What Is The Best Exercise For Weight Loss
If you’re trying to lose weight you have probably wondered what the best exercise for weight loss is. You have most likely seen those weight loss infomercials aired on late night television. Late night TV is a popular medium for selling gimmicky weight loss plans and exercise machines where they break it up into three ‘easy payments’ for you.
Have you ever been tempted to buy these products? Have you ever bought one? If you have purchased one of these products, then you possibly feel scammed if you didn’t achieve the results touted by the infomercial.
Your frustration and irritation are understandable. When you’re looking for simple exercises to assist you with losing weight, your desperation to find a solution may lead you to seek shortcuts to achieve those aims.
Instead of wasting money and time on gimmicky exercise plans and machines, why not try some traditional exercises that are proven effective in the fight against obesity? These exercises include:
- Walking, jogging and running — No special equipment required and you can work you way up to a more intensive workout. Start out by walking for 15-30 minutes per day, increase that to twice a day as your fitness improves. Then start jogging for five minutes followed by walking for 10 minutes, walking for another five then jogging for another ten. Eventually you can be doing five minute intervals of walking, jogging then running then going back to walking again as a cool down exercise. Many individuals have used these exercises with great success. They’re great exercises because they involve almost all of the body in the exercise and cause most of your large muscle areas to burn fat. You can even intensify it further by carrying two 5 lb dumbells in your hands and pumping your arms as you go. This builds arm and shoulder muscles and burns even more calories.
- Skipping — 10 minutes of skipping burns as many calories as 30 minutes of jogging. The reason for this is because your body is working against gravity (i.e. jumping up) and within a matter of seconds your heart rate skyrockets. Again, start slowly, say two minutes at a time, twice a day and build it up over time.
- Swimming — Swimming is an excellent cardio exercise. It is also very low impact, gentle on your joints and involves most muscle groups. If you have health concerns that make other forms of exercise difficult, swimming may be the solution you are seeking. Those who swim for exercise find they can swim longer than it would be possible to run or walk. Personally, I love swimming. I love the sensation of weightlessness experienced in the water. You only realise how effective swimming is as a workout when you get out of the pool and your muscles feel like jelly.
All of these are excellent exercises to incorporate into your daily routine. But before you decide on which form of exercise is for you, consider What physical activities you really enjoy. If you can identify your existing physical activities and increase the frequency in which you do them then it may help answer the need for exercise. For example, if you like golf, stop renting a golf cart to drive and walk the course instead. It’s the best of both worlds!
Consider this: Your best excercise for weight loss is the exercise you enjoy. The beauty is, because you enjoy them, you’ll want to do them more.
