Low-intensity workouts lead to weight loss
Download Our Free Sports Training Reports:
Enter your email address below: (As a bonus, we'll start sending you our free weekly newsletter, Sports Performance Bulletin.)
Exercise intensity and weight loss
Low-intensity workouts lead to greater weight loss than high-intensity exercise that expends the same amount of overall energy, according to a new study carried out in Greece.
Fourteen healthy premenopausal untrained women were divided into two equal groups, which exercised on a treadmill at either 45% or 72% of VO2max four times a week for three months, expending 370 calories per exercise session and eating as normal.
All the participants lost weight, but the low-intensity group lost 1.4kg more than the high-intensity group – 3.3kg compared with 1.9kg. The researchers speculate that this may have been due to the different effects of the two intensities on their dietary and activity habits. For example, high-intensity exercise might stimulate appetite and/or encourage relaxation more effectively than the low-intensity variety.
Percentage body fat and fat mass decreased in all the participants, with no significant differences between the groups. Fat-free mass, by contrast, decreased in most members of the low-intensity group but increased in most of the high-intensity group.
This difference, say the researchers, ‘either suggests that high-intensity endurance exercise elicits some degree of muscle growth in untrained women, or simply reflects the fact that it was less effective in reducing body weight, or is due to a combination of the two.
Int J Sports Med 2006; 27:178-181
This article was taken from the Peak Performance newsletter, the number one source of sports science, training and research. Click here to access these articles as soon as they are released to maximise your performance
Comments
It would be great if this
AdaWakeman
It would be great if this test was conducted in a more detailed and monitored fashion, speculating on the key factor being dietary habits doesn’t prove anything without details of the participant’s diets. These results are very interesting though, I need to loose weight so want to try a low intensity workout for at least an hour a day using a Slimband for extra support too, hopefully I will see some effect in a few weeks.
Hmmm that's very interesting
sation
Hmmm that's very interesting that Low-intensity workouts lead to greater weight loss than high-intensity exercise that expends the same amount of overall energy. We shouldn't forget the diet side of losing weight too. I've personally had good results with the strip that fat system. Diet and exercise have to go hand in hand for best results.
weight loss
Darylh
Weight loss, in the context of medicine, health or physical fitness, is a reduction of the total body mass, due to a mean loss of fluid, body fat or adipose tissue and/or lean mass, namely bone mineral deposits, muscle, tendon and other connective tissue. Body magic is a fantastic new product that has people buzzing about its ability for body shaping. Don't be fooled at all, and this is nothing we haven't seen before. Body Magic is simply a corset. It just reshapes a person in a particular way, and it isn't signed off on by chiropractors, and it's supposed to be uncomfortable. It's also rumored, like many other products sold in a similar manner – via what's called direct marketing – to be a pyramid scheme. It's made by Ardyss International. It isn't a method of losing weight.
That's very interesting
sandy18
That's very interesting research. I think it makes sense why participants with low-intensity workouts have lost some more pounds. If they workout intensely or hard, it will lead to larger appetite which in turn will lead to weight gain.
I think for losing weight you need to exercise but with the same diet that you are on before exercising to see some good results. So i would say make a low-intensity workout and be on the same diet or if possible slightly less.