Lifting weights and cardio reduce body fat percentage equally, study says
A new study published in the European Heart Journal has found that lifting weights and doing cardio reduces body fat percentage equally, after comparing the results from groups of people who did purely strength training, purely cardio, or a combo of the two, despite the strength trainees consuming 100-200 calories more per day throughout most of the one-year study.
The study
406 overweight adults with a BMI of 25-40 (53% women) and aged between 35-70 completed sessions of strength, cardio, or a combo of both, for an hour three times per week, over the course of one year. Some participants were assigned to a control group.
The aim was to examine the outcome in four risk factors: blood pressure, cholesterol, fasting glucose levels, and body fat percentage.
The average exercise session was around 60 minutes: five minutes of warm-up, 50 minutes of strength training for the resistance group, 50 minutes of aerobic training for the cardio group, 25 minutes of both for the combined group, plus a five-minute cooldown.
The resistance group was programmed three sets of 8 - 16 reps at 50%-80% of their one-rep max on 12 gym machines, including the leg press, hamstring curl, quad extension, shoulder press, lat pulldown, bicep curl, tricep extension and ab crunch, with one minute of rest. The strength training group also ate 100-200 extra calories more per day.
The cardio group exercised on treadmills, stationary bikes and cross trainers at 50%-80% of their heart rate reserve (i.e., the difference between their max and resting heart rate).
The combo group had to do half of the total sets of the strength group, completing two sets of 8-16 reps at 50%-80% of 1RM on nine machines, and cardio at the same 50-80% of heart rate reserve.
The results
Over the year, body fat percentage decreased in all three groups. Measured using a standardised score, the reduction was -1.0 in the strength group, -1.1 in the cardio group, and -1.2 in the combination group, which indicates an equally significant change for all three.
Body fat percentage was also the only risk factor to decrease out of the four risk factors - the other three did not decrease in any exercise group.
The cardio group saw decreases in waist circumference of 1.9cm, as did the combination group (2.2cm), but lean body mass only increased in the resistance group, by 1.2kg. The cardio group also saw the greatest improvements in cardiovascular health.
Strength training or cardio for fat loss?
Endurance cardio training tends to burn more energy during the workout, but strength training increases Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption (EPOC) - the increase in calories and oxygen used by your body (long) after you've finished your workout to return to its resting, normal state. Resistance training also increases muscle mass, which research shows increases your resting metabolic rate, or the number of calories burned while doing nothing.
With strength training, the body does not start constraining energy expenditure - where it adapts to extra physical activity by reducing energy spent on other activities, in order to keep your total energy used to a certain level - whereas this effect does happen with cardio. It's therefore probably still a good idea to include strength training in your fitness regimen if fat loss is your goal, even if you're already doing cardio.
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