ACHIEVE A BETTER BALANCE
BEEFCAKE VERSUS LEAN MUSCLE. SIZE VERSUS ENDURANCE. THIS PERSONAL TRAINER SAYS IT’S BEST TO HAVE A BET EACH WAY
There is ongoing debate about what type of training is best for overall health and body composition — resistance (weights) or cardio? It’s one that could be debated by trainers and coaches for hours on end, so I’ll throw up some facts on each type and let you decide for yourself.
Resistance training is performing exercises or movements under load and/or with resistance against the movement.
The most common forms of resistance training are free weights such as dumbbells, weight machines, resistance bands or simply using your body weight with exercises such as squats or push-ups.
These exercises will increase muscular and tendon strength, increase muscle mass, decrease fat mass, improve bone density and strength, improve balance and stability and improve immune system and sleep patterns.
Cardio is an abbreviation for cardiorespiratory and refers to how efficiently and effectively the circulatory and respiratory systems supply oxygen to the muscles during sustained physical activity.
Put simply, activity such as running, cycling, rowing — longer forms of exercise usually involving a repetitive motion.
Regular aerobic exercise makes the systems more efficient by working the heart muscle to pump more blood with each beat and the respiratory system by increasing the amount of oxygen that is inhaled and distributed to body tissue.
So this form of exercise has different benefits including improved fitness, decreased fat mass, increased strength and efficiency of the heart, increased metabolism, improved hormonal profile and improved recovery.
So, after reading through all the benefits of the two types of exercise, can you make a decision on which is best for your health goals? If your answer is no, then you are not alone.
What you should be doing for optimal health and fitness is incorporating a balance of the two into your workout.
Instead of purely focusing on a different muscle group, set aside a day for cardio or fit in a run or cycle before and after a muscle workout.
If you find a good balance and stick to it, as you become fitter in one area, it’ll make it easier to improve your fitness in the other.
For example if you are cardio fit, it will benefit you when doing weights because your endurance
will be better and you’ll be able to do more reps.
On the other hand, if your goal is to run a marathon, then cardio sessions are going to be important to improve your fitness and endurance, but if the strength of your muscles and tendons is greater and your balance and stability is better because of weight training then you are going to be a lot more efficient in your running technique.
This is why, whatever your goal, you should include both weights and cardio in your exercise routine.