Fat Loss Training Program| What Exercises Burn The Most Fat

Fat Loss Training Program| What Exercises 

Burn The Most Fat

When it comes to losing fat, there are primarily two different categories of workouts a person might consider doing… cardio and weight training.

Now in the cardio category, we can break it down even further into stuff like steady state or interval training. And while this is all wonderful stuff that I get asked about approximately 30 billion times a day, we’re going to skip right over it for now and focus on the weight training workouts.

Now in terms of weight training and losing fat, there are primarily two different types of workouts you can do. Or, more accurately, two different purposes your workouts can have.

weight training for weight loss

When we’re trying to lose fat, we really have 2 different goals. The first is to actually lose that fat. Obvious, I know. The second however is to avoid losing muscle while we’re losing fat.

As I’ve explained before, we may call it weight loss, but it’s body fat we want to lose here… not muscle. However, your body doesn’t really give a crap about what you want. It’s just going to see that a caloric deficit (the primary requirement of weight loss) is present and a fuel source is needed. So, it will look to burn fat and muscle whether you like it or not.

This of course can be prevented. But, due to the improper way most people go about fat loss (e.g. eating and training like idiots), the average person ends up losing plenty of pretty muscle right along with their ugly body fat.

So with all of this in mind, there are two forms of weight training workouts you’ll be interested in when you’re trying to lose fat.

1) workouts that cause fat loss
2) workouts that prevents muscle loss

Unfortunately, what’s optimal for one is not optimal for the other. So a workout designed specifically for muscle maintenance will mostly suck for burning fat. And workouts designed specifically for burning fat will mostly suck for maintaining muscle. At least comparatively speaking.

Such a lovely combination of ironic and annoying, ain’t it?

Weight Training To Cause Fat Loss Version 1: The Myth

When the average person thinks of using weight training to burn fat, their first thought will often be one of the worst training myths of all time. In fact, I’ll go right ahead and appoint it THE WORST of them all.

Which myth, you ask? The one claiming that you lift heavy weights for low reps when your goal is to build muscle, but then switch to lifting light weights for high reps when you’re trying to lose fat and get lean, toned, defined, ripped, cut and blah blah blah.

Not only is this NOT true, but it’s the absolute worst thing you can do if you want to avoid losing muscle while in a deficit.

In fact, the typical version of this light weight/high reps nonsense is also borderline useless for actually building muscle in the first place (hi ladies, I’m looking at you…. And while we’re on the subject, the answer is no, this form of training won’t make you “toned” either.

As you can see, this one myth is single-handedly responsible for quite a lot of crap.

Weight Training To Cause Fat Loss Version 2: Metabolic Training

Now with all of that cleared up, it’s time to get to the type of weight training that is actually, you know… useful. And that is something known as metabolic training.

This form of training usually involves higher reps, very short rest periods, lots of supersets, tri-sets and/or circuits, lots of big compound free weight and body weight exercises (ideally ones that don’t involve much sitting but do involve as many muscle groups as possible), barbell complexes, all sorts of kettlebell stuff and other similar components with the primary goal being to promote fat loss and maximize the amount of calories being burned both during and after your workout.

Basically, metabolic training sort of aims to turn intelligent weight training into a form of high intensity cardio.

And in this regard, it’s definitely a useful fat loss tool. The hormonal response to this type of training is legit. It burns more calories than traditional weight training, and it also burns more calories than traditional cardio (and it’s waaaaay less boring than traditional cardio).

So, if you’re interested in using weight training to cause fat loss, metabolic training can certainly be beneficial.

Weight Training To Prevent Muscle Loss: Strength Training

On the other side of this spectrum, we have workouts aimed at preserving muscle while fat is lost. And the best name I can think of for it is plain old strength training.

Whereas metabolic training was primarily about burning calories/fat, this type of training is primarily about strength. Or more specifically, maintaining (or increasing) your current levels of strength. Why?

Because doing so is the primary stimulus that tells your body to keep (or increase) your current levels of muscle.

To make that even clearer, if you’re looking to avoid losing muscle while you lose fat, this type of training isn’t just useful and beneficial. It’s required.

So what are these types of workouts like? Well, you know the type of weight training that is optimal for building muscle in the first place? That’s also what’s optimal for maintaining it (with one possible adjustment being a small reduction in volume and/or frequency to compensate for the reduced recovery that comes from being in a deficit… more on that in a minute).

So lifting fairly heavy, in low-moderate rep ranges, with longer rest periods between sets, with a large focus on big compound exercises and, above all else, working your ass off to (at the very least) maintain your strength on every exercise.

This is the type of training that maintains muscle during fat loss.

Which Type Of Workout Is More Important?

And in that case, assuming your goal is to lose fat without losing muscle, I’d say strength training 100% of the time.

Why? Because of the two, it’s the only form of weight training (or really the only form of exercise in general) that is actually required for this goal.

What I mean is, unless you’re significantly overweight (in which case muscle loss is much less of an issue or concern), you will lose muscle and strength in a deficit if the type of strength training described above isn’t there. However, you can VERY easily lose fat without ever doing a second of metabolic training.

So, one is required and the other is purely optional. For this reason alone, strength training wins the battle of the workouts.

Now that’s not to say metabolic training can’t also be important or highly beneficial. It most definitely can be if it’s your preferred way of creating way of caloric deficit. But, if you’re only going to be doing one or the other, the clear choice here would be to skip the metabolic stuff in favor of strength training and use your diet to create your deficit.

Fat still gets lost, muscle and strength get maintained… you win.

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