There are definitely a couple schools of thought when it comes to burning body fat. Personal trainers recommend varying cardio workouts, depending upon their training. A common way of doing cardio is by exercising at a low intensity level. It is suggested that the majority of calories burned will come from body fat at a lower intensity level. A common belief is that if one exercises too hard, then the calories burned will come from carbohydrates in the muscles and not from body fat.

Many people make the point that more total calories are burned if people exercise at a higher intensity level. They reason that if you simply burn more calories than you consume in a day, you will lose body fat. So now we will look in more detail at each school of thought.

The Popular Low Intensity Cardio Workout

When you walk into most gyms, you will see people walking on treadmills at a slow and steady pace...You are witnessing the low intensity cardio workout in action. This form of aerobic exercise became very popular after university studies proved it was the best way to target body fat directly. A very large percentage of calories burned come directly from body fat. No wonder why this form of exercise is so popular!

Pick cardio equiptment that has a built in heart rate monitor. You want to do this to insure that you hit the ideal intensity level. It will take about 10 minutes to reach your target heart rate and at that point you will want to stay in that zone for about 30 minutes.

High Intensity Cardio

This form of aerobic exercise can be tougher to perform than the lower intensity version. Although not as popular, this is a very effective way at burning tons of calories. The calories burned in high intensity cardio workouts come from both carbs stored in the muscle (glycogen)...as well as stored body fat.

A foolproof way to lose weight is to burn more calories than what you consume each day. High intensity cardio is best for creating a calorie deficit, by burning a large amount of calories.

The Limitations of the 2 Types of Cardio Workouts

It takes about 10 minutes to get your heart rate into the fat burning zone, with the low intensity cardio workout. It is great once you reach this point, but those first 10 minutes or so are kind of a waste of time.

Very few people have the pain tolerance to push hard for more than 10-15 minutes. This is the challenge with high intensity cardio...it is miserable after 15 minutes!

How to Combine The Two Approaches Into One Awesome Cardio Workout

When performed in a certain manner, it is possible to benefit from doing both types of cardio in the same workout. You can make the first ten minutes of the low intensity cardio workout productive, by starting your cardio workout off at a high intensity level.

Find a treadmill or exercise bike and set it at a high level. Push yourself really hard for 10-15 minutes. Once you are really working up a sweat, switch to a low intensity and keep it there for 20-30 minutes. This will burn calories and create a calorie deficit as well as burning body fat during the workout. I maintain an 8% body fat percentage year round using this cardio approach.