Running/Steady State Cardio
Steady state or endurance cardio is another form of exercise to avoid if you want to maximize muscle building or fat loss. This is when you find yourself running for an hour or more non stop at about 50-70% of your max heart rate.
It is repetitive and gets boring quickly if you are doing it on a treadmill and not outside where at least the scenery changes. Due to the extended period of repetitive pounding, it is also not very good on the joints.
Compared to its counterpart HIIT, it is a lot less efficient when you can burn the same amount of calories in 4 minutes with a tabata workout as you can in 1 hour of steady state cardio. This is also comparable to swimming in that when you are new or just starting to run again, your body will be inefficient and will burn more calories during the workout initially. After a while though, your body will adapt and become much more efficient, making a significant difference in the amount of energy it requires to perform the task. It won’t provide you with the added benefit of EPOC afterwards, either since the lower intensity won’t create much of a deficit and the body can keep supply up with the majority of oxygen demand.
Unless you are training to be a distance runner, there is little benefit to extended bouts of cardio, and even if you are training for a marathon, running long distances should not be the primary method of training as you can exhaust your body, and training with HIIT methods will improve your endurance quicker anyway.
If it is a matter running being something you enjoy, I encourage you to save it for free time and not to use it for training, allowing you to enjoy your activity without worrying about making progress or hitting goals and maximize your training time with more efficient methods.
It is repetitive and gets boring quickly if you are doing it on a treadmill and not outside where at least the scenery changes. Due to the extended period of repetitive pounding, it is also not very good on the joints.
Compared to its counterpart HIIT, it is a lot less efficient when you can burn the same amount of calories in 4 minutes with a tabata workout as you can in 1 hour of steady state cardio. This is also comparable to swimming in that when you are new or just starting to run again, your body will be inefficient and will burn more calories during the workout initially. After a while though, your body will adapt and become much more efficient, making a significant difference in the amount of energy it requires to perform the task. It won’t provide you with the added benefit of EPOC afterwards, either since the lower intensity won’t create much of a deficit and the body can keep supply up with the majority of oxygen demand.
Unless you are training to be a distance runner, there is little benefit to extended bouts of cardio, and even if you are training for a marathon, running long distances should not be the primary method of training as you can exhaust your body, and training with HIIT methods will improve your endurance quicker anyway.
If it is a matter running being something you enjoy, I encourage you to save it for free time and not to use it for training, allowing you to enjoy your activity without worrying about making progress or hitting goals and maximize your training time with more efficient methods.
BEST FOR:
Improving Cardiovascular Endurance, Sport Specific Training
GOOD FOR:
Improving Cardiovascular Performance
NOT FOR:
Weight Loss/Fat Burning, Lean Muscle/Mass Gain, Overweight/Obese Individuals (due to the pounding on the joints)
Improving Cardiovascular Endurance, Sport Specific Training
GOOD FOR:
Improving Cardiovascular Performance
NOT FOR:
Weight Loss/Fat Burning, Lean Muscle/Mass Gain, Overweight/Obese Individuals (due to the pounding on the joints)