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Evidence-based articles & blogs to help with making training more effective, nutrition more flexible & life more enjoyable.
Cardio Isn't For Losing Fat
I used to really bash on running. That’s because I love lifting weights… And I absolutely hated running. When I was in school, running was something we were made to do. Every. Single. Morning. Around the boarding house. Running was a chore, a punishment and an absolute nightmare. Nowadays - as you've probably seen on social media - I’m actually starting to enjoy it.
But… If you are like I was and you absolutely despise running…
I’ve got some great news for you.
You don’t actually need to do any form of cardio to lose fat.
You don’t need to do low intensity to be in the fat-burning zone.
You don’t need to do HIIT for the ‘afterburn’ effect either.
That’s because when we’re trying to lose fat we simply need to manage the calorie equation.
To lose fat, you need to burn more calories than you consume).
And cardio just doesn’t burn many calories.
Don’t believe me? Let’s consult the research.
Climbing 11 flights of stairs burns 19.7 calories.
That’s the same amount of energy as about one fifth of a medium-sized banana.
That’s stair-climbing though - no one apart from firefighters is actually doing that.
What about just getting your activity up?
But surely all those health and fitness people on the internet look fit because they’re always super active, right?
I’ll let you in on a little secret. Back when I was a GymShark athlete, I got flown out to all of the expos, shaking 1000 different hands a day…
None of the athletes ever used the stairs. We all took the lift, the escalator. That’s because we knew something that most people don’t know…
Cardio doesn’t burn many calories. The athletes were far better off conserving their energy to get through the long days at the expo, rather than needlessly exerting themselves climbing up stairs to burn a whopping 19.7 calories.
Now I’m not telling you this to talk you out of doing exercise - that would be ridiculous.
Exercise is incredible for your health - both mental and physical.
I’m telling you this to teach you - if fat loss is your main goal, nutrition needs to be your number one priority, not slaving away on the treadmill.
This is important for you to know, because it takes a lot less effort to simply eat less calories - especially if you’re making high-satiety food choices, which we will teach you how to do - than it does to perform minutes or even hours of cardio.
The biggest reason diets fail is because dieting is hard. We’ve all got busy lives - maybe you have children, school, multiple jobs, social and spiritual commitments and then some. Chances are you don’t have 2 hours per day to spend in the gym 7 days a week.
But - you do have 5-10 minutes to plan your food intake each day - once you’ve learnt exactly how to do so using my brand new book 'The Shred Method'.
We want to make dieting as easy as possible, to give you the highest likelihood of succeeding.
Tracking your calories and making some meal plans isn’t as fancy or marketable as high intensity battle ropes or tracking your heart rate using your watch to ensure you’re within some particular zone.
But it’s lightyears more effective. It’s also far easier.
Exercise for your health.
Lift weights to build muscle.
Use nutrition to lose fat.
Simple.
If you need help with setting up your diet to lose fat then you need 'The SHRED Method'.
And I'd love to give you a FREE copy, so you can lose 5-15lbs in the next 30 days.
Just jump into my new Facebook Group HERE, and grab it in the Guides section 
- Nick