If you are looking for the best cardiovascular training that requires virtually no special equipment and help burn calories, Running is the right choice. Running is becoming popular around the world because it gets your heart rate up and keeps it high for a certain period according to your needs. People adopt running as a regular exercise to stay in shape and shed excess pounds while some people do it just for entertainment. What will be the reason? The good thing is that running burn calories up to 767 calories in 30 minutes if performed in the right conditions.
Define Running as an Exercise
Running is an increasingly popular aerobic exercise. It requires extra oxygen to stimulate your blood circulation and heart rate. Your respiratory system works faster and deeper to meet your needs. Increased oxygenation level helps expand your blood vessels in order to carry more oxygen to your muscles.
Running is the best cardiovascular exercise because it is associated with many physical and mental advantages. Running helps stimulate your different organ systems but the most important function it performs is weight loss. Science-backed evidence has proved that up to two and a half hours of running a week can help you maintain your ideal weight. But don’t take it as simple as an ordinary exercise for weight loss. Running is slightly more complex than a regular physical activity. To achieve your goal in weight loss, you need to get a caloric deficit by frequently burning more calories than you take in.
How Running Can Help You?
Running is the best way to lose weight and burn extra belly fat. It helps you burn excessive calories within a few hours of exercise. It is great for your overall well-being and also helps curb cravings. This incredibly popular exercise is linked with many health benefits and is the most feasible exercise as well.
This article is important for you if you want to learn how running helps you lose weight.
Types of Running
Running can be done in different styles or forms. Each Form of running is specified with its unique benefits and purposes.
The Most popular types of Running include:
Progression Run: This style of running starts from slow and ends at a faster pace. It helps build speed and endurance and reduces fatigue. For instance, 10 km at a natural pace and 1.5 km at a against pace.
Base Runs: A normal run is known as a base run. It is a short-to-moderate length run. For example, running for 10 km and finishing at your natural pace.
Recovery Runs: This is a type of slow run after trade runs to add extra distance to your overall run. For instance, after a hard run, a 5-minute short run at your comfortable pace.
Long Runs: When longer versions of base run are done at the same pace over a greater distance, it is called a long run. The distance may be more than 10 to 12 miles. This is the best run to improve your endurance and fitness.
Hill Repeats: They resemble interval runs but are done uphill. This run is best to train your running power and speed with an increase in your stamina. It may be 10 x 1-minute hill repeats.
Interval Runs: High-intensity short runs that are repeated several times with some short breaks in between are called interval runs. This type of run helps train your speed and power. This is like a 5 x 0.5 mile run with 40 minutes of light jogging between each interval.
Better than Most Exercises for Calorie Burn
Exercise can help you lose weight. It does so by burning more calories than you consume. Running is the best option to burn calories because it involves working different muscle groups to work hard.
In addition, running is also included in High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT), as it involves the most calorie burning by enhancing the power of various muscles at their maximum. Research supports the idea that running can burn more calories than other exercises.
According to a study involving men and women comparison, more calories were burned by running 1600 meters on the treadmill than by walking on a treadmill. Running on a track burns 45 more calories than walking on the same track. You may take it lightly at first because 40 to 45 calories may not seem a huge number but a 10-mile run will be equal to 350 to 400 calories more than walking the same distance.
Moreover, Harvard University Research Statement carried out a comparative study between calorie burning over 30-minute workouts by people at different weights with the same results. This simply explains that running at a moderate pace can burn more calories than walking at more pace. Running can burn calories equal to calories burned during martial arts vigorous swimming or a 20-minute basketball game.
Calorie Burning After Running
Yes, good to hear that calories continue burning even after running. A high-intensity running keeps the calorie burning continued even after the exercise. This is a unique feature of running because there are only a few types of exercises that can continue burning calories after you finish that. Regular running can help you lose weight rapidly. This pin Clyde Hill repeats and high-intensity time of running that continues calorie burning after you workout. Running exercise is popular due to involving many muscles and needing more energy afterward to stay balanced. Burning calories after running ended is known as
“After burn effect”. According to studies, the after burn effect of running can help you burn a large number of calories over time.
In addition, in a 2023 study, 10 men were observed who cycled for 40 minutes at intense speed to calculate the hominy calories they can burn after a workout and for how long. The results found that the cycling participants burned 467 calories during the running and an extra 150 calories over 10 hours following the workout.
This example involved cycling in place of running because the “after burn effect” applied only to high-intensity running. Cycling is a speedy and convenient way to calculate calorie burned after a high pace running, in a laboratory study.
Running Suppresses Appetite
eating less food or changing the food items is the most practiced way to reduce calorie intake. However, sometimes these strategies do not work effectively and just make your task tough and increase your hunger.
According to studies, high-intensity running wombats struggle by reducing their appetite after exercise. The details of this procedure are still unclear but research supports that one way high-intensity running can help reduce appetite is by suppressing the levels of hunger-causing hormone, ghrelin. It also promotes the production of more satiety hormones, such as peptide YY.
A 2020 study involving 21 men found that running for an hour and strength training for two hours ensure a great reduction in ghrelin levels. Just running can increase the PYY production.
Research on men compared the effects of running for one hour and no exercise on ghrelin production. The results showed that running lowers the ghrelin levels three times more fastly as compared to no exercise.
Effectiveness of Running for Burning Harmful Belly Fat
Excess belly fat indicates the worst condition of your overall health. Belly fat is associated with the risk of several types of heart diseases, type 2 diabetes, and other diseases. Studies support that moderate-to-high intensity running plays a crucial role in reducing belly fat, even without changes in your dietary habits.
An analytic report on 10 studies including around 800 participants found that aerobic exercise is an effective way to reduce belly fat without any diet change. However, the same report claimed that high-intensity running is most effective for reducing belly fat. Another study involving middle-aged females showed results that high-intensity running is the best technique to reduce belly fat as compared to walking, no exercise, or low-intensity running.
Other Health Benefits of Running
Although running is considered the best technique for weight loss, it has been linked to many other health benefits. For example, a few specific health problems can be prevented or alleviated with running, including:
Knee Pain: Studies confirm that running may help reduce knee pain. Studies involving old age people revealed that running cannot be associated with arthritis or knee pain. Instead, the people who ran more had less knee pain.
Knee Damage: Most people believe in the myth that running causes damage to your knee. The analytical report based on 30 studies refuted this misconception and found strong evidence that physical activity is good for increasing the strength of knee tissues and stronger knees.
Heart Diseases: Several studies have confirmed that five to ten minutes of running a day can help reduce the risk of heart disease. Even low-paced running can also decrease the risk of heart disease by up to 50%.
Blood Sugar Levels: Running makes your muscle cells more sensitive to insulin. That helps in lowering the blood sugar levels. Running also helps move excess sugar to your muscle cells for storage.
Falls: Elderly people can get help from running. Running decreases the risk of falling, as you get old. Research revealed that the participants of a study who ran regularly at age up to 60, were less likely to fall because running had made their leg muscles more responsive and strong.
Cataracts: Running also helps reduce the risk of cataracts. In combination with another exercise, you can get better results.
How to Get Started for Running?
Whenever you think of getting started running, the first thing is getting by on the bare minimum. You can add good running shoes, running shorts, comfortable pants or trousers, a comfortable top, and a water bottle. Women are recommended to wear a sports bra to save themselves from pain.
If you plan to run during early hours or late at night, use reflective gear. This will save you from accidents.
Before beginning a running workout, keep these tips in mind!
Warm-up: Before starting any exercise, warm up your body. Stretching is usually considered best for warm-up purposes. Starting from stretching and then run after a 5-minute walk at an easy pace. Then slowly increase your pace and power.
Total Time: Start with a total time of 30 minutes. The distribution may be as, 5 minutes for warm-up, 20 minutes for running at normal pace, and the last 5 minutes for cooling down.
Cool Down: Make sure to cool down, at the end of a run. After Walking for 10 minutes, gradually slow down your speed as you go.
Frequency: As a beginner, it is recommended to aim for 4 to 5 days of running per week. This practice allows more recovery time between your running workouts.
How to Get Motivated?
Here are a few tips to help you stay motivated during your running workout plan.
- Stick to a running plan to achieve long-term success in weight loss goals.
- Change your running riots repeatedly to enhance your interest in your running workout. Add different types of runs like hill repeats or intervals.
- Make it a source of fun and entertainment for you so you may not make any excuse to avoid your running workout.
- Make a partner to make you accountable and provide company in the long run. This habit will protect you during your late-night or early hours runs.
- Keep your running gear ready at night so that you may not ignore them in the morning. This technique will keep you motivated in the early hours.
- Take part in different running competitions to get extra motivation for running. This is an effective way to keep yourself focused.
Conclusion
If you are trying to lose weight, try running for weight loss. Running is an effective exercise that offers many health benefits along with shedding the extra fats. A smart running program can help you to burn calories and excess fat. However, some factors like your diet and the right choice of running plan can affect your level of success on your weight loss running program. Researchers suggest that running is an excellent excuse for weight loss and calorie burn. Running also helps you burn calories even after a workout by suppressing your appetite and targeting harmful belly fat.
Running is a feasible way to achieve your goal because it needs little equipment, and can perform any and at any time. Try to have a running partner or change your types of runs to keep you motivated.
