Fat Loss and Expensive Equipment

Don't have access to expensive equipment? That's alright.... its not necessary or even desirable in some cases. Yesterday I was talking to a buddy of mine who recently broke up with his girlfriend. As he was venting about some of their issues, he mentioned that she wanted to buy an elliptical machine to use at home.

He tried to tell her that she didn't need one, and that she could get better results doing lunges and similar exercises. "But I don't like doing lunges," she replied.

Many people don't like doing lunges because they are difficult for them. That's exactly why you should be doing lunges, and squats, and step-ups. The more difficult an exercise is, the greater the results will be in losing fat. Turn up the intensity of the flame and watch the fat melt away.

Which is why so many people love doing the elliptical machine - the motion is so smooth and easy. Wherein lies the problem.... its too efficient! Because the effort is so low you don't burn as many calories. Because it is such an easy movement you can stay on it for 30-60 minutes with no problems.

Once again, most people think that this type of exercise is needed to burn fat. But it isn't. Your body gets used to this after a while and you don't burn as many calories. Doing more of this kind of cardio exercise won't cause you to lose weight.

You need to turn up the heat in the kitchen with more intense exercise. Interval strength workouts combined with interval cardio will get the best results in the least amount of time. If you have joint problems and have difficulty doing anything but the elliptical machine, that's another story. You have to do what you can do.

I'll finish with another story about weight machines versus free weights. At a healthclub I used to work at, the personal trainers took new members through 3 sessions to show them how to use the various equipment. Many of the over 40 crowd wanted to stick to doing the weight machines and were kinda scared of the free weights, such as barbells and dumbbells.

One of the new people I was going to work with had been following along with her sister, before she started our official sessions. As we walked past the exercise area to sit down and talk about her goals, she commented that the "skinny" people were over there (free weights area) and the fat people were over here ( computerized weight machines).

I thought that was very observant of her. Those computerized machines used a "key" that automatically adjusted to the person's height and the weight was preprogrammed from their previous session. Good old fashioned dumbbells got better results, according to her observations.

I couldn't agree more. Nothing wrong with machines, but they are not necessary to achieve your fat loss goals.