Heavy lifting vs light, cardio v's weight training, calorie

heavy lifting with explosiveness and about 45 seconds to 1 1/2 minute rest between set burns alot of calories and build lean muscles I started out 10-12 reps for 4 weeks; 8-10 reps for weeks & than 3-5 reps going close to my max around 85% of it (lost about 20 lbs in a month lifting heavy). P.S. must used proper form to be explosive on each rep or it will be an negative set.

Unfortunately Kell you need to do both weights & cardio. The weights help with the definition but the cardio helps with loosing the weight quickly. Both make your metabolism go faster but you will get more weight loss from the cardio you do. I always suggest Les Mills Body Pump for weights classes as you will easily burn a lot more calories from more weight repition than bigger weights. Plus Body Pump is guaranteed to change the shape of your body the quickest
Good luck for your journey!

I have the same problem. I have just started a fashion design business on top of working full time, so I'm really busy. I find that I can burn calories faster doing cardio and since I have to squeeze gym in these days I find its easier to do an hour of cardio and burn about 500 calories than do weight training and burn half. So I'm doing loads of cardio and some circuit training when i find the time. At the moment my aim is to lose weight and just burn calories, but I know I have to build muscle underneath for when the fat is gone. I also find it difficult to log weight training i.e. to figure out the name of each exercise i did on the database... i don't know if there is an easier way of doing it, but i just hate not know exactly how many calories i burned. Thats also why I prefer cardio, the machine tells me exactly what i burn so its easy to control.

Ok thanks guys but what about calorie deficit or maintenance? I was under the impression you can't build muscle on a deficit, so in order to improve on what I have do I need to eat maintenance cals and weight train?

If you’re new to lifting, you will likely see some small gains, or at least some reshaping (toning) of the underlying muscle. The gains will be very minimal, much more to do with fluid being held in the muscle repair process. You’re certainly not going to bulk up like a body builder. However the reason you lift at this stage to protect the existing muscle that you already have. Calorie deficit & cardio without lifting will likely lead to you losing both fat and some underlying muscle. That leads to your body needing even fewer calories to maintain your weight, which is not a good road to go down.

When you have stripped your fat % down and met your goal weight or goal body fat %, then you can re-evaluate your next step. If you would like more muscle shape at that point, then you can use a small surplus and more lifting to try a clean bulk for a time.

Weight loss & maintaining it is all about periodization through the years, some fat loss phases, then maybe some muscle building, followed by some more fat loss or whatever you decide you need to do to reach your ever moving goals. What you can’t do is just reach your first goal weight and then stop… because that’s when you start to re-gain all the weight.

Lifting with Cardio gives you the best tools to not only achieve your weight and body shape goals in the near term, but to also maintain that end result in the years to come.

What lifting and Cardio to do is a whole other discussion, but I recommend you get a copy of ‘new rules of lifting for women’ I have both the men’s and women’s version on my kindle and those books are a good guide for starting things the right track.