Cardio makes you fat: "Women: Running into Trouble"

Alan Aragon and Lyle McDonald both say that cardio is pretty much pointless for normal weight loss scenarios, and they are two of the most knowledgeable fitness experts on the planet. You can accomplish the exact same thing with a larger caloric deficit, and get the same cardiovascular benefits from metabolic weight training, along with superior preservation of lean body mass.

If you want to do cardio for endurance or sport-specific training, then awesome.
If you wan to do LISS in conjunction with a strength training regiment for weight loss, then props to you.
If you want to use cardio as your primary exercise for weight loss, then enjoy losing tons of lean body mass and lowering your metabolism. (I'm sure that one will get me flamed, but hey, the truth hurts sometimes)

I read McDonald say something like that recently. He was talking about "untrained" people, though. In other words, if you're totally sedentary and you start running you can't go very far or very fast and you won't burn many calories. Once you've been running for a while, though, you can easily burn 1000 calories during a run. What would be better for your metabolism, eating 1600 calories or eating 2600 and running? If you're creating a deficit through diet, you're eating a lot less food than if you're creating the same deficit through exercise. Of course, if I go burn those 1000 calories and then come home and eat a large pizza I won't be losing weight. I do think resistance training is important for retaining lean mass (and so is protein, right?), but I'm not sure why you think that weight training can give you the same benefit as cardio. I lifted for years with little to no cardio and saw no improvement in my resting heart rate (an indicator of cardiovascular fitness). Running for one summer got it down into the low 40s (from the 90s).

Jynus, do you run? how far, and how often?

Depends on context. I used to play competitive sports. At my peak I played national level Ultimate and trained/played about 20hours a week with craptons of cardio as the sport is just pure running. Did that for 2 years, and a good few before that with a few hours a week playing other cardio based sports like soccer. I never ran for fun or for time, or competed with running. it was always for training so I honestly have no idea how far, or what my times would be then. It was always ok, 20 min jog, go, and just do that before moving onto other training.

Now my last year of Ulti, I started doing weight training. I found a jump training template that had strength components and hit the gym to improve my performance. After I retired from Ulti to have time for life, I kept going to the gym to remain active. I went much more frequently and exercised a lot more intensely as I had the time and rest for it since I didn't want to bother with sports anymore. End result was after cutting out 20 hours of cardio a week and replacing it with about 6 hours of weight training, I shed a crapton of fat and recomped my body to the point where I just looked drastically different. I always looked athletic before, but had a much more olympic sprinter like look to me afterwards and had a 6pack for first time ever. That was a wakeup call for me about training methodologies and results from them. (assuming diet is in check)

I did spend a couple years actually doing personal training too, and have all my basic certs. And with my sports background and training as a profession, for study I would honestly say I've spent hundreds of hours reading studies and articles on fitness and health, and spent thousands of hours working with people on forums much like this, or in real life training with people. So I do have a bit of a background.

Interesting timing on your question however. I can say this though, I've always wanted to make the point where I do what I say, and made it a point to not do ANY cardio in my training, and have held true to that for the last 2 years. I wanted to show that you can gain and lose, faster and better, all without cardio. However over last weekend, a friend wanted to go for a jog and I said why the hell not. We didn't time it, but it was 3km. And I got through it without any trouble, 1 1min walking break or so though. my freaking legs were itchy as hell though, lol. 2 years not doing cardio prob has a few bugs to work out. I actually plan on taking 1 day a week now just for running. My son is 4, and loves to be outside, and is always wanting to race and do active things. I'll make it a father/son thing to go for a lil jog as much as we can and be active together doing whatever.

k, theres your essay on my background.

edit: the post right above mine is basically a mirror image of my experiences, but in reverse. the link does seem to be excessive/competitive cardio. Might be something to that rather than joe average just doing a few hours a week on the treadmill trying to drop a few pounds.

Alan Aragon and Lyle McDonald both say that cardio is pretty much pointless for normal weight loss scenarios, and they are two of the most knowledgeable fitness experts on the planet. You can accomplish the exact same thing with a larger caloric deficit, and get the same cardiovascular benefits from metabolic weight training, along with superior preservation of lean body mass.

If you want to do cardio for endurance or sport-specific training, then awesome.
If you wan to do LISS in conjunction with a strength training regiment for weight loss, then props to you.
If you want to use cardio as your primary exercise for weight loss, then enjoy losing tons of lean body mass and lowering your metabolism. (I'm sure that one will get me flamed, but hey, the truth hurts sometimes)

I read McDonald say something like that recently. He was talking about "untrained" people, though. In other words, if you're totally sedentary and you start running you can't go very far or very fast and you won't burn many calories. Once you've been running for a while, though, you can easily burn 1000 calories during a run. What would be better for your metabolism, eating 1600 calories or eating 2600 and running? If you're creating a deficit through diet, you're eating a lot less food than if you're creating the same deficit through exercise. Of course, if I go burn those 1000 calories and then come home and eat a large pizza I won't be losing weight. I do think resistance training is important for retaining lean mass (and so is protein, right?), but I'm not sure why you think that weight training can give you the same benefit as cardio. I lifted for years with little to no cardio and saw no improvement in my resting heart rate (an indicator of cardiovascular fitness). Running for one summer got it down into the low 40s (from the 90s).

Jynus, do you run? how far, and how often?

Depends on context. I used to play competitive sports. At my peak I played national level Ultimate and trained/played about 20hours a week with craptons of cardio as the sport is just pure running. Did that for 2 years, and a good few before that with a few hours a week playing other cardio based sports like soccer. I never ran for fun or for time, or competed with running. it was always for training so I honestly have no idea how far, or what my times would be then. It was always ok, 20 min jog, go, and just do that before moving onto other training.

Now my last year of Ulti, I started doing weight training. I found a jump training template that had strength components and hit the gym to improve my performance. After I retired from Ulti to have time for life, I kept going to the gym to remain active. I went much more frequently and exercised a lot more intensely as I had the time and rest for it since I didn't want to bother with sports anymore. End result was after cutting out 20 hours of cardio a week and replacing it with about 6 hours of weight training, I shed a crapton of fat and recomped my body to the point where I just looked drastically different. I always looked athletic before, but had a much more olympic sprinter like look to me afterwards and had a 6pack for first time ever. That was a wakeup call for me about training methodologies and results from them. (assuming diet is in check)

I did spend a couple years actually doing personal training too, and have all my basic certs. And with my sports background and training as a profession, for study I would honestly say I've spent hundreds of hours reading studies and articles on fitness and health, and spent thousands of hours working with people on forums much like this, or in real life training with people. So I do have a bit of a background.

Interesting timing on your question however. I can say this though, I've always wanted to make the point where I do what I say, and made it a point to not do ANY cardio in my training, and have held true to that for the last 2 years. I wanted to show that you can gain and lose, faster and better, all without cardio. However over last weekend, a friend wanted to go for a jog and I said why the hell not. We didn't time it, but it was 3km. And I got through it without any trouble, 1 1min walking break or so though. my freaking legs were itchy as hell though, lol. 2 years not doing cardio prob has a few bugs to work out. I actually plan on taking 1 day a week now just for running. My son is 4, and loves to be outside, and is always wanting to race and do active things. I'll make it a father/son thing to go for a lil jog as much as we can and be active together doing whatever.

k, theres your essay on my background.

edit: the post right above mine is basically a mirror image of my experiences, but in reverse. the link does seem to be excessive/competitive cardio. Might be something to that rather than joe average just doing a few hours a week on the treadmill trying to drop a few pounds.

So, in short, no, you don't run....

That's really all you had to say, Jynus.

Alan Aragon and Lyle McDonald both say that cardio is pretty much pointless for normal weight loss scenarios, and they are two of the most knowledgeable fitness experts on the planet. You can accomplish the exact same thing with a larger caloric deficit, and get the same cardiovascular benefits from metabolic weight training, along with superior preservation of lean body mass.

If you want to do cardio for endurance or sport-specific training, then awesome.
If you wan to do LISS in conjunction with a strength training regiment for weight loss, then props to you.
If you want to use cardio as your primary exercise for weight loss, then enjoy losing tons of lean body mass and lowering your metabolism. (I'm sure that one will get me flamed, but hey, the truth hurts sometimes)

I read McDonald say something like that recently. He was talking about "untrained" people, though. In other words, if you're totally sedentary and you start running you can't go very far or very fast and you won't burn many calories. Once you've been running for a while, though, you can easily burn 1000 calories during a run. What would be better for your metabolism, eating 1600 calories or eating 2600 and running? If you're creating a deficit through diet, you're eating a lot less food than if you're creating the same deficit through exercise. Of course, if I go burn those 1000 calories and then come home and eat a large pizza I won't be losing weight. I do think resistance training is important for retaining lean mass (and so is protein, right?), but I'm not sure why you think that weight training can give you the same benefit as cardio. I lifted for years with little to no cardio and saw no improvement in my resting heart rate (an indicator of cardiovascular fitness). Running for one summer got it down into the low 40s (from the 90s).

If you read more closely, no one said that strength training gives you the "same benefit" as cardio. What has been stated is that there is cardio benefit from strength training that will show cardio fitness improvement compared to the sedentary or untrained. For cardio fitness as an objective, cardio exercise is best. That is not being disputed by anyone as far as I can tell. As you've pointed out, each type of exercise has a fitness and health benefit. They are comlimentary to in opposition to each other.

Actually, if you look above my post at what I quoted, you'll see: "get the same cardiovascular benefits from metabolic weight training." So, I actually just looked "metabolic weight training" up and it seems to be cardio with weights. If you're using smaller weights so that you can do more reps and keep your heart rate up, then you're doing cardio. I think that's a great way to exercise. What I like to do is circuit training on a greenway that has exercise stations periodically. That way, my cardio is my "rest period" while I run to the next strength exercise (chin-ups, dips, etc.). Now, you can say that this "metabolic weight training" is superior to jogging or elliptical or whatever in terms of weight loss and I'm not going to argue with that. If you try to contrast it with "cardio," then you have a problem, because that's what it is. If you're getting cardiovascular benefit, you're doing cardio.

I agree with both thier statement and your conclusion. Metabolic weight training is essentially "cardio" in nature. This "weight training can give you the same benefit as cardio." in what you wrote is what I was responding to. Thanks for pointing out what you meant. I appreciate it.

I currently only lift (career+family+newborn+side projects = can't spare more than 3 hrs/week to work out), and am around 50 rhr now. You may not be lifting enough to see the benefits. My overweight power lifter former boss has a rhr in the 40's and was told he has the heart of a 20 year-old. You need to lift enough that you hit 100% HRM, which is way easier than it sounds.