Which exercise is better? Cardiovascular or weight lifting? All exercisers ask themselves that question, whether beginners or not. Correct answer to that question is neither. Both, cadio and weight lifting are essential to your health, and it does make a difference whether person is just into cardio or just weightlifting.
What is cadiovascular exercise?
Cardiovascular or also known as aerobics focuses on developing and strengthening the cardiovascular system (which is the heart and blood vessels and improves circulation) through aerobic training. This way cadio training increases both heart and lung capacity and causes your body to produce an increased number of blood vessels, which means they all, individually and together, work more efficiently. Or in other words: cadio exercise uses large muscle groups for a continuous period of time, and during that time muscles need more oxygen to handle this exercise. Consequently your heart starts to beat faster and breathing gets faster and heavier to meet the demand for more oxygen. This way toxins and waste products are quickly removed from your body, while nutrients and oxygen are delivered to every cell of your body. Not only that: heart is a muscle that needs regular conditioning, because only well-conditioned heart can pump a large amount of blood with fewer beats than a weak heart, and only exercise can make your heart more resistant to stress, heart attack, and other health problems.
There is many health benefits of cardiovascular exercise: decreased incidence of heart attack and stroke, lower blood pressure, lower %26lsquo;bad%26rsquo; cholesterol and higher %26lsquo;good%26rsquo; cholesterol, decreased risk of most cancers, decreased risk of osteoporosis, etc. Of course, for those who want to burn fat- cardio exercise is solution: it burns fat. And not only that- for those who want to perform better strength training program: it is easier to lift with greater intensity for longer periods if person exercises cardio also: person is more tolerant to fatigue of lactic acid burn.
On the other hand, lack of exercise leads to changes in the body that may threaten person's heart. And if lack of exercise is combined with overeating, the result is obesity and higher levels of bad cholesterol, which leads to heart disease, circulation problems
When person trains (runs ...) he or she is increasing the efficacy of system, which mean meeting higher and higher levels of aerobic endurance. This results in increased energy and ability to preform better physically as well as mentally. Cardio exercise is also a great way to prepare for older age: research namely proves that adults who maintain a higher level of cardio exercise throughout their early and middle life, comparing to people who don't exercise, live fuller and more productive lives as seniors.
Typical cardiovascular exercise: cardiovascular exercise is any exercise that will make your heart beat faster and breathe deeper: running, walking, hiking, jogging, bicycling, dancing, aerobics, swimming... Doctors recommend 30 to 60 minutes of aerobic exercise at least 3 to 4 times a week.
What about weightlifting?
Weightlifting or weight training strengthens the muscles by lifting weights. When overall muscle strength increases, also the support of the body increases: muscles are namely connected to each other and they are the ones who hold up the skeleton. So, what are the benefits of weightlifting? As we already mentioned stronger connective tissue and greater joint stability, increased metabolism, better coordination and balance if working with free weights, decreased body fat and greater lean muscle mass, stronger bones and reduced risk of osteoporosis.
Many researches show the age-reversal effect of weightlifting training: people performing only moderate weight training demonstrated muscle mass, cardiovascular fitness, coordination and bone density comparable to those who were 20 years younger than them. Reason for that was partly because the increased growth of hormone secretion.
What is better?
There is no better. Every smart exerciser knows the optimum lies in both %26ndash; cardiovascular and strength exercise. Both 'methods' are essential for developing healthiest body possible. They namely target different systems: cardiovascular exercise strengthens lung, vessels and heart, while weight training uses the stamina of cardiovascular exercise to build muscles that support skeleton and organs.
What is the best combination?
Some say it is best to keep cardiovascular and strength exercise separate, so you can pay attention to each type of training, while others claim it would be best to combine them. So, why not combine? Mostly because when combining the two in the same workout it is more likely that whatever you do second will suffer since you have the most energy at the beginning of your workout, except if you're doing both types of exercise in shorter intervals, which is often unpractical. Ones who support that method claim it is best to do cardiovascular exercise one day and strength exercises another day. You can do that way or combine cardiovascular and strength exercise at different times on the same day, which gives opportunity to rest before doing the second activity. Another option would be doing cardio and strength exercises during the same workout session or simply exercising a combination.
Other claim best combination of cardiovascular and strength exercise is swimming, which is represented as ultimate aerobic conditioner as well as muscle builder. Because of water environment muscles concentrate more on working than on supporting your body. Besides it is not easy at all to swim all those laps. Try it- you'll see. If deciding for swimming it is best to combine different styles of swimming: freestyle, breaststroke, backstroke... And then rotate the strokes so your muscles are continually surprised and challenged.
In conclusion
Smart exerciser knows there is no better and there is no choosing between cardiovascular exercise and weight training. The best programmes incorporate both cardiovascular and weightlifting since only this way maximum development and body strength can be achieved.
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