Percentage of Importance - Diet, Weights, HIIT, Steady State Cardio

M

mellowbird

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I thought this might be an interesting question for the experts here. What percentage of importance would you give these 4 things in terms of weight loss - diet, weight training, HIIT, steady state cardio. My amateur guess is diet 80%, weights 10%, HIIT and cardio makes up the other 10%, not sure about the split between them though.

My experience has been this - last year I went from 60kg to my goal weight of 54kg in 3 months, doing only diet and weight training. I guess I wasn't disciplined enough to do all 4, but I was happy enough to lose a pound a week based on just diet and weights. And I enjoyed my new body for all of 2 months until I got pregnant!! Well I had my baby 3 months ago. I weight 72kg right after having the baby and now 3 months later I weigh 57kg, again using diet and weights. But of course the 15kg I lost wasn't all fat. Since I just had a baby it was also water, womb shrinking, etc. And because I had a C section (that's major ab surgery for those who are not familiar with baby stuff) I couldn't do weights until much later. That's why I gave diet a high 80% importance.

Anyway what do you guys reckon the level of importance of each of these 4 are in percentage terms?
 
I'm not an expert, but this seems fun. I would say 50% diet, 25% weights, 12.5% HIIT, and 12.5% steady state cardio.

Diet is definitely worth half the consideration, without controlling diet, you cannot lose fat, so without monitoring this, the other 3 elements are useless.

Weights get 25% because I believe they are the reason I held onto all my muscle when I lost weight. It's a great fat burner, depletes glycogen stores, raises EPOC, and as said, gives your body a reason to keep muscle and burn fat instead.

HIIT and steady state split the last 25%. Yes, I know about the studies saying HIIT burns 9 times as much fat, but people who have done serious HIIT know how punishing it can be. I remember my HIIT days, I would really have to get pumped up and bust that **** out. It was relieving knowing I could go in the gym and take a nice 40-60 minute run at a comfortable pace. So I think both came in very handy.
 
For weight loss I am going to have to agree with the 80% diet. People will react a little different to weight and cardio combinations, so those are tough to put a percentage on.
 
In my experience, diet is the heaviest factor in the equation by a long way. If your diet is not spot on you will find it difficult to make long term progress regardless of your workout routine. You will find it hard to both build muscle or loose fat.

HIIT is advantageous over SS cardio because, for some people, it will allow you to loose less muscle while cutting... However, the EPOC effect of HIIT and cardio in general is overstated, IMO... Research does exist to show that weights have a higher EPOC effect than SS cardio or HIIT.

Having said that, when it comes to the workout, weights are very important for long term weight control, and IMO much more important than cardio. SS cardio and HIIT will help you to achieve your caloric deficit on a day by day basis, and this will cause you to loose weight (weight = fat and muscle) in the short term (i.e. less than a year). However, in the long term, muscle is essential to lift your overall metabolic rate therein making your body a much more efficient fat burning machine, and assist you to keep the weight off.

So, to provide a quantitative answer as per your question, diet is 70%, workout is 30% of which weights are 25% and cardio is 5%. This is a long term plan. IMO.
 
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In my newbie opinion I would say diet - 25% and exercise 75% when combined together. Caloric deficiency plus intensive activity is the way to lose fat. How many people drink only slimfast and work in the office but shed little weight?

See for example
 
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