The efficiency argument is interesting. Does weight training build muscle? No. It
breaks down muscle and the body ADAPTS by building more muscle. So in aerobic
training - when we ‘encourage the use of fat’ - do we force that same body to adapt
by storing more fat?
It’s interesting that some of the biggest experts such as Charles Poliquin, Paul Chek,
John Berardi, Eric Serrano, etc., all seem to think so.

Whether you following a low carbohydrate, low fat, high protein, high carbohydrate
etc., diet, the rule you learned in fourth grade gym class remains the same – in order
you lose body fat, you must expand more calories than you take
in. Caloric balance is so important that I have saved an entire chapter on it shortly.
Fat loss is all about being in an energy deficit – burning more than you are taking in.
Aerobic training is not the most effective way to achieve an energy deficit because
you only burn calories while you are doing it. Anaerobic training takes advantage
of the other 23 hours left in the day because not only do you burn more overall
calories but it cranks up your metabolism to burn calories hours afterwards. Since
weight training is considered, anaerobic, and it contributes to building muscle and
keeping it, you will burn calories nonstop. Even when you hit the sack!
Anaerobic training is cardiovascular exercise WITHOUT the
presence of oxygen.
Any activity that is 1-3 minutes of intense duration - think middle-distance running,
circuit training, hockey, middle distance track, soccer etc. - will put your body into a
very quick oxygen debt. Think of anaerobic training as the equivalent of taking out a
large sum of money in one withdrawal. The ‘shock’ will be much greater if you withdrawal
$10,000 from your account as opposed to taking $1000 out every few months.

After you withdraw this ‘large sum of money’ you will be in debt! Consider exercise,
after a high intense anaerobic workout your body will be in oxygen debt, which is also
known as excess post-exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC). This is the key ingredient
to anaerobic training because your metabolism will remain elevated following this
exercise, or withdrawal, until you restore the ‘bank account.’ The size of the ‘withdrawal’
will determine how long your metabolism stays elevated. Very intense and
exhaustive exercise can keep your metabolism elevated for up to 12-
24 hours while light exercise may elevate your metabolism for only a
few hours.

I believe that the best way to rapidly improve fat loss results is to incorporate interval
training. Most refer to interval training as high intensity interval training (HIIT)
which is very effective and time efficient.
Interval training is when you alternate an extremely high intense period of activity
with a very low intense period of activity for multiple times. This method of training
conditions your body to higher intensity without fatiguing as quickly. Since you expose
your body to a level of intensity for a series of repeats – you are able to do much more
work in the same period of time than you were before.

Here are the reasons why I favor interval training for fat loss:
· As you improve, the work intervals can get harder and harder, and the recovery
intervals can be shortened, or performed at a higher tempo. The only
downside to this style of training is that it is very hard and will force you to
suck for air! As my running buddies would say, ‘Interval training is guaranteed
to put you in the hurt box!’
· Do me a favor and visualize the start line of the Olympic 100m dash or any
sprinting type event. Visualize some running backs and some speed skaters.
Are you visualizing huge, ripped and super lean physiques? Do you ever
wonder why these guys’ pecs, arms and abs look better than yours and you
spend more time lifting weights to build muscle? Some of the most muscular
athletes in the world are involved in anaerobic sport.
· High-intensity cardio has a much stronger effect on GLUT-4 trans location
in muscle cells due to the increased force of muscle contraction. This means
that high-intensity cardio creates a much stronger nutrient partitioning effect
towards muscle tissue than low-intensity cardio.
· High-intensity training favors the fast twitch muscle fibers, which have the
greatest chance of hypertrophy. Long periods of low-intensity exercise tend
to “over-train” the fast-twitch muscle fibers and convert the intermediate
muscle fibers to slow-twitch fibers. If your body has less fast-twitch fibers,
then you will experience less hypertrophy from training.
· The body’s hormonal response to high-intensity cardio is similar to the
body’s hormonal response to resistance training (i.e.increased insulin sensitivity, GH
release, IGH-1 release, etc.) without placing the same strain on the nervous system
as resistance training. High-intensity cardio causes the body to preferentially
store more carbohydrates and burn more fat.
· High-intensity cardiovascular exercise increases oxygen expenditure and
forces the body to adapt by becoming more efficient at oxygen transport
(increase in VO2 max). More efficient oxygen transport to the muscles will increase
fat oxidation as fat oxidation is dependent upon the presence of oxygen.
· High-intensity cardio seems to be more muscle sparing. Several studies
have shown that interval training burns fewer calories when compared to
continuous lower intensity cardio. However, the skin fold losses were greater
with the HIIT group (can you expand on what this study is about and where
the information came from – makes it more credible) than in the continuous
intensity group. This means not only did the HIIT group lose more fat, they
also spared more muscle tissue by burning fewer overall calories.