Max 30 Mins of Cardio?

kk281

its all about your energy stores. your muscles store carbs in them, as does your liver. the trick is to use up your stored carbs in order to commence ketosis (buring fat for energy). The problem with getting energy from ketosis is that it is not as quick as glycogenesis ( breaking down muscle for energy). during a particulary intense cardio session your body is unable to keep up with the highly increased demand for energy once it depletes its stores of carbs and starts breaking down muscles as a way to keep up. if your working out for an hour every day that leaves 23 hours of non-workout time, during which you body is still burning calories to keep your body functioning. the more muscle tissue you have the, the more calories you body has to expend to maintain that muscle tissue. a cardio workout is a good way to burn through your bodies stored up carbs and get into your fat reserves. most fat bruning occurs AFTER your workout as it is too slow of a process to keep up with the vigorous demands of a particulary strenous workout. This is also partly due to the fact that ketosis takes more water than glycogenesis and when you are on the elliptical sweating like a pig, your body is already using a lot of water to keep your body cool and doesn't want to use even more to get more energy, so it just turns to the more readily accesible muscles instead. less muscle means less calories burned during the OTHER 23hrs of the day when your NOT working out that many people seem to forget about. Its a good idea to split up your cardio and strength trainning excersise, but if you can't (like me) it is good to stick to a 75:25 / 60:40 strength trainning:cardio ratio
(ie. 45min strength: 15min cardio / 40min strength: 20min cardio)

long story short: build the muscle, burn the fat, loose the weight.

FemininGuns

It all depends what your goal is. If you just want to see the numbers go down, do as much cardio you want... BUT, if you are trying to build muscle and lose fat, you cannot do a lot of HIIT as you would be starting to break down your glycogen in your muscles to get the energy you need (hence the no more than 30 min.). I do 1 hour of walking in the AM on an empty stomach... This is all behind the notion of burning the fat and feeding the muscles. When doing lower intensity cardio (130hpm) for an hour, your body doesn't panick to get the energy it needs. It takes its time to break down the fat and use that energy to keep you going.

johnwhitent

It also depends on one's level of fitness. According to the books by Covert Bailey fit people begin to burn fat as fuel more rapidly than unfit people because the body is accustomed to exercise and anticipates extended challenges and therefore begins to call on fuel stored as fat quickly. With less fit people the body assumes that any exercise will be short in nature so why bother going to the trouble of burning stored fat. A fit person will begin using fat as fuel within a few minutes of beginning exercise but unfit people may have to work out 45 minutes or so before fat even begins to be burned as fuel. This is all from Covert Bailey in his book "Fit or Fat." The guy is a nutritionist with a degree in Biochemistry from MIT, so he does know what he is talking about.
I often do an hour of plyometrics then go on an hour long hard road bike ride, two hours of serious cardio. I do strength training from P90X and get plenty of carbs and protein. Works for me.

AllyS7

Skinny fat does that include marathon runners?

I'd hope not. I do at least 30-50 min of cardio 3 times a week and 2-3 hours of cardio another day. These sessions aren't just jogging though. HIIT, hill training, fartlet, cross training...I also do resistance training for 20-30 min 3-4 times a week.

I've lost weight, and have better muscle definition. I do, however, on my long runs eat carb/protein before and have some sort of snack (gels) with me about 30/45 min in if I need it.

saldridge

Yeah, I am sure all those runners, swimmers, cyclists etc. never do more than 30 minutes of cardio or they would all be weak and skinny fat.

I keep hearing more and more about the skinny fat from cardio and I think it's bull****. I do believe that if you just diet without exercise - yeah, you become flabby because of the total lack of muscle. I do know a lot of people who basically just do cardio - most of them run and bike, and NONE of them are what people consider "skinny fat".

I'd say you can safely dismiss exercise, eating or health tips that start with NEVER unless it is about using intervenous drugs or so. That is in a blog by some 20 year old chick - nor background in exercise or nutrition from what I see. Forget the grain of salt, take a whole scoop with that advise. It's what works for her and is most likely not applicable to the general public.

piccolarj

So I gues I should stop doing my 4 hour/60mile bike rides? I think not!!! I agree it's all in how you feed your body pre & post workout. A 30 min workout is not nearly enough for me to get the calorie burn my body needs nor increase my endurance.

AllyS7

So I gues I should stop doing my 4 hour/60mile bike rides? I think not!!! I agree it's all in how you feed your body pre & post workout. A 30 min workout is not nearly enough for me to get the calorie burn my body needs nor increase my endurance.

60 Mile bike rides! That is seriously impressive!

I completely agree with you, I could barely get started with some of my training in 30 min.

johnwhitent

Yeah, I am sure all those runners, swimmers, cyclists etc. never do more than 30 minutes of cardio or they would all be weak and skinny fat.

I keep hearing more and more about the skinny fat from cardio and I think it's bull****. I do believe that if you just diet without exercise - yeah, you become flabby because of the total lack of muscle. I do know a lot of people who basically just do cardio - most of them run and bike, and NONE of them are what people consider "skinny fat".

I'd say you can safely dismiss exercise, eating or health tips that start with NEVER unless it is about using intervenous drugs or so. That is in a blog by some 20 year old chick - nor background in exercise or nutrition from what I see. Forget the grain of salt, take a whole scoop with that advise. It's what works for her and is most likely not applicable to the general public.

Glad you read the article, I couldn't bring myself to. Too much garbage out there. Agree "skinny fat" is true mainly for dieters who don't exercise. Back when I was in my thirties my whole bike club would go on rides of 3 to 6 hours on weekends and we were one healthy group of people. Now I'm 58 and can't do what I once did, but I still get in several hours of cardio a week.

johnwhitent

So I gues I should stop doing my 4 hour/60mile bike rides? I think not!!! I agree it's all in how you feed your body pre & post workout. A 30 min workout is not nearly enough for me to get the calorie burn my body needs nor increase my endurance.

Good for you! I'm jealous, I've gotten older and can't do the long rides anymore but I savor every minute on the bike. Some folks my age are still doing it so maybe I can work back up to those long rides. Thirty minute max? Come on man!

jeannas

Bump

campbellcjdm

I think the main thing is that there is no 'magic' answer that works for everyone. For the 60Mile biker ... good for you. I love biking but had gotten out of it. My son and I will be biking 184 miles on the C&O canal in June with the Boy Scouts -- that's my motivation right now!! But I would have never considered bikes before - it was always casual riding. But I can say that my legs are certainly toning up - even though it is considered a cardio exercise.
The goal of mixing up the cardio & weight training is to burn calories and build muscles (which burn calories). Same goal for both basically. I suggest you do the cardio first, then the big-muscle weights (eg. legs first, biceps last). The benefit is that you will get your heart rate up for the weight lifting, the big muscles first will keep the heart rate up, and you will slow down as you do the smaller muscles... and you will burn more calories !!! :happy:
I am curious why myFitnessPal doesn't give any credit for weight lifting, because it certainly burns calories and should be included in the calculations.

mikeyrp

I am curious why myFitnessPal doesn't give any credit for weight lifting, because it certainly burns calories and should be included in the calculations.

It does but only if you log weights as CV

piccolarj

So I gues I should stop doing my 4 hour/60mile bike rides? I think not!!! I agree it's all in how you feed your body pre & post workout. A 30 min workout is not nearly enough for me to get the calorie burn my body needs nor increase my endurance.

Good for you! I'm jealous, I've gotten older and can't do the long rides anymore but I savor every minute on the bike. Some folks my age are still doing it so maybe I can work back up to those long rides. Thirty minute max? Come on man!

You can do it!! We have some 50 & 60 year old cyclist in our club. Just take it slow and build up. Cycling is a great exercise because you get the benifits of both cardio and muscle training especially in the lower half. My legs have never been this tone before and I long for day when I have those "Cyclist Legs"!!

johnwhitent

Thanks piccolarj. I'm 58 now and diverted from cycling to trail running for several years so that I could take my dogs out on the trail for their exercise. "Back in the day" I was an avid cyclist and did centuries and such. It is a great form of cardio exercise! Now I do a little cycling, trail running, plyometrics, and strength training. I'm trying to enter my sixties fit and younger physically than my years would indicate. You'll never find a cyclist who buys the "anything over 30 minutes is too much" approach! They say the pros burn over 10,00 calories a day - and no "jiggle" there.

terri0702

Bump

antipholous

When you lose weight, you inevitably lose muscle, too. The weight lost is a combination of both fat and muscle.

What the poster here is refering to by "skinny-fat" and "weak" is that you won't build up your muscle if you only do cardio. Long, extended, heavy cardio exercises (long-distance running or biking, etc.) will break down muscle pretty damn fast. Look at your 95 pound, Kenyan marathon winners for examples of why this happens.

The poster was that if you want the "toned" look, which most people do want, you're going to have to vary your exercise, lift weights, and avoid prolonged, intense cardio to achieve this goal.

If you want to put in additional hours at the gym, but do want to work towards the toned look constantly, just circuit train, vary your cardio, weight lift, or play a sport. I circuit train regularly, and it's awesome, but hard to do if the gym's crowded.

Flyntiggr

Don't believe everything you read on the internet. Just because someone says something in a blog doesn't make her a brilliant fitness expert.

My trainer expects my cardio workouts to be AT LEAST 30 minutes each, if not longer. In order to train for longer distances, you have to run past your distance/time to build endurance.

AmandaD99

Interesting replies! And I now also learned the meaning of BUMP. :laugh: :bigsmile:

knantz

I am curious why myFitnessPal doesn't give any credit for weight lifting, because it certainly burns calories and should be included in the calculations.

Lifting weights is listed under strength training in the cardio section.

campbellcjdm

Thanks !

shreddingit

Skinny fat means thin with high body fat.
Fitness models do 25-45 min of cardio like 2x a week, bodybuildets rarely do cardio, mostly because a lot of mindless cardio burns muscle.
but there is a way to build some muscle with cardio...