Fat burning is one of your metabolism's biggest jobs, burning up to 75 percent of your daily calories, according the Mayo Clinic. Fat is energy, 3,500 calories of it in every 1 lb., stored up in your body's fat deposits--your fuel tanks. When you work--any kind of exercise--you burn up calories and speed up your metabolism, making it more efficient even at rest. Muscle is a great calorie and fat burner. Consult a physician or professional trainer before kicking off your program.
Walking
Walking works your legs--a large muscle group--and your back and neck muscles, to keep you aligned for balance. Walking also keeps your arms busy, swinging to smooth and steady your pace. At 3.5 miles in an hour, your muscles burn up about 280 calories, or over 1/4 lb. of fat a week for four walks.
Biking
Bicycling at a leisurely pace, less than 10 miles per hour (mph), is low impact in case your feet or back can't take much pounding. But you'll burn up almost 300 calories for every hour of sunny sight-seeing, or about 5 1/2 oz. of fat a week in four fun rides.
Swimming
Water is an effective exercise medium. You almost become weightless while working against a the water's resistance, exercising just to move forward. An hour of laps can burn away over 500 calories, or over a 1/2 lb. of fat in only four refreshing dips a week.
Outdoor Running
Outdoor running offers variety--city or country and uphill, downhill or level routes--along with sunshine and fresh air. A brisk jogging pace of 8 mph can incinerate almost 1,000 calories in an hour, melting away about 1 3/4 lbs. of fat in a week with four invigorating jogs.
Indoor Treadmill
A treadmill keeps your walking or running scorecard up-to-date when rain, snow or road conditions keep you indoors. Motor-driven units change speeds to match your needs. Many can elevate to take you uphill.
Step-treadmills can burn up 650 calories in an hour, or almost 12 oz. in a week of four workouts.
Pumping Iron
Resistance training--which could use weights or elastic ropes or bands, or your own body, in push-ups or pull-ups--builds muscle mass. That gives you more calorie-burning machinery and lets you further increase your fat burning workouts, a self-perpetuating upward spiral of fitness and fat burning. Weightlifting or using gym or home weight machines can burn almost 220 calories in an hour, or almost 4 oz in a four-exercise week.
Activate Your Lifestyle
Everyday activities, at home or on a job, all use calories and burn fat. Speeding up or intensifying each activity--like taking stairs instead of an elevator--will reward your efforts. Lifestyle exercise experts recommend 10,000 steps a day. Buy a pedometer and step up your fat burning activity.
Try a New Sport
Try a new sport and vary your workouts. Repeating the same sports or exercises over time will selectively concentrate only on the set of muscles involved. Changing to a different sport or exercise will build other muscles. The more muscles you build, the more fat burners you stoke.
Diet Controls
Hallie Levine, a health and wellness writer for "Redbook" magazine, recommends combining dietary changes with exercise programs. For example, green tea extract, low-fat, dairy-based calcium and increased daily water intake all burn calories. She also suggests cutting alcohol, which slows metabolism while piling on new calories.
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