Physical activity

This counts for last week because I meant to post in yesterday but didn't.

What role does cardio play in your project and how is it most beneficial?

Cardiovascular exercise commonly referred to as cardio is all the rage with people trying to lose weight, but why is that? There are tons of different ways to do cardio you can run, bike, climb stairs, play basketball, ect. they all have one thing in  common you body is burning its stored energy to provide you with the necessary fuel to do the activity at hand. Your muscles have an immediate source of energy just waiting to be broken down into ATP and used to fuel you through out your exercises session. The key to cardio is to burn that stored glucose and force your body to tap into its energy reserves. For prolonged exercise sessions your body will be burning stored fat and you will be losing weight but depending on the type of exercise and the intensity it is done under the amount of energy burned will vary greatly. Say you are walking on a treadmill at four miles an hour for 30 minutes you will burn about 200 calories, but now say you walk on a treadmill at 5 miles an hour at 10% incline for 30 minutes you will burn about 350 calories. The reason there is such a great difference is because the intensity of the exercise is much greater and your body requires more energy in order to be able complete the task. Also when you do your cardio can make a huge difference on the progress you see. There are two best times for aerobic exercise, in the morning before you eat breakfast and as soon as you are done with your weight training. In the morning your body is in a fasting state because you have not eaten for hours so your insulin levels and other chemicals that help keep excess weight on and at their lowest point of the day so you will get thee best benefit for cardio first thing in the morning. After you finish your weight training is also one of the best times in the day to do your cardio. The reason for this is because you have already taxed your body heavily from the weights so your glycogen storage are depleted so in order to provide the necessary energy your body has to uses your excess body fat.

Can you lose fat while putting on muscle or does it have to be one or the other?

The main issue with this commonly asked question is that losing fat and gaining muscles happen in the exact opposite way. To lose fat you need to burn more calories than you take in but to gain muscle you have to take in more calories than you are expending in order to feed the muscle. Losing fat while gaining muscle is like trying to have your cake (hopefully not cake) and eating it too. The best bet for people that are trying to do this is to focus on each goal one at a time. If you are trying to lose weight the most efficient option is to first off focus on losing fat. Once you are happy with your fat loss then you can start with the fun part, putting on muscle. This will make it so that you are only focusing on one goal at a time and can be more productive and effective at each one.