Strength training and weight loss - How does it work?

Strength training and weight loss might seem like two totally different subjects - but they actually go together naturally like salt and pepper or cake and ice cream.

Strength training for weight loss should really be called "strength training for fat loss" because your body loses fat and inches faster than weight. Muscle tissue is heavier than fat tissue, so you can be burning fat and losing inches like a maniac but your weight changes more slowly as you strengthen muscle and improve tone but lose fat.

Strength exercise has many health benefits in addition to helping the body burn fat more effectively.

• It helps to decrease insulin resistance, which has been linked to fat storage around the tummy area.
• It's a key way to boost metabolism naturally.
• It helps strengthen bones as well as muscle.
• Your posture and ease of movement will improve as you strengthen related muscle.

So forget about the scale, or at least put it under your bed because strength training and weight loss uses a tape measure and the fit of your clothes as the main measurement of results!!

Definition of strength training

Let's get the definition of strength training so we know exactly what we're talking about (it's not body building, which is actually a sport!) and while we're at it, let's answer the question, what is resistance training?

Strength training is one of the four types of exercise - cardiovascular (which includes aerobics), strength, flexibility and coordination/balance - that improve different functions of our bodies and contribute to optimum health and physical fitness.

Strength training is the use of resistance to muscular contraction to build the strength, endurance and size of skeletal muscles. There are many different methods of strength training, the most common being the use of gravity or elastic/hydraulic forces to oppose muscle contraction.

What is resistance training?

Resistance training is specific kind of strength training. It refers to a specific form of strength training that uses elastic tension (as in resistance bands) or hydraulic tension (think exercise machines) to increase strength.

Whenever you use resistance against any muscle or group of muscles in your body, you strengthen those muscles. You also strengthen the bones that the muscles are attached to because they respond to resistance by getting stronger as well.

For example, using your own body weight as resistance against gravity, as in doing sit-ups, would be strength training.

Strength training bands are easy to use, portable and adjustable to your level of strength.

Swimming is an excellent form of strength training and weight loss because the water provides the resistance, and swimming is great cardiovascular exercise too.

Getting back to strength training and weight loss. I have personally experienced that this is the most effective form of exercise for losing weight and inches and improving muscle tone because I've experienced it for myself.

Strength training for weight loss can help almost anyone. I have a few health issues, including life-long diabetes and strength training was the first thing that ever got me results in my weight loss and health improvement efforts.

How does strength training assist weight loss?

When you strengthen your muscles, they have a greater demand for energy to function. As you strengthen muscle, it burns more stored fat for energy. In other words, strong muscle tissue "burns" greater amounts of fat for fuel.

Resistance/strength training is a key way to boost your metabolism naturally. Muscle needs energy constantly, so the stronger your muscle tissue, the more efficiently and regularly your body will burn fat for fuel.

Any kind of physical activity burns calories, even chewing gum. But losing weight is a lot more than the simple "calories in, calories out" equation that we're bombarded with all the time!. How your body uses the calories varies, and this is one reason for the effectiveness of strength training and weight loss.

"Cardio" is important as a form of exercise and is vital for health, but it primarily improves heart and lung function. Including some strength training, even one time a week, to your lifestyle will pay you back with not only looking better, but feeling a lot better too.

Strength training and cardiovascular exercises help your body in different ways.

Incorporating strength training into your lifestyle

There are many ways to incorporate strength training for weight loss and health into your lifestyle. For one thing, it doesn't have to take a long time or even a ton of resistance to start feeling and seeing results fairly quickly.

Isometric muscle contraction: Isometric contraction is a type of strength training exercise where you contract and relax muscles, but don't move any joints. Squeezing your buns together is an example of isometric contraction. It's fast and simple and can be done practically anywhere, anytime. Find out more about isometric exercises at Fitness Made Fun.

My favorite form of strength training, which is a great cardio workout, flexibility and balance exercise too is mini trampoline exercise.

So quit trying to starve yourself skinny because losing weight doesn't work that way! Start doing some strength training, and weight loss will be a result you enjoy!

Cheers!

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