 calories per day. Fitnesspal calculated 1340 for me. Be careful with fruits, I love them but calories can unfortunately add up. I lost five pounds to 140 this morning. My stomach is almost flat. I didn't do any stomach exercises because as everyone on here says you can't spot reduce.

Thank you, I would love to run, but unfortunately I have a medical condition that will not allow me to run for more than a minute or two at a time if I get lucky. I can do a brisk walk at about 3.5 to 4 mph. However, running is pretty much out of the question for me.

sexymuffintop

Thank you all for replying. I will definitely start doing more weight lifting that way I can begin to tone my body. I'm just so scared of eating more calories. Half the time I feel like I've eaten too much when I go past 1200 or 1300. But I will definitely try my best.

lol I eat about 2000 a day! And could easily eat more!

07JKGirl

Friend 1: You look great, what do you do for exercise?

Friend 2: I lift weights.

Friend 1: That's cool, what do you do for cardio?

Friend 2: I lift weights faster.

Too Funny!!!

gracielynn1011

Cardio burns a lot of calories and helps with your endurance, strength training also burns calories but a lower amount. The benefits to strength is maintaining your lean body mass, so that you don't end up looking sick and shrunken.

If I only have time for one or the other, I would choose strength training. You can create a deficit with diet to make up for no cardio, but you can't maintain your current level of fitness without strength (or at least I have never been able to).

SqueakyXO

Doing both is better than choosing one or the other. If you only do cardio and no strength training then you'll end up becoming too thin...more than likely it'll make you extremely, possibly anorexic skinny. At least that's the mistake I made, so adding weight-lifting after my running really helped. Hope this was helpful, and good luck on your weight-loss journey.

sabified

Do both!

For me, the benefits of cardio are improved heart and lung function, improved endurance, relieves stress, and burns calories to make a calorie deficit easier. (IE, I'd rather run three miles to burn 300 calories than eat 300 calories less.)

Strength training, though, has completely reshaped my body. It increases your bone density, and strengthening my muscles means I'm much less prone to injury. But the biggest thing for me is that lifting weights in a calorie deficit means that as you're losing weight, you'll keep as much lean mass as possible. That means you'll lose mostly fat, not a combination of fat and muscle. And THAT means that you'll need to lose fewer pounds to reach your goal body. And your body's shape will be better. Without lifting, I had a flat saggy bum. With lifting, it looks like I got an asslift. :laugh:

You can't spot reduce, but with less than 15 pounds left to lose, I'd suggest making sure you're set to lose .5 pounds a week, getting more protein than MFP suggests, eating most of your exercise calories, including strength training (personally, I prefer heavy lifting with compound movements) and track your progress through how clothes fit, measurements and progress photos, instead of just the scale.

I saw your post and immediately thought of Lornia's blog post on the topic...

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/LorinaLynn/view/cardio-vs-weights-again-558463

alexandriapatton

Doing both is better than choosing one or the other. If you only do cardio and no strength training then you'll end up becoming too thin...more than likely it'll make you extremely, possibly anorexic skinny. At least that's the mistake I made, so adding weight-lifting after my running really helped. Hope this was helpful, and good luck on your weight-loss journey.

Thank you, I definitely don't want to be too thin

alexandriapatton

Do both!

For me, the benefits of cardio are improved heart and lung function, improved endurance, relieves stress, and burns calories to make a calorie deficit easier. (IE, I'd rather run three miles to burn 300 calories than eat 300 calories less.)

Strength training, though, has completely reshaped my body. It increases your bone density, and strengthening my muscles means I'm much less prone to injury. But the biggest thing for me is that lifting weights in a calorie deficit means that as you're losing weight, you'll keep as much lean mass as possible. That means you'll lose mostly fat, not a combination of fat and muscle. And THAT means that you'll need to lose fewer pounds to reach your goal body. And your body's shape will be better. Without lifting, I had a flat saggy bum. With lifting, it looks like I got an asslift. :laugh:

You can't spot reduce, but with less than 15 pounds left to lose, I'd suggest making sure you're set to lose .5 pounds a week, getting more protein than MFP suggests, eating most of your exercise calories, including strength training (personally, I prefer heavy lifting with compound movements) and track your progress through how clothes fit, measurements and progress photos, instead of just the scale.

I saw your post and immediately thought of Lornia's blog post on the topic...

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/LorinaLynn/view/cardio-vs-weights-again-558463

Thank you for sharing! Love it!

_EndGame_

OK, so cardio is good for general all round weight loss, and strength training can work 2 ways.

If you lift weights, whilst eating a deficit of calories, you will maintain lean muscle whilst you lose weight.

If you lift weights whilst eating a surplus of calories, you will build muscle.

So both cardio and strength training go hand in hand in my opinion. I lift weights, I do cardio and I eat a deficit of calories. I don't want to lose lean muscle mass whilst I lose the fat.