Is cardio really necessary?

For cardiovascular health? Yes. To lose weight or body fat? No.

A.C.E. Certified Personal/Group FitnessTrainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

+1

Lifting builds muscle. If that's your goal, and you hate cardio, I wouldn't worry about it.

Not to mention...well, aside from the benefit of heart health, I really hate cardio. I just can't run around for hours & miles & be remotely happy. I can do it in the context of a sport, or something like kickboxing for example, but....other than that I really have never enjoyed it (& this is coming from a former soccer player).

No, not for weight loss. You can lose weight lying in a coma if you aren't eating enough.

Yes, it is necessary for health. Honestly, I don't understand why so many equate 'cardio' only with running. If you like sports, play sports. Kickboxing is great. Walking, hiking, biking, tennis, swimming, all great. There are so many ways to get your heart rate up enough to qualify as "cardio" exercise. Surely, you like something besides sitting and lifting.

IMHO, cardiovascular work is essential to overall fitness...it's really good for your...well, your cardiovascular system. It's basically weight lifting for your heart and I wouldn't ignore it. Do you need to do a gazillion hours droning away on a treadmill? No...but you should try to get in 150 minutes per week of something, at least walking for general heart health. Beyond that, your fitness goals would dictate.

While weight lifting does raise your heart rate, you're not really doing too much in the way of cardiovascular fitness because you're not elevated for a sustained period of time...but weight lifting makes you look awesome and feel awesome.

In summary, do a bit of both...I do tend to do a bit less cardio in the winter, but as a general rule I try to keep it around 50/50 the rest of the year.

Resistance training is also good for heart and lung health.




See chart for details.
http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/101/7/828/T1.expansion.html

The few areas that are not improved with strength training alone can be improved with less cardio than you think.

Do your preferred method of strength training and throw in some conditioning work a couple time per week if you want.

A+++++++ for the Arnold gif. Did Willis know what he was talkin' bout?

You don't need to do cardio to lose weight. Start off on a small deficit of 200-300, when you hit a stalling point (which should take awhile) and the weight isn't coming off anymore increase the deficit to 400-500 and continue doing this in small increments until you're where you want to be. I think cardio should be used as a last resort for losing weight once you're finding that you have dropped your calories as far as they can comfortably go then you will want to look at increasing your physical activity instead of lowering your calories any further. This approach is more for someone looking to hold onto their muscle though.

The OP said she didn't need to lose weight but wants to add lean body mass. Why would you recommend she eat at a deficit?

Her ticker shows she is still trying to lose weight

You're still young, at this point in your life and based on your goals you probably don't need to do cardio.

But the older I get I've found the more I focus on being overall generally healthy and less on just aesthetics.