does cardio LOWER your metabolic rate?

annecolorgreen
annecolorgreen Posts: 116 Member
edited November 12 in Fitness and Exercise
I've heard that it does...I've GAINED weight while running and i'm frustrated. I just started some strength training hoping that will help.

Replies

  • oceanspirit
    oceanspirit Posts: 4 Member
    I've only ever heard that running causes you to lose weight. Which since I hate to run, it made me quite sad. For my own personal journey, it seemed to me that running was what finally tipped the scale in the right direction.
  • Azdak
    Azdak Posts: 8,281 Member
    No--that is just the current silliness.
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
    I've heard that it does...I've GAINED weight while running and i'm frustrated. I just started some strength training hoping that will help.
    Cardio causes muscle to get smaller and more efficient. Technically, that can lower your metabolism. Shouldn't lower it that much, though. Strength training is a great idea.
  • zafferFL
    zafferFL Posts: 402
    I've heard that it does...I've GAINED weight while running and i'm frustrated. I just started some strength training hoping that will help.

    has you eating habits changed at all since you started running?

    e.g. #1 when some people start exercising they experience that new hunger, so they eat more creating a surplus in calories even above what they had before exercising.

    e.g. #2 are you logging food and exercise and possibly overestimating the amount of calories you burn causing you to eat more calories back than you actually burned?
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,974 Member
    It can IF it's done excessively and you are constantly are in a negative nitrogen balance. Usually long distance runners can have this issue, but I've seen many a "cardio queen" doing 3 or more hours of nothing but cardio at the gyms I've worked at and they are baffled at why they can't lose fat.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 28+ years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
  • rileysowner
    rileysowner Posts: 8,321 Member
    No unless you are doing hours and hours a day. Metabolic rate is very well maintained by your body. The things that can slow it are 1) Prolonged times of eating at a large calorie deficit or below BMR 2) Metabolic disease, not doing cardio.

    If you just started running and you were eating correctly according to the guidelines of this site and measuring your food instead of just estimating, this http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/200544-why-do-you-sometimes-gain-weight-when-starting-a-new-exercis could be the culprit for your weight gain. Other possibilities are you are not eating enough, but not so little that you are actually starving, just too big of a calorie deficit for too long. Or, you are eating too much by either not logging everything you eat, not measuring carefully, or using a database entry here that is incorrect. If a food entry have a * beside it, it was entered by a member, and you would be well advised to verify the information since sometime it changes, and sometime it is simply entered wrong. The other option is if you are eating a lot of premade/frozen meal purchased at the store, your sodium level is too high and you are retaining water.

    Strength training is always a good idea.
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