How to burn more calories in a workout

It’s no secret that many of us go to the gym to lose weight. What do you need to burn fat? Calo­rie deficit. That is, a lifestyle in which you spend more calo­ries than you receive.

So how do you get the most out of your work­outs?

Answered by Luke Corey, Cer­ti­fied Dietit­ian and Sports Nutri­tion Spe­cial­ist at EXOS Per­for­mance Train­ing. He asks to keep in mind that the num­ber of calo­ries burned is pure­ly indi­vid­ual and depends on the phys­i­cal lev­el, train­ing inten­si­ty and body struc­ture of each per­son. How­ev­er, he argues, there are gen­er­al rules that work for every­one.

1. You have to watch your heart rate

It is impor­tant to under­stand the next point. Calo­rie burn­ing depends on the amount of oxy­gen you inhale. 1 liter of oxy­gen can burn 5 calo­ries. The faster your heart beats, the more oxy­gen enters the cells of your body.

2. Workouts must be intense.

You should not shirk, but make every effort. This is how you can increase your heart rate. Imag­ine some kind of scale from 1 to 10. 10 is an exer­cise for which you will need all your strength. Make sure you give 8–10 on this scale.
Try inter­val train­ing, in which a fast run is fol­lowed by a rest.

3. Low-intensity long-term training may also work.

If fast run­ning or intense exer­tion isn’t for you, try jog­ging. Low-inten­si­ty car­dio burns fat when you ded­i­cate 40 to 60 min­utes to it. No less, but no more.

4. Engage the muscles of the whole body

Mus­cles rarely act in iso­la­tion in real life. They close­ly inter­act with each oth­er. There­fore, basic exer­cis­es — for all mus­cle groups — are both the most nat­ur­al for our body and the most fat-burn­ing. The active work of many mus­cles requires large ener­gy costs.

5. Weight the weights

Mus­cle growth is pos­si­ble only when you con­stant­ly increase the work­ing weight. Oth­er­wise, they adapt to the work­ing weight, and the result can not be expect­ed.

6. Take small breaks

There is noth­ing wrong with spend­ing 1–5 min­utes in peace and qui­et before jump­ing into a new exer­cise. It is impor­tant that your body is warmed up (this will reduce the risk of injury). And also — so that you can ful­ly per­form the nec­es­sary move­ments.

7. Take advantage of every opportunity to burn calories

Just because you’re work­ing out in the gym does­n’t mean you can’t do any­thing else. Increase your dai­ly calo­rie intake! Take the stairs, instead of watch­ing TV, choose a walk in the park. While work­ing in the office, peri­od­i­cal­ly get up from your seat and walk along the cor­ri­dor a cou­ple of times.

8. Don’t skip rest days

Many peo­ple think that it is only impor­tant to train as much as pos­si­ble. This is not true. The main mus­cle growth and calo­rie burn­ing comes AFTER train­ing. In order to recov­er, the body needs two days or more. You should only prac­tice again when you feel that the recov­ery process is com­plete.

9. Drink plenty of water

Water is the cor­ner­stone of metab­o­lism. To burn fat, you need to main­tain it at a high lev­el. Drink more than 2 liters of water per day.

10. Fast carbohydrates before and after training

Fast car­bo­hy­drates are the ene­mies of a good fig­ure. So, any­way, it is con­sid­ered. They quick­ly raise the lev­el of insulin in the blood, which means they pro­voke the depo­si­tion of fat. But! Before strength train­ing — in 30 min­utes — they will give you the ener­gy you need. After that, they will increase the lev­el of insulin, which has an ana­bol­ic effect (that is, it makes mus­cles grow), and replen­ish glyco­gen stores in the mus­cles.

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The opin­ion of the edi­tors may not coin­cide with the opin­ion of the author of the arti­cle.