Build muscle mass. When you increase your muscle mass, you boost your resting metabolism. This is because muscles require more calories to keep them in being than does fat. "That's why it's recommended you add weight training to an exercise program."
Calisthenic exercises:
- using hand weights to do bicep curls;
- using weight machines at a gym;
- doing specific calisthenics like push-ups and abdominal crunches.
"If you're building strength, you are losing weight". Any kind of strength training is going to increase muscle mass, agrees Jamey McGee, fitness director at Wellness Center at Meadowmont, part of the University of North Carolina Healthcare System in Chapel Hill.
"That's why we have classes like yoga and pilates, to strengthen your body," she states. "Pilates is about strengthening the core of your body - your back, your abdomen. Some forms of yoga have a similar effect."
Heimburger recommends weight training twice a week. One advisory: "I don't recommend carrying weights or wearing ankle weights while you're walking. Adding weights could damage your joints. Weights should only be used when you're standing still."
"A personal trainer or exercise physiologist can also set you up with a well-balanced strength-training program that targets the major muscle groups", Heimburger adds.
Get plenty cardio-vascular exercise. There's no getting around it - the biggest burn comes from cardio-vascular exercise. That means running, hiking, walking, cycling, taking aerobics classes, dancing, kickboxing, or using cardio machines at a gym - anything that gets your heart rate up.
Ideally, you should do this four to five times per week for 30 to 40 minutes each time. "The whole idea here is just getting out there and burning as many calories as you can," says Heimburger.
"What we say is, you should be exercising at a level where you can talk, but you can't sing."
