Discover How Weight Training Leads to Rapid Fat Loss

Weight training is an anaerobic exercise that increases your metabolism and tones your body by helping you burn fat quickly.

The only way for you to continue to burn fat calories hours after you have finished working out is through anaerobic exercise.  Anaerobic means “without oxygen” and the most beneficial form of anaerobic exercise is weight training. Weight training is the key to burning fat at rest. Weight training is an anaerobic activity that will cause you to burn more calories than aerobic exercise. The calories that you are burning during weight training exercises are mostly calories from carbohydrates (meaning you must eat even more calories per day for energy); but the calories you burn after your workout are mostly calories from fat.

The reason you are burning fat after your workout is because weight training increases your metabolism which uses your stored fat as energy.  Interval training has the same effect. Some people (especially women) ask if they could stop weight training and just do interval training since it is beneficial for working out during exercise and after the workout.

The answer to that is NO.  The reason why I say no is because lifting weights or using some form of resistance is the only way to tone and shape your body and tighten your skin.  You do not want to lose fat and have sagging skin.  Resistance training (even if it is lifting your own body weight) is the only way for you to tighten up your body, while at the same time you burn fat quickly.

Not all weight training workouts are made equal.  The quickest way to burn fat through weight lifting is by doing multi joint (compound) exercises that simultaneously work different muscle groups at the same time.  Not only will you spend less time working out, but your workout will be more effective at fat burning.  Mike Geary does an excellent job of teaching very effective  multi joint  exercises in his program The Truth about Six Pack Abs.

Sidenote : By gaining 10 pounds of muscle you will burn an extra 3500 calories per week

When you incorporate weight training as part of your workout program, you should increase your calorie intake including carbohydrates and especially protein.  Protein helps the muscles grow which helps to burn fat quickly.

Does Weight Training Make Women Bulky?

If you are a woman and you avoid lifting weights because you are afraid weight training will give you bulky muscles, you might be surprised to hear that it will not.  To obtain those “bulky” muscles, you literally have to spend hours in the gym.  The level of resistance training required for general good health will not produce bulk in women.

The hormone balance for men and women are not the same.  Thus, it takes a lot of effort to look like a female body builder.

If you are worried about weight gain as a side effect of lifting weights, you should know that regularly incorporating weight training into your exercise regimen will actually help you control your weight and help you burn fat quickly.

True, you will likely gain a few pounds after you begin lifting weights.  However, it is important to keep in mind that muscle is more dense than fat.  This means that while muscle may weigh more, it takes up less space.  So would you rather be 160 pounds of fat with a 38 inch waistline; or 160 pounds of muscle with a 29 inch waist?  When it comes to losing weight, you should judge your progress by the use of a measuring tape  more so than a scale, because losing fat is more important than losing weight…and if you want rapid fat loss then you must lift weights (even if it’s your own body weight).

As you lose fat and gain muscle, your weight may not decrease.  This is why it is so important not to focus on the scale.  How do your clothes fit?  Are they looser?  How about your appearance, do you feel a little more confident in how you look?  Then don’t worry about what the scale says!  You will very likely drop a size or two with little to no change in your weight.

With age you typically experience a decrease in the rate at which your body uses calories (metabolic rate).  By regularly incorporating weight training, you offset the loss in muscle tissue that typically occurs in the aging process.

Ultimately, you avoid age-related weight gain when you prevent muscle loss. Muscle tissue is metabolically active, unlike fat tissue.  This means that even at rest, muscle tissue is burning calories, and incorporating weight training into your workout is the quickest way to burn fat.

So yes, say goodbye to low calorie diets if you plan on exercising regularly. Your body needs the calories for energy so that you can feed your metabolism to keep burning fat quickly.  Without the calories your metabolism will slow down because your muscles have no calories to give it energy.

Lastly, as you become stronger through weight training, you are likely to be more active.  You will feel better and have more energy.  This alone will promote a more active lifestyle.  As a result you will spend less time sitting around – this equals more calories burned.

So what is the message to take out of this?  Incorporating weight training exercises two to three times per week will promote a healthy attractive body, not a bulky physique.