How to run to lose weight? If you don’t lose weight after running, what’s wrong?

Some people, as they run, their spirits are elevated and they become addicted to running, no longer considering it as a means to lose weight; some people, as they run, feel that they just can’t love this chore and can’t get the high from it, so they give up; and some people, having tasted the sweetness of losing weight through running, fight against fat on this road.

No matter what your current state is, if you want to lose weight by running, you should first dispel the doubts in your mind: Can running reduce fat? Of course it can.

If you still don’t understand this, you can read more popular science articles about sports.

After you have a firm belief, the only thing left is the method. If you run but don’t see any changes in your figure and weight——

Or you have just started running and need to be patient and continue running for a while. Because the fat-reducing effect of running is not immediate. Don’t be anxious to see yourself become as thin as a bamboo pole after running for one or two weeks (fat is not gain by eating in one day, and thinness cannot be achieved quickly);

Or maybe you didn’t adjust your diet well, and you burned calories while running. But ended up eating more calories, so your expenditure was more than your income. So you naturally lost everything (but you have to be open-mind, after all, you ate delicious food);

Or they are running incorrectly. They want to do aerobic jogging , but they run too fast and their heart rate is too high, which makes them very tired every time and they can’t keep running. They stop after running for 20 minutes. This situation is most common among novice runners.

What factors are related to the effectiveness of aerobic fat loss?

Let’s first look at a set of calculation formulas for burning calories during exercise:

Men: Calories burned = [( age x 0.2017) — ( weight in pounds x 0.09036) + ( average heart rate x 0.6309) — 55.0969] x time in minutes / 4.184

Women: Calories burned = [( age x 0.074) — ( weight in pounds x 0.05741) + ( average heart rate x 0.4472) — 20.4022] x time in minutes / 4.184

Ignore the previous coefficients and only look at the parameters: age, weight, heart rate, and time.

You will find that in this formula, in addition to age and weight, two parameters with relatively small changes, the variables that affect calorie burning are heart rate and time.

Yes, that’s why I recommend that weight loss runners look at their heart rate instead of speed, and look at time instead of distance when running .

Heart rate and time are two key variables that affect fat burning during exercise. Both are proportional to calorie consumption, and the time parameter has a greater impact on calorie consumption.

Physiological limits

But it should be note that within the physiological limits of the human body, heart rate and time are interrelated. If the heart rate is too high, you cannot sustain exercise for a long time, and the fat burning effect is naturally out of the question (such as a 100-meter sprint); if the heart rate is too low, you can sustain exercise for a long time, but the fat burning effect is very small (for example, walking slowly for an hour will only make you sweat).

Running too fast, having a high heart rate, and being unable to persist are the reasons why many people who run to lose weight cannot lose weight.

Therefore, if you want to effectively lose fat through aerobic exercise, you must find the fat-burning heart rate range that suits you and try to maintain it for a longer time.

How fast and how long should I run to effectively lose fat?

As mentioned in the fourth section (part 1), how fast you should run should be determine by your heart. You should not refer to other people’s speed, nor should you refer to past experience, and you should not take it for granted. When running, you should use heart rate equipment to monitor your heart rate at all times – this is a good habit for running.

First of all, scientifically speaking, there is indeed a “maximum fat burning zone”, which is approximately between 56%-74% of the reserve heart rate, which is equivalent to the intensity of aerobic jogging E-running.

However, when it comes to each individual, this range varies from person to person.

For people who have no exercise habits, their optimal fat burning zone may be below 55% of the reserve heart rate. So for beginners, even brisk walking can effectively reduce fat as long as the time is long enough ; for an elite runner who trains all year round, his optimal fat burning zone can be expanded to above 74% of the reserve heart rate – so marathon runners can run for a long time at a faster speed and still use fat for energy.

Aerobic exercise

Therefore, in other words, if you stick to aerobic exercise for a long time. Your fat burning efficiency will gradually improve, and your body will be built into a “fat burning machine”. The number of capillaries at the end of your muscles and the number of red blood cells in your blood will increase, your heart contraction force will increase, and muscle fibers will become strong. This is why jogging can improve your physical fitness and is good for your health.

But no matter where your optimal fat burning zone is, it means a moderate-intensity running state that is not too intense and can be maintain for a long time. This is also the characteristic of aerobic jogging – otherwise, if you run too fast, your heart rate will enter the anaerobic zone, and blood sugar will become the main energy source instead of fat.

If you want to experience the joy of running, want to lose weight through running effectively, and want to stick to running for a longer period of time, you must remember one very important point, which is “slow”.

Generally speaking, the time for easy jogging should be more than 30 minutes to achieve the effects mentioned above.

Heart rate

Therefore, for beginners, even if they do not have heart rate equipment, it is best to start with brisk walking or a combination of walking and running. Do not pursue speed, and breathe at a rhythm that allows you to have a conversation with others, so that you can continue exercising for more than half an hour without too much effort.

Overweight friends should pay special attention and start with walking while strengthening their leg strength and paying attention to their walking posture, or alternate it with swimming and cycling to avoid sports injuries.

In other words, if you are out of breath and want to give up after running for more than ten minutes, it means that you are running too fast . You might as well slow down, or even change to brisk walking, let your heart rate slowly come down, and you will feel that you can continue running happily again.

For runners who have been running for a while, they also need to monitor their heart rate in real time. While running to ensure the fat burning effect – because our body senses are actually very slow, and the feeling of too high a heart rate or being too tired is delayed.

The above principles are equally applicable to runners who run outdoors or on treadmills . Especially for runners who run on treadmills at home or in the gym, do not take it for granted to choose a speed, and then be too lazy to adjust the speed, gritting your teeth and running from beginning to end – learn to monitor your heart rate during running.