Is there a target zone to burn more fat? No. There is not. There is, however, a zone at which you burn a higher percentage of fat than any other source of energy. These other forms of energy include carbohydrates and proteins. It has been suggested that more fat is burned during lower-intensity exercises. However, more calories are burned at higher intensities, which leads to more weight loss.
Low intensity v. High intensity
If your goal is to lose fat mass, as is most often the reason people begin an exercise program, you need to burn more calories than you take in. It is true that you burn a higher percentage of fat for energy at lower intensities, as stated by Ph.D. candidate and certified exercise physiologist Travis Saunders, than you do at higher intensities. Lower intensity exercise being lower impact on your joints and muscles and a heart rate that is higher than when you are at rest, but not out of control. Higher intensity workouts usually involve more impact on your body and a very high heart rate. However, you will burn a higher number of total calories, which is the ultimate goal, when you work out at higher intensities.
Exercise Duration
Saunders points out that you will burn more calories at a higher intensity than you will burn in the same amount of time at a lower intensity. You must adjust your exercise intensity in order to ensure that you meet your caloric expenditure goals without burning out before the end of your workout. If you increase the intensity of your workout too quickly, you will severely limit your capacity to continue to burn calories and fall short of your goal. You should work out at an intensity that is challenging while allowing you to continue to work for an extended period of time.
Post exercise
According to Matt Fitzgerald, a certified sports nutritionist and endurance sport coach, the type of energy you store after your workout is equally as important, or more important, than the type of energy you burn during your workout. If you spend the majority of your time burning fat for fuel to get your through your workout, your body will store the calories you consume during recovery as fat. Likewise, if you spend more time burning carbohydrates as fuel during your workout, your body will store your recovery nutrition as carbohydrates.
Power Output
One of the goals of exercising, particularly if you are an athlete, is to increase your power output. According to Fitzgerald, if you are an athlete who is working to both drop a few pounds and increase your performance, you must include short bouts of exercise at very high intensities. He points out that staying at a rather low intensity may burn a higher percentage of fat, but you will not allow your muscles the opportunity to adjust to increased stress. In other words, if you do not train at the intensity at which you plan to compete, you will not perform as well as you might like to during competition.
A Healthy Combination
In order to lose unwanted fat mass in a healthy way, you must incorporate both medium-intensity and high-intensity exercise into your workouts. You should shoot for a caloric deficit of approximately 300 calories per day, according to Fitzgerald. By combining low-intensity exercise with high-intensity exercise, you afford your body the opportunity to learn to utilize both carbohydrates and fat for energy. If you are able to take from both your fat stores and your carbohydrate stores, you avoid depleting either form of energy and ending up with a nutritional deficiency.
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