Celebrity personal trainer Bill Philips is just one of the thousands of health and fitness professionals who recommend a combination of cardiovascular and resistance exercise to achieve impressive weight loss results. A mix of walking and calisthenics such as pushups and sit-ups is such a combination. Weight loss is a complex process, so this routine won't guarantee that you'll lose weight, but it certainly won't hurt your chances.
Weight Loss Basics
Losing weight is relatively simple equation. If you burn more calories than you take in with your food, your body needs to access energy your body has stored as fat. When it burns that fat, you lose weight. Increasing your activity level through exercise is one of the two most common approaches to creating that caloric imbalance.
Walking
A daily walk is such a low-impact and effective exercise that health guru Dr. Mehmet Oz recommends it for everybody in his book "You: The Owner's Manual." When it comes to weight loss, cardiovascular exercise such as walking is more effective than resistance exercise because it burns more calories. According to health resource website HealthStatus.com, a 160-pound person will burn about 190 calories in 30 minutes of vigorous walking.
Pushups and Sit-ups
A program of calisthenics such as pushups and sit-ups qualifies as resistance training. Resistance training burns calories, and builds muscle mass -- a factor that can improve your metabolism so your whole body burns more calories in all activities throughout the day. A 30-minute session of calisthenics will burn about 165 calories off a 165-pound person. However, 30 minutes of calisthenics is an impressive physical feat. Beginners will need to split that into two 15-minute workouts, or even three sessions of 10 minutes each.
Can You Lose Weight?
A program of walking and calisthenics is exactly the kind of workout program that produces solid results when trying to lose weight. However, you will have your best results if you combine that program with some observation of your diet. Your body will crave additional food to make up for the calorie imbalance you create. If you increase your appetite to match your new consumption, you will find that you lose weight very slowly, or lose no weight at all.
References
- "Eat, Drink and Be Healthy"; Walter Willett, et. al; 2004
- "You: On a Diet"; Roizen & Oz; 2009
- Health Status: Calories Burned
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