Cardio vs. Resistance Training: Which Approach Is Better for Losing Body Fat?

Ready to shed some unwanted pounds? If you're like most people, the first thing you'll do is lace up your running shoes and go for a jog, or jump on a treadmill, elliptical machine, or stationary bike to get that heart rate pumping and burn some serious calories. Cardiovascular workouts, or “cardio” for short, take many different forms and yield excellent results for increasing your lung capacity, strengthening your heart, improving blood flow, lowering blood pressure, raising endorphins, and delivering plenty of good vibes! But when it comes to getting “in shape” and losing those stubborn pounds of body fat, is cardio really the best way to go?

Enter resistance training, aka strength training. It's common to think about weight lifting and body weight exercises as a means to build up a big, muscular physique, but let's take a closer look at the very powerful but lesser-known benefit this kind of training has to offer specifically for fat loss.

First a quick side-by-side: 30 minutes of cardio (at a pace of about 10 minutes per mile) can burn up to 372 calories, while a 30 minute session of resistance training will shred about 112. Cardio looks like the clear winner, right? Not so fast! There's more to the story.

After your resistance training session ends, your body continues to reap the rewards through a process called “excess post-exercise oxygen consumption,” or EPOC for short. Because of this unique physical response your body has to strength training, you will actually be burning about 10 extra calories per hour without doing a darn thing...for up to 36 hours after your 30 minute session ends! Those 10 calories/hour may not sound like much but with a little math you can see how they add up.

36-hour "afterburn" x 10cal/hr = 360 calories! And that's on top of your original 112.

That's right, while you are binging Netflix hours after hitting the gym your body is still putting in some work for you!

Now the two types of exercise are starting to look a little more neck-and-neck as far as caloric burn is concerned. So, can you just pick one or the other and get similar results?

There was a study conducted in 2012 by Duke University that tried to get to the bottom of this very question. The study was divided into three groups (both men and women) and lasted 8 months. Group 1 did three one-hour resistance training workouts per week. Group 2 jogged three days a week at a moderate intensity for about 45 minutes. Group 3 did both workouts. Can you guess who had the most success?

I suppose it depends on how you measure success. The cardio-only group actually ended up losing the most weight! But there's a big caveat here: not all the weight they lost was fat. They lost muscle as well. Because decreased muscle mass also means lower metabolism, that means even though they now weigh less, they will be burning far fewer calories, making their ongoing weight loss efforts and even weight-maintenance far more difficult in the long run.

The resistance training + cardio group lost the most body fat. If you are looking to improve your body composition (the lean, toned, defined look) long into the future, and not just become a smaller, “skinny-fat” version of your former self, it is absolutely clear that the combination of both forms of exercise is the way to go. Maintaining or increasing your muscle (lean body mass) is crucial to sustained success, as it keeps your metabolism revved up, and gives you more flexibility if your diet goes off the rails for a short time, in addition to improving your figure/physique.

Studies like this one and countless others inform my coaching philosophy and are a huge part of what makes my training so effective. I love helping to take the guess work out of reaching your goals. Stay with me, and I will help you put in the work that will make your body work hard for you...even long after our sessions end.