Fat Burning Tips

Since we are in the fat-losing mode and we are each putting together our own programs, I thought I'd share some ideas with you that might make your workouts more productive. Some of the following are pasted from articles that I have gathered over time.

Cardio Workouts - Exercises For Serious Fat Loss

One of the most effective combos for some serious fat loss is circuit training along side interval training. The following gives you a program to make you sweat out a blast of fat within 45 minutes!
You should know your Maximum Heart Rate and your correct training zone to know if you are training at the right pace. You can easily find your Target Heart Rate (thr) with this simple method. Subtract your age from 220 (226 for women) to calculate your Maximum Heart Rate (mhr). Find your training zone below and multiply that number times your maximum rate.

• Healthy Heart Zone (Warm up) 50-60% of maximum heart rate
  
• Fitness Zone (Fat Burning) 60-70% of maximum heart rate
  
• Aerobic Zone (Endurance Training) 70-80% of maximum heart rate
  
• Anaerobic Zone (Performance Training) 80-90% of maximum heart rate
  
• Red Line (Maximum Effort) 90-100% of maximum heart rate
  

Here is a sample of a 35 year old male who is working out in a training zone for fat burning (70%):

• 220 - 35 = 185
  
• 185 X .70 (70%) = 129.5 beats per minute
  

Strict form for this training is a must in order to maximize gains and prevent injury. Before you begin make sure you have a towel on hand, some water and really good cross trainer type sneakers well tied.
Follow the below with no rest in between until it says so, then repeat for one more round!
These may seem menial but I DARE you to try it, I guarantee you will get your butt beat!

• 20 pushups
  
• 20 walking lunges per leg
  
• 10 burpees
  
• Skip rope for 1 minute
  
• 20 bicep curls
  
• 50 Ab crunches on ball
  
• 20 Tricep Dips
  
• 25 Jumping Jax
  
• 10 deadlifts, stiff legged
  
• 20 Front Delt Raises
  
• Stair stepping for 2 minutes
  
• Rest for 5-7 minutes while stretched in muscle worked for 10 seconds remembering to stretch each side.
  

Sometimes we forget that it only takes a few simple exercises to get to our goals and that we can work with what we have. A gym is excellent but how about those who do not go to a gym for whatever reason? Something like this can be done at home as well. What if you did not feel like going to the gym because of weather or time constraints? This program eliminates excuses and keeps you on your game!
Water helps to get that fat out of your system so sipping throughout your workout is hugely advantageous and recommended.
This workout is well complimented by doing it 2 times per week with 2-3 extra days of 20+ minutes cardio work on a cross trainer or jogging. The stretching portion will help you recover for your next round as well as helping eliminate lactic acid build up which can cause delayed onset muscle soreness.

More to follow,
UL

Early morning cardio workouts before eating any carbohydrate meal will help to enhance fat loss because your body's insulin and glycogen levels will be at their lowest and so your body will burn stored fat because of these low levels.
Eating immediately before cardio will inhibit this fat burning because you will first have to burn off what you ate first before your body will burn stored body fat.
You will also benefit more from a schedule of: 30 -40 minutes of cardio twice a day, 5 days a week, rather than a 2-hour cardio 2-3 days per week. The reason for this is that by doing the more frequent, less time-consuming program, you maintain a higher metabolism throughout the day, thus burning more fat all day.
I hope that this helps to give you guys some ideas on enhancing your workouts and you may want to take willky up on his offer to help you with your training program.
UL

Thanks UL.. just what I was looking for.

While my cardio is not quite as demanding as yours UL, I do most of the exercises you listed. I am able to get my heat rate to 85% though and am DIEING lol. Thanks for reminding us that there is an alternitive to not going to the gym as some of us will be doing.

Also wanted to add that in case anyone is interested, Walmart sells a nice wrist watch that moniters the heart and is a chrono. They have a few models and I found the Mio Sport to be a godsend. You can see the models they make here http://www.miowatch.com/ Mine is now called the clasic. I have checked it against a few other machines and find it to be quite accurate. Also will tell how many calories you have burned. Check it out if you need that little bit of extra motovation, lol.

eddie:
I have used that same Mio Classic now for about 3 years and it really does help during my workouts to monitor my heartrate.
UL

Yea I love mine and at $40 its not a bad deal. I use mine on the trail as well. It has really helped not only in my heart rate but in my cool downs and my warmups. I cant belive how acurate it is with no chest strap.

Also I just wanted to share this site with everyone as well. If your counting your calorie intake and tracking you workouts this site is a GREAT TOOL as well. It is free with the opertunity to buy into it. Great lookup tool for lots of foods as well.
http://www.thedailyplate.com/