People work out for various reasons, but losing weight and weight management probably rank among the top motives. With harried schedules, multiple responsibilities and more things to get done than time allows, you might wonder how many times you need to work out each week in order to lose weight.
Surprise Answer
Here's something you probably don't expect to read. You don't have to workout at all to lose weight. The cornerstone to weight loss is eating fewer calories than you burn doing your daily activities. But if you don't workout, then you have to eat quite a lot less. If you workout routinely, you enhance your fitness, improve your health, increase your metabolism and burn more calories, so you can eat a bit more each day and still lose weight. If you only workout once or twice a week, probably burning anywhere from 250 to 1,000 calories per workout, then on those days you will make more progress toward your weight loss goals. Losing weight will, no matter how much you exercise, hinge on how successful you are at eating fewer calories than you burn.
Recommended Frequency
With all that said, the fact remains that a sedentary lifestyle is associated with being overweight or obese. Recommendations for how much you should exercise to lose weight vary. Many fitness and health experts, such as MayoClinic.com, recommend that you do at least 30 minutes of moderately intense cardio workout on most days of the week. The Cleveland Clinic recommends you do cardio exercise for 30 to 60 minutes three to five days per week. The American College of Sports Medicine guidelines advise that many people must do 60 to 90 minutes of moderately intense cardio workout on most days of the week to lose weight.
Practical Concerns
Biophysics -- the interface of the biological and physical sciences -- dictates that the more often you workout, the more calories you burn. Research shows that being physically active reduces your risk for obesity, diabetes and metabolic disease, as well as many other health problems. So it boils down to how badly and how quickly you want to lose weight. If you have severe limits on time, then find at least three days a week that you can workout. If you are more motivated to lose more weight more quickly, work out more often.
Intensity
Biophysics also dictates that the longer and harder you workout, the more calories you burn. You can increase the workout burn by focusing on doing cardio exercise, such as walking, running, jogging, swimming and biking. Cardio gives you the greatest caloric burn for the perceived effort. You burn more calories by working out more intensely, but to obtain cardiovascular and respiratory health benefits from your cardio workouts, you should use a pace that you can maintain for at least 10 minutes, and you should do at least 30 minutes of cardio over the course of the day.
References
- American College of Sports Medicine: Physical Activity and Public Health Guidelines
- Cleveland Clinic: Exercise and Weight Control
- MayoClinic.com: Aerobic Exercise: Top 10 Reasons to Get Physical; February 2011
- "Medicine and Science in Sports and Medicine"; Contribution of a Sedentary Lifestyle; Jebb Moore; November 1999
- "Obesity"; Prospective Associations Between Sedentary Lifestyle and BMI; L Mortensen, et. al.; August 2006
- University of New Mexico; Calorie Burning: It's Time to Think "Outside the Box"; Len Kravitz
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