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What Exercise Burns More Body Fat: Bodybuilding Training with Weights or Cardio?

By , About.com Guide

Question: What Exercise Burns More Body Fat: Bodybuilding Training with Weights or Cardio?
Is cardiovascular exercise really the best exercise to burn fat? Lately I have been hearing that is not the case. If so, what is the best exercise for fat burning?
Answer: To burn fat, bodybuilding training exercise performed with weights gives you more benefit than cardiovascular exercise; believe it or not. There are many reasons for this.

Weight training exercise gives you a metabolic boost for 24-48 hours. The reason for that is because when you perform bodybuilding training exercise with weights a lot of damage happens to the muscle fibers, and thus, the body has to spend energy repairing the muscles and making them stronger than before.

Traditional cardiovascular exercise, on the other hand, only burns calories throughout the duration of the exercise. Once the activity is done, your metabolism goes back to normal.

Because of this, weight training is a better exercise for fat loss since your metabolism is stimulated for much longer. Also, keep in mind that cardiovascular exercise cannot re-shape your body in the way that weight training does. If you are looking to have a tight and fit toned body, emphasize bodybuilding training exercises with weights with some cardio after the workout in addition to it.

With that said, keep in mind that fat loss is really a function of your diet as well, so if you are not following a proper bodybuilding diet for fat loss that puts you in a slightly lower caloric deficit, you won’t be able to lose any body fat. But from the perspective of exercise, bodybuilding training with weights beats cardio any time.

Conclusion

Because with weight training exercise you can:

  1. Increase your metabolism for 24-48 hours.

  2. Re-shape your physique

Bodybuilding training with weights needs to be emphasized over cardiovascular exercise in order to burn fat.

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