Fat Burning Classes?

stir_crazy

Hi,

I joined a gym last year as I would like to lose weight, tone up, etc. I found that I work best in classes, which my gym does, as I tend to fart around in the gym and don't push myself. These are the classes that my gym does and that I can make it to:

Spin, Spin and abs, Spin and Circuits, Ab Attack, Circuits, Bodypump and Boxercise (once a week).

I've got a heart rate monitor so have been using it during training. I want to burn fat, but I'm not sure which classes are best for efficient, fast fat burning?

I thought circuits would be good but according to my HRM most of the time my heart rate was in the cardio range even though we were doing squats, burpees, weights,etc.

cleggy.

Basically its about aerobic and anaerobic excercise. With or without oxygen.

Low intensity stuff like walking, slow cycling will be fuelled mainly by fat.

Higher intensity excercises such as running, punching, kicking, throwing, lifting weights, faster cycling, sprinting will be burning mainly carbs for fuel.

Somewhere around 60-65% of your max heart rate is ideal for fat burning.

Do a mixture of both to get slimmer and fitter.

Ximian

Try High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) coupled with weight training for burning fat, and a good healthy diet of course

stir_crazy

Thanks. I'm doing intermittant fasting and fancied doing some exercise with it on my non fast days. Just wanted to make sure I was doing a mix of cardio and fat burning exercises to tone up a bit faster.

cleggy.

Ximian wrote: »

Try High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) coupled with weight training for burning fat, and a good healthy diet of course

Any high intensity exercise won't burn much fat as it will be fuelled by carbohydrates. Low intensity will burn much more fat and a small amount of carbs.

cleggy.

stir_crazy wrote: »

Thanks. I'm doing intermittant fasting .

Ditch that. Eat a balanced diet daily to keep energy levels up. You'll need your muscles and liver full of carbohydrate to be able to burn fat efficiently when you exercise even at low intensity.

http://www.examiner.com/article/fat-burning-101

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_does_'fat_burns_in_a_carbohydrate_flame'_mean

http://www.livestrong.com/article/81636-fat-burning-process/

Ximian

cleggy. wrote: »

Any high intensity exercise won't burn much fat as it will be fuelled by carbohydrates. Low intensity will burn much more fat and a small amount of carbs.

I've read contradicting articles I was always told that low intensity workouts will burn more fat than high intensity workouts but more recent studies seem to favour HIIT for fat burning. For example:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/ultimate-8-week-hiit-for-fat-burning-program.html

" A 2001 study from East Tennessee State University demonstrated similar findings with subjects who followed an 8-week HIIT program (subjects dropped 2 percent in body fat) as compared to those who followed a continuous steady-state program (subjects had no percentage drop in body fat) on a treadmill."

and

"A study from Australia reported that females following a 20-minute HIIT program, consisting of 8-second sprints followed by 12 seconds of rest, lost six times more body fat than the group who followed a 40-minute cardio program performed at a constant intensity of 60 percent of their maximum heart rate."

Here's another interesting article: http://stronglifts.com/cardio-fat-loss-hiit-vs-long-duratio-cardio/

You can probably find some other articles that contradict the others but I have had more fat loss success with HIIT and weight training (light weights, kettlebells, and bodyweights).
I guess it's finding what works for you, what shape you're in, what you enjoy and what goals you achieve.

heartbreak_star

Heavy weights, low reps, mixed in with some good cardio

HBS x

stir_crazy

Thanks for the tips guys, I think you've hit the nail on the head Ximian, there's so much contradicting advice out there!

heartbreak_star

Good luck - it's all about finding what works for you. As a rule of thumb, a routine gets 3-4 weeks with me. No difference = change something

HBS x

Jamopy

There's a lot of uninformed advice being given here.

Basically, to lose fat the most important thing is your diet. You can train for hours a day and still stay fat if your diet is bad. Or you can drop large amounts of fat without doing any exercise at all if you get your diet right. To put it in comparison, you can spend an hour running and burn 400 calories, eat a mars bar containing 500 calories, and end the day a teeny bit fatter.

If you want to "tone up" then the best way is some form of resistance training - weights, machines, bodyweight exercises, whatever you find easiest and enjoy most. For cardiovascular fitness steady state cardio will give you the most consistent improvements and will burn the most calories. But as said above, diet is far more important than any training you do.

So my advice would be to clean up your diet - i like the paleo diet or intermittent fasting, but almost any clean diet is better than no diet at all - and find some sort of physical activity/pass time that you enjoy and will continue to do.