Length of Cardio Workout

miss muffet

miss muffet

New member
just wondering if it matters if i break up my cardio. instead of doing an hour at a stretch (huff puff huff puff), am i losing anything by breaking it up into two half hour sessions, or even three twenty minute sessions? my heart rate would still be up where it needs to be in my target zone. common sense tells me it wouldn't make a difference, but i guess if everyone could just rely on common sense there wouldn't be such thing as a professional :) any help?
 
You can stretch in between as long as the time is consecutive. if you don't mind me asking what heart rate are you training at. THere are certain zones for weight loss and for cardiovascular training.
 
Well it is what it is there are certain heart rate zones where your body prefers to use body fat as its energy source and a certain where it pulls the energy almost strictly from carbohydrates. Maybe you should do some real research before you discount scietific data.
 
TrainerTodd said:
You can stretch in between as long as the time is consecutive. if you don't mind me asking what heart rate are you training at. THere are certain zones for weight loss and for cardiovascular training.
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i try and stay between 140 and 180, and my max is 202. thanks for your help, and thanks to mal for directing me to that link
 
TrainerTodd said:
Well it is what it is there are certain heart rate zones where your body prefers to use body fat as its energy source and a certain where it pulls the energy almost strictly from carbohydrates. Maybe you should do some real research before you discount scietific data.
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It's true that the fat burning zone likes to burn calories from fat while you're exercising, but that's not the whole picture because luckily all fat burning doesn't stop the minute you quit exercising. Most any reliable source nowadays will tell you that the fat burning zone is a myth. It's all about the total number of calories burned. Train at a higher intensity, and you burn more calories, and you'll be burning fat well beyond the point where you stop working out, and if you look at the big picture, this method ends up burning more fat than if you had trained in the so called fat burning zone.
 
I have a exercise physiology book that tells other wise that I had to learn in my exercise physiology course, where I am a senior in exercise science. It was published this year as a matter of fact. title exercise physiology sixth edition. scott k powers and Edward t howley. There is a perfect little graph on page 63 and 64 discussing exercise duration, intensity and fuel selection. I suggest reading it. Very interesting.
 
okay, reading over your posts i have a new question.

compromising both of your views (because i am a complete amateur at this and have no idea where to begin researching for myself), what if you trained in the "fat burning zone" for a longer period of time? it seems quite possible, since the heartrate is lower than for higher intensity training. and you'd be burning more calories if you exercised for an hour instead of for thirty minutes.

if weight loss is all about a caloric deficit, then it follows that you're simply aiming to burn calories through exercise, and you can burn more calories if you train harder. but the fact remains that those calories can come from different sources, right? and if you're trying to lose fat and not glycogen, then i feel like it would make sense that a "fat burning zone" would be where you want to train, so that you can keep the muscle stores intact.

just trying to make sense of all this. if you could take the time to explain your views, or direct me to a place where i could read up on both perspectives, i'd greatly appreciate it :) thanks for your time!
 
You get a gold star. That is exactly right. You just train for a longer duration and the calories form from fat and not from carbohydrates and therefore you lose fat.
 
ooh a gold star :) i'm a sucker for anything shiny! i'll increase the length of cardio as much as i can up to 60 minutes, keep my heart rate 140-160 and take note of any difference i'm experiencing as far as the weight loss goes. i'll be my own little experiment :)
 
miss muffet said:
and if you're trying to lose fat and not glycogen, then i feel like it would make sense that a "fat burning zone" would be where you want to train, so that you can keep the muscle stores intact.
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First of all, your body gets used to this low impact exercise. You get very efficient at it. It starts doing less and less good.

As far as losing fat and not glycogen... if this theory is true, then why does HIIT workouts work for weight loss so well? Why do weight lifting workouts on large muscle groups work? I mean, after all, both are a relatively short amount of time and they are very intense, which is the opposite of "fat burning zone" workouts. So why do they work? With this theory they shouldn't work at all, but its quite the opposite.


miss muffet said:
if you could take the time to explain your views, or direct me to a place where i could read up on both perspectives, i'd greatly appreciate it :)
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I can almost guarantee that Steve will be in here soon and will do more than enough explaining. :) But, in the meantime, this is overly simple, but this chart will explain the idea in the most basic form:

The Truth About the Fat Burning Zone - Your Target Heart Rate

Basically, yes, your percentage of fat calories burned is higher... but given the same amount of time, that doesn't mean that the actual number of fat calories burned is higher, it's actually lower. Given the same amount of time, if you work out with a higher intensity, you will have burned more fat at the end of the day. If Steve doesn't comment on this soon, look him up and send him a private message and he'd be happy to write you an entire book on the subject.
 
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I'll stick with the exercise physiologists thanks. They get paid a whole lot of money to do this research and they are very smart people.
 
When you are weight training you generally get your heart rate in that zone, not to mention muscle is more metabolically active anyways.
 
corndogggy said:
First of all, your body gets used to this low impact exercise. You get very efficient at it. It starts doing less and less good.
Click to expand...

of course, that makes perfect sense. once it becomes easier, i'd up the ante a bit, perhaps change my course of action from week to week. and as for your question about HIIT... it stumps me. i have no clue. how does it work? why does it work?

i really want to understand all of this. for me, it's not enough just to lose the weight. it's a process, and the more i understand about it the more i can achieve and the better i'll feel about what i'm doing with my body. and i know i've said it before, and at the risk of sounding overly grateful... THANK YOU!! for taking the time to help me understand.
 
wait... i get it. according to that website, at lower intensity training you are burning a higher PERCENTAGE of fat calories. however, you're burning way more OVERALL calories in higher intensity training, so even though the percentage of fat calories burned is lower, it's still more than those burned in lower intensity training.

that makes sense, too. but then i have more question (hah, sick of me yet?): where are the other calories coming from? is it good or bad to lose calories from these stores?
 
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