subject: Build Muscle To Burn Fat [print this page] If a person really wants to burn fat and lose weight, most of the time they turn to a cardiovascular workout. What many people do not realize that they need to build muscle to burn fat. This is the whole concept behind popular workouts!
A cardiovascular workout may be a great starting point to losing weight, but over a certain period of time you may notice that you stop losing weight and soon your weight starts to plateau. This is because your body has become accustomed to the exercise and it no responds the same way. When you start adding weights into your workout, your body becomes challenged once again and the weight starts dropping off again.
When it comes to circuit training exercises like Extreme some people, mostly women, get scared off because they think that they will develop big, bulky muscles, but that is absolutely not true. When you perform the right exercises with enough weight just to push you to your limit, you develop lean muscle mass, which is the kind that makes a a tight and toned body. Plus even if a woman tried to develop muscles like a man, it would take her years and artificial drugs and hormones to do so.
It is a proven fact that the more lean muscle that you have on your body, the more fat you will burn. You can burn up to 50% more fat when you have lean muscle on your body than if you did not add weight training or circuit training to your workout regiment. Did you know that when you have lean muscle on your body, that you can actually burn fat as you sleep at night or when you are sitting at your desk for 8 hours working? When you build muscle to burn fat, your body's metabolism gets supercharged, which means that even during resting periods you are burning calories at a dramatic rate.
In Chalene Johnson's workout called Extreme, she follows a technique called lean phasing to build muscle to burn fat. Instead of just simply doing cardiovascular exercises she adds in resistance training with weights and circuit training which is both a cardio workout as well as a resistance workout. Lean muscle is built up with different phases that all leave your body wanting more instead of plateauing. Extreme is a great example of the build muscle to burn fat workout approach.
Wouldn't you love to be able to workout for 45-60 minutes 5-6 times a week and then continue to burn fat and calories for the rest of the time. Surely everyone can find some time to sneak in even a half hour resistance workout to help build muscle, even if you have to wake up 30 minutes earlier or go to bed 30 minutes later. It is definitely worth it as you see lean muscle begin to develop the fat just disappear.
