4 Keys To Effective Exercise For Weight Loss

Following on from last week’s article where I talked about some exercise myths, today I am talking about my 4 keys to effective exercise, especially if you goal is weight loss.

4 Keys To Effective Exercise;

1/ Importance of REGULARITY

Your body’s metabolism will be boosted by and respond to regular exercise over time. Exercising on and off, here and there isn’t enough. Your body likes to be consistently challenged and worked, and if you do that and stick to it, your body will reward you with a higher metabolism.

So don’t do any type of exercise you hate – because you won’t stick to it. If you hate the gym, don’t do that. If you hate running, don’t do that. For most people exercise isn’t there favourite thing to do. But you need to like and enjoy it at least to a certain extent in order to keep doing over a prolonged period of time.

2/ Importance of VARIETY

Your body responds to and likes to be challenged in different ways. So try and keep your workouts as varied as you can. As discussed above, do things you enjoy by all means, but don’t just swim or don’t just run.

Circuit training involving weights, medicine ball, stability ball, boxing/kickboxing etc. is great because it is constantly challenging your body in different ways and working different muscles. If you just do 1 type of exercise you are just working 1 set of muscles in 1 particular way over and over again. So it’s not as effective.

3/ Importance of keeping your HEART RATE ELEVATED

The higher your heart rate the more you burn. Obviously your fitness level is going to dictate how much rest time you need between each exercise or activity. If you haven’t done much exercise for a while, it would be unrealistic to expect yourself to be able to go from 1 exercise to the next with no rest. And indeed your heart rate will stay elevated in between even if you are resting because your body will not be as quick to recover.

But the goal over time is to rest less and less, and ultimately as little rest as possible is what you are looking for. Firstly this way you are getting as much exercise in to a given period of time, so optimising your calorie burn. But you are also keeping your heart rate up as much as possible, also optimising your calorie burn.

4/ Importance of INCIDENTAL EXERCISE e.g. walks.

Exercise doesn’t have to all be about high intensity workouts. Don’t get me wrong, that’s my kind of training and the way I like to train my clients. But going for a walk with the dog, playing in the garden with your kids, taking the stairs to work rather than the lift. All that adds up. And over the course of a day and week with add to your overall calorie burn.

Don’t just rely on intense workouts, simply ‘move’ as much as you can do to day as well. Over time your weight will drop as a result.

Stick to these 4 keys to effective exercise and your working will be burning more fat and calories than 99% of people out there!

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