The Best Cardio Workout for Every Phase of Your Fatloss Plan

So there's a big debate going on between fitness experts about the best cardio workout to burn fat. So who should you believe? The guys telling you that long duration cardio is better or the ones telling you that shorter higher intensity cardio rules, or the endurance athlete types who tell you that you need to just go run or bike for hours and hours a day to get lean.

The truth is all these approaches are effective and you need them at different stages of your fatloss plan. It's called progression or periodization and I'm going to break it down for you so you know when to do what type of cardio, how much, etc. The best cardio workout tips to help you increase fat burning whether you're struggling to get started or more advanced.

The Best Cardio Workout to Boost Endurance is Long Duration Cardio Workouts

Long duration cardio workouts are typically between 40 and 90 minutes. It can be running, walking, cardio machines, spinning or kickboxing class, rowing, or aerobics videos but it takes a long time and it's steady state.

Some trainers will tell you this is never important but here's when it matters.

  • If you haven't worked out for a LONG time due to sheer laziness and you have zero endurance. You get winded just going up a flight of stairs.
  • If you just had major surgery, injury, an illness i.e. prostate cancer surgery, c-section, bronchitis, hip bursitis, just to name a few of the things my clients surprise me with from time to time.
  • You are royally stressed out and fatigued because of work, family problems, law school, etc.

If you are experiencing any of the above then this is not the time to go all out and get crazy with hardcore intervals. Cut yourself a break and just go for the more moderate cardio (notice I didn't say easy). Try 40-45 minutes and break it down like this: 10 minute warm-up at moderate pace, 20-25 minutes working slightly harder, then 10 minute cool down at moderate pace.

Feel good that you are doing something to improve your endurance. Try it 3-4 times a week for a couple of weeks. Soon enough you'll be ready for intervals and you can start adding those in randomly during the 20-25 minutes when you're working harder to prepare your body for the very high intensity interval training cardio which you will need to do as soon as you become more fit.

The Best Cardio Workout to Increase Fatloss is High Intensity Interval Training

This is the cardio that Turbulence Training and Body for Life and a bunch of other transformation workout programs recommend because it blasts major fat off your body. The research proves that it can burn 9 times more fat than the long duration cardio but you have to do it correctly. Blast 500 calories in under 27 minutes with the Burn Calories Cardio Workout

The best time for this is any time you want to increase fat burning and calorie burning. If you've been on long duration for a while and intervals seem too tough then you can start gradually. Try 2 high intensity cardio workouts per week along with 2 long duration cardio workouts per week to get started. This is what I did when I first started on bfl and I couldn't handle those hardcore intervals. It will get easier and easier each week so be patient.

A great way to burn even more calories is to do high intensity cardio 4 times a week then tack on 20 minutes of long duration cardio at the end of 2 or all those workouts.

I learned this fatloss tip from Tom Venuto of Burn The Fat. He recommends using both methods for torching fat and also for burning more calories.

Use an mp3 guided cardio workout like the ones at iamplify and learn how to do this the easy way. My favorites are Cardio Coach volumes 3 and 4.

Best Cardio Workout to Boost Intensity Further is Dynamic Plyometric Cardio

If you're already doing high intensity interval training and you want to blast even more calories then plyometric cardio is exactly what your body needs. It's fast paced, dynamic, demanding.

It can be adapted for people of all levels and can be combined with any of the other types of cardio on this page at any phase of your fatloss plan to increase endurance, boost fat burning, boost calorie burning, beat boredom, and challenge yourself. Check out how it's done below.

Watch the video with BJ Gadour creator of WorkoutMuse and learn how to blast more fat with dynamic cardio intervals.

The Best Cardio Workout to Challenge Your Body, Eat Anything, & Burn More Calories is Endurance Cardio

O.K. I'm totally exaggerating about eating whatever you want but going for a 60 mile bike ride that takes all morning or a 13 mile hike that takes 5-8 hours does give you freedom to eat more of what you love (you can even eat during the workout!!) and you get to burn thousands of calories too. You can do this once a month or once a week but you need to put your body through this type of serious endurance workout every so often for three reasons.
  • To see if you're workouts are doing the job of keeping you fit.
  • To keep it interesting, fun, and challenging.
  • To achieve something more than just looking good in a bikini (yes we all need to stop being so shallow every now and then).

My crazy co-workers Paulo and Ott go trail running for 3 hours when they don't have clients to train.

My clients Fred & Nancy bike 60 miles every Saturday with a group (they're both in their 70's).

My boyfriend and I hike 8-13 miles once or twice a month. This is the best cardio workout of any kind (but that's just my opinion).

Put your workouts to the test and see if they're doing the job! It's challenging and also more fun than you can imagine.

Check Out How I Put My Strength & Cardio Workouts To The Test

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