Home body weight exercises or gym weight training?

MarkusDarwath wrote: »

sgt1372 wrote: »

Not sure why you think you need to go "hard and heavy" or do HIIT on a rower to get a good cardio workout.

Reason one is to spend less time for the calorie burn. By the time I get to the gym and do whatever else I might be doing that day, I don't want to be spending a full hour on cardio. Reason two is that rowing also acts as a supplemental full-body strength exercise, and the harder you push on the stroke the more resistance you get.

But again, my thoughts of doing 30/10 intervals for 20 to 30 minutes were pushed waaayyy into the future yesterday when I kicked my own butt with 3 minutes of rowing and at least 4 breaks (wasn't going for intervals. Was just intending to get my feet wet with about 20 minutes of mild effort.)

Your best time to $ is by going at a cadence that you can maintain for 20-40 minutes. As illustrated above, doing HIIT is going to leave you gassed/smoked for a very small caloric burn. Going at a sustainable pace for 20+ minutes will burn more calories and while it should leave you feeling slightly out of breath, it should also leave you feeling more energized the rest of the day.

The test of a good workout isn't that it leaves you feeling like you got run over by a truck for 3 days, but that 6 weeks/months later you're still going and you can chart progression.

The gym is the best place to gain muscle, even just using dumbbells only. If the gym is out of the question, good quality resistance bands in various ratings can help replicate many weight and machine exercises at home.

As for the benefit of HIIT vs steady state cardio they both have their place. Steady state cardio (jogging, etc.) is aerobic, meaning it uses oxygen and fat as fuel. It also conditions the heart and lungs better than HIIT because the left ventricle has the opportunity to fill up before the right ventricle empties making the heart stronger. HIIT is anaerobic, using stored carbohydrates as fuel. This allows strength and explosiveness to increase but isn't as beneficial to the heart and lungs as steady state. It's also a better fat burner due to the longer period of increased metabolism after exercising, even though it doesn't use stored fat as fuel like steady state does. But it increases the chance of injury. One HIIT session per week and the rest steady state should allow you to reap the benefits of both.

It is absolutely possible to gain muscle mass and lose fat at the same time or maintain muscle mass while losing fat but it's not easy. Using techniques like intermittent fasting and cycling caloric intake make it possible. If you raise your calorie (and carb) intake on weight training days 20% over TDEE and lower it 20% below TDEE on rest (cardio) days you can recomp and in fact gain muscle while losing fat. But your diet and training have to be on point. You're already using myfitnesspal to dial in your diet, so you're half way there.