The Disadvantages of Cardiovascular Exercise
It is pretty much widely know that exercise is essential for weight loss and muscle gain, since more calories must be burned than consumed in a day to lose weight. Also, the muscles must be worked in order to gain mass, yet there are many misconceptions and myths about the best way to lose weight and gain muscle mass at the same time. There is, however, a wrong way to try and achieve this goal, and that is by participating in only cardiovascular exercise.
Even though cardiovascular exercises have been known for being the best way to lose weight, this is actually completely false. It can take ten or more hours a week of cardiovascular exercise to lose weight, and it is usually only a pound or so per week. Performing the same exercises can also cause your weight loss to plateau, meaning you go through a period where you work out just as hard, but having absolutely nothing to show for it.
As mentioned, cardiovascular exercise takes up a load of your free time. For some people this is an inconvenience, but for many other people this is just flat out impossible. Not everyone can pick up and trek to the gym for 15 hours a week. Plus with cardiovascular exercise, it takes time for your body to warm up and even get into calorie burning mode.
It is known that cardiovascular exercise is beneficial for the heart, but it can actually be bad for the bones and joints in return. Fast running and other high paced cardiovascular exercises can put a lot of strain on the joints, which can lead to joint pain and even arthritis in the future. It can then in return make it harder to work out, since you are left sore the day after an intense cardio workout.
To really see a lot of benefit from a cardio workout regimen, it has to be daily - yes, daily as in seven days a week and for at least an hour every day. As you can imagine, this is likely to leave you feeling sore and tired all of the time. Worst of all, you can gain even more weight if you stop these daily workouts once your body becomes accustomed to them.
If you want to see true fat loss from cardiovascular exercise, you have to get into a specific zone called the fat burning zone. The fat burning zone represents a specific range of heart and breathing rate, both of which are very high. That means that low intensity cardio workouts are not effective for burning fat, even though you are still burning calories. High intensity workouts are not ideal for everybody and without them, cardio workouts won't help you lose fat.
While cardio exercises have always been touted as weight loss programs, they have never been touted as muscle builders. You are working your muscles in a different fashion, and usually only the lower half of your body is receiving any kind of stimulus. Running or riding a bike for example, don't involve your upper body at all and while they will make your legs stronger, it will be hard to actually put on additional muscle.
With all of these disadvantages to classic cardiovascular workout programs and exercises, it is important to realize that you can still grab up all of the benefits, without the disadvantages. You can do this through turbulence training. You'll be able to work your heart and your lungs, without having to run or do high intensity programs. You can save your bones and joints from unnecessary stresses and you can do it all in less time, making it superior to the cardiovascular exercises of yesterday.
