how often should i be doing cardio?

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  • klcalliari
    klcalliari Posts: 60 Member
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    I do either Insanity or TurboFire EVERY DAY and both would count as cardio but are in NO way boring... i hate running on a treadmill and both programs actually get me a better burn than traditional cardio
  • SnazzyTraveller
    SnazzyTraveller Posts: 458 Member
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    I'd say aim for daily. 30 mins at least?
  • ironanimal
    ironanimal Posts: 5,922 Member
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    More often than never and less often than you can't stand.

    What do you want to accomplish? Are you trying to lose weight? Run a marathon? Increase muscle definition?

    Edit: Seen your post above. You want to drop BF%. Cardio will only get you so far and it greatly outweighs your lifting time at the moment.

    Cardio is IMO, good for two things; being able to do cardio better and creating a caloric deficit. For body composition changes to happen such as you want to see, resistance training is what you need. Get yourself under a barbell more often than you're on the treadmill.
  • vmekash
    vmekash Posts: 422 Member
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    I do cardio for 45 min. on Mon., Wed. & Fri.; strength train on Tues. & Thurs.
    The main reason I do ANY cardio is to earn more calories. I love my evening snacking, and am not about to give it up.
    When I reach my goal, I plan to do cardio much more often, but probably for less time (20 min. or so?), as I will be able to have more calories as a base line for maintaining weight. Afterall, I got fat because I like to eat, and never really knew when to quit, plus didn't really exercise. So, I want to keep on eating (just not so much), therefore, CARDIO.
    :tongue:
  • LuccyH
    LuccyH Posts: 266 Member
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    I usually do cardio 5-6 times per week, depend how i feel and usually for hour or more. I love cardio. :)
  • shorty35565
    shorty35565 Posts: 1,425 Member
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    Let me get this straight: you are 106 and just need to lose 1 lb to reach your goal weight? If that is the case, then answer this question: if you maintained weight, how much activity do you see yourself doing? 3-5 days worth? How much weight lifting vs cardio?

    If you are only 1 lb from goal, then you should tone down your exercise regimen to what you plan to do during maintenance. My workouts are heavy lifting 5 days a week and only 2 days of cardio at 70% VO2 max for 10 minutes just to maintain my cardio benefits.

    Diet wise, you should be eating about 250 calories under actual TDEE since you only have 1 lb to lose. That way you only need to up calories by a very small margin once you drop that pound.

    In short, the closer you get to your goal, you decrease the deficit so that both your diet and exercise habits are very close to what you would do during maintenance.

    Brilliant advice as always!
    The only cardio I do is walk. I do it 3 times a week. I lift every other day (3 days a week) & take one day off. I used to be a cardio junkie & ate low right on top of it. I ended up at a low weight & not at all like I wanted. You don't need so much cardio, seriously. At least I don't think so.
  • foxfirekenzie
    foxfirekenzie Posts: 244 Member
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    i usually do 5 days a week of cardio bc i have 2 days where im busy all day and cant do any... but ive found the time to hit the gym on one of those days now so if i go to the gym today that will make 6 days/week of cardio

    but im pretty tired. i usually do an hour of cardio 5 days/wk +/- warmup (usually only 5 min warmup/cooldown)
    im getting plenty of nutrients but im thinking maybe 6 days of cardio per week is too much? i was thinking maybe on that 1 extra day i could just do 30 min instead of a full hour.

    i dont know.. how much cardio do you all do? what is too much or too little?

    oh and btw i am 5'3 and 106.. 105 goal weight and have lost 24 pounds so far

    I''m 5'1" but even so everyone is different. You don't need to do so much cardio if you don't want to. I love running so I do it just as much as I lift weights. But I found after running marathon after marathon (and hitting the gym for weights) that I still gained weight. Losing weight is all about calories, not cardio. Of course you burn some calories but not near as much as all the HRM's say and it is insignificant when you have enough fat reserves on your body.

    Eating at a calorie deficit is hard on people; even a small deficit puts your body in a state of flux with hormones and such. Everyone is different. Some people can handle a deeper calorie deficit than others, this is not right or wrong, it just is. Stress in your life affects your hunger hormones; lack of sleep, fatigue, job stress, family stress, financial stress, etc. Add in emotional eating issues and it gets even more complicated. Most people can only handle so much change/stress at once, they try to do too much and fail. Sometimes it might be a better strategy to eat at maintenance and make some small changes first, it really depends on how much stress you are taking in at the moment.

    Exercise is for making your lean body mass pretty (especially lifting weights) for when the fat is gone. Losing fat with no muscle is ugly and cardio alone will not make you pretty. You cannot out exercise too many calories.

    Lifting weights is KEY. I recently had my DXA scan done and at 51.5 years of age I have the bone density of a super athletic 30 year old. That is a direct result of lifting for over 30 years. Now if that is not scientific proof that lifting weights keeps you younger I don't know what is! Also I believe it is why most people think I look much younger than I really am.

    Start lifting now, lift heavy and change it up often, find a lot of weight routines with free weights, make it fun, embrace it, make it part of your life. Only 3 days a week is all it would take. Crank up your tunes and learn to love it, because your body will love it and it will make your quality of life better in many ways, especially when you get older like me.

    Because of this I don't have to worry about osteoporosis. If you wait until you are older and your bones start to deteriorate it's a bit too late, you can't get back what you lost, and you can only start a resistance routine that will prevent further damage.

    If you are female you don't have the hormones to get big naturally. I lift heavy and I'm still really tiny. My lean body mass is only 104 lbs and that is fairly heavy for a 5'1" female, and quite a bit of this is due to my having very dense bones from 30 years of lifting, not all muscle, and I'm still quite tiny.

    My muscles really are not that big, but they show a lot of definition because I'm quite lean. If I gained some fat then I would have a softer more toned look (which is OKAY too!). Then if I gained more fat I would look bulky and hefty like I did most of my life until last year. YOU CAN HAVE WHATEVER YOU WANT. Lean and ripped, soft and toned, or hefty, it all depends on how much fat you leave on your body. Calories are the only thing that changes fat. Exercise is for changing or maintaining your lean body mass only. Lifting weights will give you the best bang for your buck for shaping your body. I finally changed my shape by putting lifting first and cardio 2nd. You cannot out exercise too many calories.

    Wishing you the best! -Bobbie

    How many times are you going to post this wall of text? Can you answer the OPs question without making every post about you? It makes it very difficult for people to accept your advice when it seems that you don't even take the time to actually respond to them INDIVIDUALLY.

    Give it a rest Bobbie, I'm so sick of seeing the same cut and paste post in countless threads..............geeze.

    Ditto, a thousand times over.
  • LadyIntrepid
    LadyIntrepid Posts: 399 Member
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    I love doing cardio, but not at the expense of strength training. You don't say anything about strength training. Everybody's different, but I would suggest doing strength training (3 times a week seems to work well) and then whatever cardio you want around that but not so much that you feel overly fatigued. And you need to make sure your food intake is high quality and quantity fuel enough to support your efforts. Getting fit is about feeling great, not worn out.
  • Sassy9411
    Sassy9411 Posts: 67 Member
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    When people say "Strength training" what do you mean exactly? As in, if I found a video that involved using my 3lb weights that would be strength training? I've seen it mentioned a lot, but I never know exactly what that entails.
  • LadyIntrepid
    LadyIntrepid Posts: 399 Member
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    When people say "Strength training" what do you mean exactly? As in, if I found a video that involved using my 3lb weights that would be strength training? I've seen it mentioned a lot, but I never know exactly what that entails.

    Well... you could start with three pound weights if you found that challenging but the point of strength training is to ever challenge your body. There are exercises you can do using your own body weight and resistance bands if you don't belong to a gym. If you join a gym and/or have access to heavier weights, an excellent primer is "New Rules of Lifting for Women". Even if you don't have access to weights... yet... it's an excellent read and will answer many of your questions. But yes -- anything that challenges your muscles as opposed to simply increasing your heart rate (cardio) is more or less strength training. That's a pretty simplistic answer. It's worth taking the time to find out more. Poke around online -- there's a TON of info out there!
  • mercymarque
    mercymarque Posts: 450
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    I do cardio 6-7 days a week. I also do strengh training 2-3 days out of the week along with cardio. I don't think there is any wrong answer. I was reading just today for weight management (to stay the weight ur currently are), it's best if you do at least 30 minutes of aerobic activity on most days. For strenght training, aim for two to three 20 - 30 minute sessions a week. I guess anything over 30 on most days would = loss.
  • Nirlbou
    Nirlbou Posts: 27 Member
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    Cardio, has only one goal, impove heart function and keep red blood cell count high. This only requires one season(120-155bpm, depending on age) every 3rd day. Anything more is counter productive (unless your goal is to look emaciated)
  • donyellemoniquex3
    donyellemoniquex3 Posts: 2,384 Member
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    b u m p
  • Sassy9411
    Sassy9411 Posts: 67 Member
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    When people say "Strength training" what do you mean exactly? As in, if I found a video that involved using my 3lb weights that would be strength training? I've seen it mentioned a lot, but I never know exactly what that entails.

    Well... you could start with three pound weights if you found that challenging but the point of strength training is to ever challenge your body. There are exercises you can do using your own body weight and resistance bands if you don't belong to a gym. If you join a gym and/or have access to heavier weights, an excellent primer is "New Rules of Lifting for Women". Even if you don't have access to weights... yet... it's an excellent read and will answer many of your questions. But yes -- anything that challenges your muscles as opposed to simply increasing your heart rate (cardio) is more or less strength training. That's a pretty simplistic answer. It's worth taking the time to find out more. Poke around online -- there's a TON of info out there!




    Thanks! I think I found a few videos that I'm going to give a shot!
  • shorty35565
    shorty35565 Posts: 1,425 Member
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    When people say "Strength training" what do you mean exactly? As in, if I found a video that involved using my 3lb weights that would be strength training? I've seen it mentioned a lot, but I never know exactly what that entails.

    In my opinion, lifting heavy. If 3lbs is heavy for you then start there! Start with whatever if heavy to you & work ur way up.
  • MoreBean13
    MoreBean13 Posts: 8,701 Member
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    Strength training requires progressive overload to be effective. If you can lift a gallon of milk out of the refrigerator, 3lb weights are not strength training. They're mild resistance for cardio. To qualify as strength training, you should be thoroughly burnt out after performing a movement 15x or less. The lower the number of repetitions, the heavier the weight, generally the more effective towards strength goals. (with some exceptions). Lift something heavier than 3 lbs, please.
  • ang3h
    ang3h Posts: 185 Member
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    I do 50 minutes of cardio 5 days a week because I like to eat. I know I could lose weight or maintain without the cardio but I just love food too damn much..I'm cranky and tired as hell if I eat under 1600/day.
  • debsclio
    debsclio Posts: 24
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    I walk 30 minutes a day everyday, even if its in my lunch break, just get up and move.
    I go to the gym on saturday mornings and do stationary bike vigorous effort 30 mins and treadmil 3,7 speed and incline 7 for 30 mins.
    I do dumbells twice a week.
  • sandra152
    sandra152 Posts: 77
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    Just do what you think is right aslong as you do some form of execise aweek every little helps

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