Groundbreaking Fat Burning Cardio Research Study - An Expert's Opinion

I've received a few emails about a "new groundbreaking fat loss study" and how it is supposed to burn fat faster than regular cardio (even though we know regular cardio sucks).

Researchers compared...

a) Doing a 60 minute bike (at 60% max effort) then recovering for 60 minutes

vs

b) doing a 30 minute bike, resting 20 minutes, and then doing another 30 minute bike and then resting for 60 minutes. (both rides at 60% max effort).

The results showed...

i) The total calories burned between the workouts did not differ.

ii) more fat was burned during the recovery for the split workout (77% vs 56%).

What does this mean?

Jack squat.

Nothing.

First, why would i even consider doing either of the above when a 20-minute interval workout gets more results?

Second, who is going to do this?

Third, look at the actual numbers of fat calories burned...at most, it could be 50 extra calories. Again, useless in all practical terms.

But...

Look for health clubs to be full of people sitting around for 20 minutes between cardio bouts...maybe clubs will start offering "recovery rooms" where people can sit for 20 minutes and read dry People magazines, instead of the sweat covered People magazines they are used to reading while doing their relatively worthless cardio workouts in the past.

Why am I so hard on cardio?

Because its a waste of time...

and now these researchers and the authors of these "news reports" want to waste even MORE of your life...

As I wrote recently...

A recent study published by the North American Association for the Study of Obesity, subjects aged 40 to 75 were instructed to do 60 minutes of aerobic exercise per day for 6 days per week for an entire year.

(Reference... Obesity 15:1496-1512 (2007). Exercise Effect on Weight and Body Fat in Men and Women. Anne McTiernan*, et al.)

Given the amount of exercise, you'd expect weight losses of 20, 30 pounds, or more, right?

Well, the surprise findings showed the average fat loss for female subjects was was only 4 pounds for the entire year, while men lost 6.6 pounds of fat over the year. That's over 300 hours of aerobic exercise just to lose a measly 6 pounds of blubber. Not time well spent, in my opinion.

*** Listen, you give 300 hours a year, and you'll lose a lot more than 6.6 pounds of fat...trust me on that. Heck, give me 300 hours a year and I could probably turn you into a Ninja, commercial airline pilot, and accomplished mime, and still help you burn more fat than you would with 300 hours of cardio.

Here's the best advice I can give you...

Ignore mass media news reports about fitness.

If anything worthy of note comes up, you'll hear it from me,

Craig Ballantyne is a Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist and writes for Men's Health and Oxygen magazines. His trademarked fast fat burning workouts have helped thousands of men and women with weight loss and fat burning in less than 45 minutes three times per week. Expert fat loss workouts help you burn fat without long, slow cardio sessions or fancy equipment. Craig's bodyweight workouts for fat burning help you lose fat without any equipment at all.

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