I had been on a strict workout regiment for well over a year before I had heard one of the best weight loss tips ever about the fat burn zone. Once I did, it changed my life and my appearance forever. I was following a typical workout plan that had me lifting weights followed by cardio. When I say cardio I mean high intensity, sustained high heart rate for relatively short periods of time. In plain English I was running for 20 minutes. I did lose a little weight in the first couple of weeks, but after that I couldn’t lose an ounce. I must also submit that I was eating healthy through the day, but my dinner was still the standard three course meal. This did play a part in why I wasn’t losing weight and I have outlined this issue in other articles on diet and nutrition on this site.
I continued to work out for a few months until I graciously received a few tips on how to burn fat from a private personal trainer I met. She told me that in order to burn fat I needed to change my cardio workout from the sustained high intensity high heart rate to a much lower intensity “fat burn” workout. This is a cardio like workout in that you use the same equipment or do the same exercises just at a slower pace to keep the heart rate down. One good indicator you are in the fat burn zone is your ability to have an unbroken conversation. This just means you are not taking deep breaths or gasping for air while you talk.
The most obvious indicator that you are in the fat burn zone is heart rate. When your heart rate is high it is an aerobic or cardio workout, which does burn fat as well as more calories. So why then would you want to keep your heart rate low? Well, the reason why is so you will burn a higher percentage of fat. But don’t let your heart rate get too low or you will not burn much fat at all. This may sound obvious to you, but some people think is slow is good, slower is better. Not true. Anyway it never occurred to me that all the different zones listed on cardio equipment included a fat burning zone, and all I had to do was keep my heart rate within it and I would be burn fat. Go figure, the answer to my weight loss issue was literally right in front of my face for over a year. I don’t know why, but I just never paid any attention.
Once I followed my new friends advice I lost a lot of weight and very rapidly. After a few weeks of fat burn style cardio she advised that a couple days per week I introduce some “high intensity interval training” which is essentially the fat burn workout with wind sprints repeated.
Science has now discovered a number of reasons, but for now I will discuss the two main ones here. When you perform moderate paced aerobic exercise for extended periods of time (in a typically recommended target heart rate), your body is burning fat during the exercises. So this sounds pretty good so far right?