Fat Loss – Anaerobic Exercise Vs Aerobic Exercise?

Aerobic vs. Anaerobic for Fat Loss

Excess post-exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC). EPOC, or after burn, represents the oxygen consumption the body uses to return to its pre-exercise state.

You’ve probably heard people at the gym talking about ‘the after-burn’ this refers to the number of calories expended, above resting values, after an exercise bout. This can last for up to 48 hours!

The physiological mechanisms responsible for increased metabolism following exercise include oxygen replenishment, phosphagen (ATP-PC) resynthisis, the removal of lactic acid, and increased blood circulation and body temperature.

Your body can take anywhere from 15 minutes to 48 hours to fully recover to a resting state. Studies have found that the duration of EPOC, or after burn, depends on the intensity and duration of exercise.

Higher Intensity = Longer Recovery

Now ask the question, high intensity training or long steady aerobic training for fat loss results. Burn more fat, burn more calories and improve your cardiovascular fitness in less time.

“No Time to Exercise” Is Not an Excuse

If your goal is to lose more body fat, improve your cardiovascular fitness and achieve total body conditioning, High Intensity Interval Training, or HIIT, is the way forward for you.

Why does this type of high intensity interval training method work?

First, let’s get something sorted, less time does not mean easier!! HIIT is a very demanding, hardcore physical training method. This training increases both anaerobic and aerobic cardiovascular (CV) fitness. You will also burn more calories after you stop exercising, due to the high demands you have put your body under during training (EPOC), as explained above. High Intensity Interval Training also causes metabolic adaptations that enable you to use more fat as fuel under a variety of conditions. This will improve your athletic endurance as well as your fat-burning potential. HIIT is great for people with a greater muscle mass that want to ‘cut up’ as it limits muscle loss that can occur with weight loss in comparison to using traditional steady-state so called ‘fat burning’ training methods.

In a nutshell, you must push yourself out of the top of your aerobic zone and into anaerobic.  Allow your body to replenish your anaerobic energy system during the recovery intervals.