Believe it or not, but I actually hoped this thread would lead to some informative discussion on all sides. I'd like to get back to business.
My opinion, which you can take for what it's worth is the order of importance concerning fat loss is as follows:
1. Nutrition
2. Anaerobic exercise which includes weight training primarily
3. Cardio
Why not cardio as number one?
First, let me say this:
IMO, anything that gets someone into the gym is better than not having them in the gym, assuming that there's no real "risk" involved (i.e. biomechanical concern even with proper performance of the exercise), but certainly there are some "better ways" to exercise vs. others. I see no problem with using a particular tool if it means that the individual is more likely to adhere to his/her program, even if it's not "optimal"...half the results are better than no results.
So back to my original question: Why not cardio as number one?
Remember, I'm speaking relative to the goal of fat loss. When operating in a caloric deficit, we are unable to do as much in terms of exertion without burning ourselves out. Overtraining is a lot easier to initiate while dieting, since our bodies don't have near the capacity to build up since we are shorting our bodies of energy.
This said, we have to be wise in selecting what we do each day. We want the most bang for your buck.
Cardio is way down on the list b/c what's it give you? Obviously it gives you some cardiovascular conditioning. And that's great. Because of this it should be a part of anyones program. But to over-emphasize this when fat loss is also desired, you are shooting yourself in your foot. It doesn't take much to build/maintain cardiovascular health. Every day bouts of steady state cardio certainly isn't required.
In terms of fat loss, what does cardio provide? And this is where the whole "optimal" thing is uncovered. Depending on how you are doing your cardio, the most you are going to burn calorically speaking is a few hundred calories. Well heck, I could have simply reduced my food intake a bit and received the same result. A deficit is a deficit no matter which way you slice it.
Of course nobody wants to go around starving themselves. The secret lies in finding the right balance between diet and cardio to create the desired caloric deficit. Most of the time I find individuals eating far too little food and running far too much, adding even more to their energy deficits, setting themselves up perfectly for overtraining. On top of this, many times they find their success stalled. Good reason too. Create a huge energy deficit for a long enough period of time and your body will start to resist everything. Cravings will skyrocket. Metabolism will slowdown. Weight and fat loss will be stagnant. It's not a pretty thing.
In a nutshell, cardio is good for improving/maintaining cardiovascular fitness. In terms of fat loss, I'd simply use it as a small calorie bank that allows you to eat more food than had you done no cardio at all. Suppose you do 3 sessions of cardio per week totaling 900 calories burned. Well that's 900 more calories you can consume. Follow me? It's very inefficient relatively speaking in terms of energy expenditure.
Weight training definitely sits much higher on the pole in terms of importance when it comes to fat loss and body recomposition.
People leave out the idea that weight training actually elevates caloric expenditure better than normal cardio. All the *damage* lifting weights does to your body requires a lot of *repair processes* in your body after you're done exercising. This increases your metabolism and caloric expenditure for hours after the bout of exercise.
Weight training has also been shown to increase one's cardiovascular fitness.
Many people don't understand how weight lifting effects the body, especially while dieting. They think they can do light weight, high rep isolation exercises to *tone* their problem areas.
Unfortunately, human physiology doesn't work like this.
High reps light weights is a bogus fallacy for toning. How do you "tone" a muscle? A muscle either grows or it doesn't. It is that simple. Toning is a function of fat loss. Fat loss is a function of energy balance. Weight training really doesn't factor into that equation. You can't tone with weights.
Resistance training is a stress. You stress the body lifting weights hoping for a positive response. That response is either muscle maintenance or muscle growth. Maintenance and/or growth is not dictated by the weight you lift. Rather, it is dictated by the fuel you are providing your body nutritionally speaking. Fuel it enough, it will grow. Don't fuel it enough, it will maintain.
The problem with light weights while dieting is simple. You are not giving your body a reason to hold onto the muscle. You see, building muscle is very expensive, energetically speaking. The tissue itself is energetically expensive to maintain compared to the other tissues of the body, plus it is not an optimal fuel for the body in times of energy deficiency.
Your body "knows" this. So, when you begin to diet (and by diet I mean invoke an energy deficit) the first place your body wants to cut down on is your muscle. It says to itself, hell, this stuff is energy costly and it looks like we are not going to be getting enough food, so let's minimize this stuff. This is very rudimentary, but you get the point. And these "rules" are not cut and dry. The more fat you carry, the more the story changes.
So if you are really in an energy deficit, and lifting weights (I don't care if they are light, heavy, whatever) you are NOT going to add any appreciable amount of muscle mass. Why in the world would, or even how in the world could it add muscle, which itself if very energy costly to maintain and even more energy costly to build.... all while you are not eating enough to begin with to maintain what you've got. You can't create something out of nothing. If you do, your body has found a way to work around the basic laws of thermodynamics.... something that I HIGHLY doubt.
If you lift weights without this surplus of energy (i.e., while you are dieting) you are not going to increase your muscle mass significantly, if at all. Especially women.
While dieting, one of the primary things about weight training is this: It serves the function of muscle maintenance.
So many people say my belly is fat, so I am going to do a lot of crunches and ab work. Or my arms are flabby, so I am going to do a lot of tricep work. Or my thighs are fat, so I am going to do tons of leg work. Why though?
The fat is what you don't like and weight training really doesn't play a role in losing that fat directly, at least in the sense that you are thinking. Weight training works your musculature.
My best advice I can give you is ditch these types of exercises and start doing compound exercises that involve multiple joints and muscle groups. Think squats, different variations of deadlifts, bench press, rows, pulldowns, standing overhead dumbbell press.... these are the exercises that are going to give you the most bang for your buck and aid in muscle maintenance most optimally.
They're also the ones that are going to increase your caloric expenditure the most too.
I could go on and on about benefits associated with weight training that usually lay uncovered under a bunch of myths drowning this industry.
But I'll promise you one thing. You talk to any quality trainer or strength coach and he/she will say the same thing.... "weight training is vital. period."
Not just for fat loss, but health in general.
Free weights vs. machines. This came up briefly in this thread before things went south.
I will admit to being overly hateful toward machines. IMO, there is nothing superior to free weights. Why?
They allow you to move through your unique biomechanical planes of motion. A squat looks similar regardless of who is doing it. However, if you look closely, our knees and hips move in unique paths, maybe not even visible to the eye. By constantly locking yourself into the machines fixed plane of motion, overtime, this can lead to injury. This disallows you from letting your joints move through the unique biomechanical planes. This is something known as pattern overload syndrome.
Muscles respond best when they're required to control weights, not just push against them. This brings stabilizers into the picture. When you lift with free weights, small muscles that are not necessarily used to move the weight are brought into play for balance and stabilization. Basically, more of your body is called upon when using free weights. By locking yourself to machines, you take stabilizers out of the picture for the most part. This too, can lead to injury down the road when you do something in the real world that requires the use of your stabilizers.
Free weight exercises tend to improve real-world athletic functioning— running, kicking, jumping, throwing, and/or whatever sport you happen to play or activity you choose to do.
All this said, there is nothing inherently bad about machines. You just have to know when to apply them to your routine. Most here would be much better suited sticking to heavy, compound, free weight movements.
At this point, I'm most likely rambling. I had a bunch of thoughts floating through my head that I wanted to get down in this thread to try and strike up some good conversation. So at this point in time, I'll open up the window to you all, for comments or questions.
