Cardio exercises are a good way of keeping your weight in check. They increase your metabolism, which in turn, helps in burning more fat and calories per workout session, resulting in increased weight loss. But do you have to do cardio in order to lose weight, or are there other ways of shedding those extra pounds or kilos to stay fit?
No. You Do Not Need Cardio to Lose Weight
While a cardio exercise is a good way of losing weight, it is not the only way of doing so. This is not to say that you shouldn’t be doing cardio in the first place. However, doing only cardio can have physical and mental effects, such as increased pain from working out, as well as a decrease in muscle mass, feeling of tiredness, and overall loss in motivation. However, there are other ways of losing weight, which can work on their own, but can also very well complement cardio.
Other Ways of Losing Weight
HIIT, or high-intensity interval training, helps not only in your overall body strength (such as building up muscle mass), but just as importantly, allows your body to burn fat even after you work out.
Another good method of weight loss is to take in fewer calories than you would usually have, either by reducing your food portion size, or by choosing foods with lower calories. The fewer calories you take in, the more calories you can burn out, thus resulting in weight loss.
Choosing or adjusting your diet plan can help in weight loss as well; for example, less sugar and carbohydrates, and more whole-foods and proteins. Higher protein intake boosts your metabolism, allowing you to burn more fat.
And lastly, keeping a consistent exercise schedule can help make working out an overall habit in your life. Spreading your workouts into small sessions over a longer period of time can help as well. Find a way to adapt your workouts to your life, and it will become second nature to you.
Simply put, cardio alone is not necessary for weight loss. You can adjust your lifestyle to complement cardio with different activities, or just skip cardio overall and reap the benefits of weight loss through other methods.
In Short, Mix and Match
The key benefit of cardio for weight loss is that it results in a more significant increase in metabolism, which helps burn more fat. However, while cardio alone may be tiring, incorporating the aforementioned activities can be an even greater boost to your weight loss journey, especially if you use them to complement your cardio-related activities, and can help motivate you even further in the long run.
In conclusion, cardio is not mandatory, but is still an effective means of weight loss.
