Fit and Youthful Life

Guest Author: Bryan Kavanagh


Copyright (c) 2009 Athleticbodysystem

What if you were performing those hours of cardio for nothing and it was actually causing you to gain weight?

I appreciate and wholeheartedly agree that LOW intensity (>30%) WALKING will primarily burn fat. But when you think about it you are only burning energy 30% more than if you were at home or at work?! Not very productive is it? Why did you go to the gym? Walk OUTSIDE! It’s nicer out there!

If you are serious about burning fat and developing the lean athletic look, go to the gym to TRAIN. Sorry ladies, but this also means staying out of the aerobics studio and away from the bums and tums toning classes. You have real work to do if you truly want to develop a lean and sexy feminine physique, and becoming a cardio queen and doing those aerobic classes and bums and tums classes at your local gym just don’t cut it.

Low intensity exercise has two uses in my opinion. . active recovery (from an intense session) and performing everyday activity. Going to the gym to perform low intensity 1 hour+ long walks is inherently WRONG! Think about it. . . going to the gym to burn 30% more fat than if you were on your couch for that same hour. . NO THANKS.

Long drawn out exercise is COUNTERPRODUCTIVE . . think about it logically, you train your body for endurance with long drawn out ‘cardiovascular’ exercise yea? To what effect? Your body does not know you are trying to lose bodyfat. . it only knows that you began walking three times a week and it wants to become efficient at doing it. It gets BETTER at doing that activity. . i.e. next week you area going to use less energy doing the exact same exercise as you done this week.

Scary Huh?

You are essentially training your body to burn LESS FAT.

It’s True!

You see your body stored that fat there for a reason, due to some poor nutritional habits and/or lack of physical activity and TRAINING. Low intensity exercises in the form of everyday activity is OK. It is more erratic and unpredictable than endurance activity. Doing the shopping and cleaning the house mowing the lawn and a physical job/hobby all count as physical activity as they are a mix of differing intensities and movements. Endurance exercises WILL burn fat, YES. . but as a result your body will actually store more so that you have fat for your next endurance activity!

Come on you know it makes sense!

If you knew you had 3 bills to pay: Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 7pm. . You would spare more cash until then to save getting into debt/missing a payment. You body does the same . . ‘ok so she (your name) is going to perform solely fat burning exercise 3x / week. So I will keep storing fat so she can fuel these low intensity exercises. Your body is only doing as it’s told, it thinks you need fat there so it stores it so you can perform the exercise next time. It’s merely an adaptation to what you are doing!

Now here’s the interesting part! When you perform high intensity exercise you primarily deplete GLYCOGEN stores. ‘Glycogen’ is ‘muscle sugar’ or a method which your body stores carbohydrates in your muscle. Interestingly enough you will burn minimal fat during the actual High Intensity exercise bout.

‘WHAT? I thought you said you were going to show me how to burn fat ‘

Now listen up. . there is only one thing more precious to your body than your fat stores. . its your glycogen stores! Your body does not want to let go of them. . its like its ‘piggy bank’ its raw energy that it wants to keep and by performing high intensity exercises all the time and depleting this glycogen you are being a nuisance. In order to counteract this your body will do the unthinkable! It will actually begin to burn fat at higher intensities in order to PRESERVE your glycogen stores. A study done on male and female International level Judo competitors showed that following a training session (high intensity fighting average heart rate 80% + Max Heart Rate) they were primarily oxidising fat and not glycogen. Amazing! Their body adapted to the rigorous high intensity exercise and began to do the unthinkable and burn fat at increased intensities! You have turned your body into a fat burning machine!

Low intensity exercise makes you fat. High intensity exercise burns fat PERIOD.

Guest Author: David Done


io Burn Muscle?

If you want to finally burn fat but you are worried about burning muscle, I have some astonishing news about the best fat burning cardio and resistance training exercises that will set you free from fat loss plateaus without causing you to do so much cardio that you burn muscle.

I get a lot of emails from confused dieters and men and women who want to lose weight, but fear they are doing so much cardio exercise that it will cause them to burn muscle and lower their metabolism.

Information like this outrages me, because with all this confusion, it’s not your fault that you are struggling with fat loss, because there are too many people trying to confuse you with science. After all, you’ve tried all that cardio and dieting but you’re still not where you want to be.

So here’s what you need to do. First, we don’t need to do cardio in the first place. So that will get rid of our worries that the cardio will burn muscle. You should be using short, burst interval training workouts instead, since they help you burn belly fat in less time.

Second, it’s actually hard to lose muscle. If you are doing total body resistance training workouts two or three times per week, you will not lose muscle, even if you are eating a very low calorie diet. (And you don’t even need that much protein either!)

Dr. Stu is one of my long-term Turbulence Training clients, and he’s been working out at 5:30am in the morning on an empty stomach for years. However, he’s not doing this because there is any magic fat burning effect. He’s just doing that because he is the busy father of 3 boys!

So he gets up, goes to the gym, does his resistance training workouts, and finishes off with high-intensity cardio or interval training. And his cardio workouts do not burn muscle.

In fact, he went from 15.6% down to 11.7% body fat and MAINTAINED my lean mass (and strength actually increased a little). He’s working muscles he hadn’t used in years, and is noticeably more muscled – that’s not bad for a guy who’ll turn 38 next week!

Plus, even when he travels, he’s up early doing bodyweight exercises in place of cardio and to avoid losing muscle from inactivity. After all, the only real way to lose muscle is to do endless amounts of cardio, cut your calories, and avoid all resistance training.

But with the Turbulence Training bodyweight workouts, he still gets an incredible cardiovascular challenge as well as a big shock for your muscles. If you don’t think you can get stronger and leaner using bodyweight exercises, think again! Bodyweight workouts work when they are based on good science and good planning.

I bet you knew all along that cardio wasn’t the best way to lose fat, even though all the out of shape trainers at your gym kept telling you it was. Well, now you have something better to use to burn fat and to avoid losing muscle.

Stick with the Turbulence Training resistance workouts (even using bodyweight exercises) and interval training in place of long, slow cardio workouts, and you burn fat, not muscle.

Learn More:

Learn more about the fat loss workout at Turbulence Training.



The Real Youth Potion

Guest Author: George Grigoryan


ve been struggling to get in shape you’ve probably considered cardio for weight loss including cardio classes.

But did you know that cardio for weight loss is the LEAST effective and to get in shape?

The idea behind doing cardio for weight loss is that it burns calories and therefore helps you get in shape. And yes, it works…very slowly.

There are other forms of exercise that burn MUCH more calories and give much faster results than cardio for weight loss.

Let me reveal to you the two most effective ones that I consider my ’secret weapons’ in my work of fitness coaching for women.

If you are going to do cardio for weight loss, then make sure you do something called interval training. It burns three times the calories in one third the time.

In other words it is NINE times more effective.

I’ve got a great beginner weight loss cardio workout for you that’s proven to work. I want you to try it.

Get on a treadmill and set the speed 2.5mph – 3mph and set a low incline. Walk for 5 minutes – this is warm-up.

Now keep the speed the same, but double the incline. Walk like this for 1 minute. This is you work interval.

Bring the incline back down and walk like this for 2 minutes. This is your rest interval.

1 work interval + 1 rest interval = 1 ROUND

Week 1: do 3 rounds 3 times per week .

Week 2: 4 rounds 3 times per week.

Week 3: 5 rounds 3 times per week.

Week 4: 6 rounds 3 times per week

Cool-down for 5 minutes after each session.

If this is too easy for you, pickup the speed in addition to the incline for your work intervals.

If you do this cardio routine in addition to your Metabolic Resistance Training (sign-up for my newsletter to get it), by week 4 you can lose up to 8 pounds of fat.

My other secret weapon is even more powerful. It is Metabolic Resistance Training.

It’s a form of resistance training I designed specifically for women. The reason it’s extremely effective is that it burns calories during the workout and for 48 hours AFTER the workout.

It elevates your metabolism permanently.

Sure, you can do traditional cardio for weight loss, but if you want results NOW, then I suggest you try interval training and metabolic resistance training.

It’s worked for dozens of women I trained and it will work for you too.

Guest Author: David Taggart


Are you sick and tired of always running on the treadmill? I mean a lot of the time it honestly can just be boring. What if you could lose weight while having fun doing your cardio workout? I mean why not spend more time really doing the things that you like to do while getting a workout. Well, with the right instruction and guidance, it can happen and I will tell you how!

Your Cardio workout does not always have to be running on the tread mill, so why not pick up a new activity that you enjoy. The biggest problem that most people encounter while exercising is a loss of motivation, especially when they do not see the results they want right away. If you choose something you will enjoy doing, and do it more consistently, you are much more likely to stick to your workout routine, burn the fat, and cardio sculpt your body.

Here are some cardio sculpting exercises that you could try to do:

1.Go Swimming. If you enjoy the water, go for a swim two to three times a week. Start out slow but begin increasing the intensity of your workout.

2.How about some jump rope? You are able to do a lot of fun things with a jump rope. Many of the worlds best athletes use a jump rope to get a great cardio workout. There are many games that will keep you entertained while jumping. It can also become a new challenge for those you are very competitive, for example, try to jump backwards, crossovers and all the many other jump roping jumps.

3.Enjoy Nature. Go to the beach and go for a jog during a beautiful sun set. Go up the canyon, in the mountains, whatever your heart desires. The most important thing is to make it enjoyable while working out.

4.Lastly, get a workout partner and have fun while challenging one another. One of the best methods to new weight loss is interval training. Interval training allows you to receive direct benefits of cardio sculpt. It is high intensity cardiovascular exercises for a few minutes and then a very low intensity recovery period for one minute. A good example would be, you could sprint for one to two minutes and then walk for thirty seconds. You can do this with a number of different exercises.

Hopefully these suggestions allow you to enjoy your workout so much more and keep you motivated in your weight loss goals.