Is your exercise giving you the results you want?

A PHYSICAL activity and health researcher at Central Queensland University has said that weight is only determined to a small extent by how active we are, so exercising may not see the type of weight loss results many desire.

The professor said losing weight just by being more physical active is one of the hardest ways to go about it. The American College of Sports Medicine recommends 250 to 300 minutes of moderate intensity exercise per week to see weight loss. This is twice the amount of physical activity recommends for general all round good health.

Many people are told resistance training is the best way to lose weight, but the main idea for promoting it to lose weight is that muscle mass needs more energy than fat mass, so the muscular you are the higher your metabolic rate which means calories are burned quicker. However, aerobic or endurance training is just as good to help you lose weight and a recent study showed endurance training was more effective in producing weight lose compared to resistance training. 

The best way to lose weight is to have a nutritionally balanced diet combined with exercise.