One of the most common issues that arises when trying to burn fat, is the FEAR of losing our hard earned muscle. We spend months and months during the colder periods trying to add mass, and give little focus to the fat-gain that slowly creeps up on us (seemingly out of nowhere mind you). There is a solution however… Below are 5 things that you can do to make your fat-loss goals more achievable, whilst maintaining that muscle-mass year round. You just need to be selective with your training, and make incremental adjustments.
- Choose HIIT over steady state cardio High Intensity Interval Training has been proven to increase fat burning, allows for less time at the gym and also keeps the body’s fat-burning furnace running for a lot longer than typical steady-state cardio. TIP: 15mins of HIIT followed by 15 of steady state cardio at a moderate intensity will REALLY burn some serious fat.
- Take BCAA’s whilst you do your cardio To lessen the chances of muscle loss during cardio sessions, drink BCAA’s mixed in water to help prevent the body using its muscle mass as an energy source.
- Separate you weights and cardio into 2 sessions if you can If you do cardio and weight training in the same day, separating them into two sessions, at least 8 hours apart, may help you enhance recovery and avoid residual fatigue from the previous workout. The last thing you want is your body becoming over-trained. A fat burning machine this will not make!
- Do weights first and cardio second Always do the weights first and cardio second if training them both on the same day. If you want to get the most out of your weights session, you need to get that out of the way first. Don’t forget, weight training with short rest periods, is a form of fat-burning cardio in itself. TIP: Reduce your rest periods between sets of weights to 45-60 seconds MAX to really keep up the intensity.
Tags: Bodybuilding, building Muscle, burn, Burning, Burning Calories, Calories, Cardio, Exercise, hydrate, hydrated, Muscle, warm up, Weight Lifting, Workout