Cheshire Life’s health and fitness coach, Colin Ayliffe shares some tips to get you looking great

What do most of us do in an attempt to get into shape for the summer? Usually it’s a case of hitting the treadmill or elliptical trainer for thirty minutes.

From my experience as a Movement and Lifestyle coach, I know cardio is an overrated tool for weight loss, hence why I don’t really incorporate it much into my clients’ programmes.

The truth is, anyone who is overweight is actually nutritionally depleted so their bodies are already stressed out through lifestyle choices such as poor diet, lack of quality sleep, caffeine and sugar addiction, weak muscles and stiff joints.

Cardiovascular exercise is, in fact, a further stress to the body. Imagine being a chased by a lion for half an hour and you can start to imagine how much stress hormone is pumped into our blood stream!

Our body cannot differentiate between being chased by a lion or running on a treadmill belt, so our primary stress hormone, cortisol, is released so our bodies can deal with this situation.

So what is the answer then?

We should try to choose resistance training over cardio at any given opportunity.

Resistance exercises stimulate the metabolism for up to 72 hours after exercise, whereas our metabolism drops back to its resting state as soon as we finish our cardio workout.

We’re only stressing the body when we actually lift a weight, which on average is 6.5 to 8 minutes during a thirty-minute weights session, as opposed to the thirty minutes of constant stress reaction during cardio.

Once our body adapts to cardio, our metabolic stimulation is reduced and you can hit a plateau in your gains, which usually happens after the first month.

When using weights, as long as you change your program every four-six weeks, your body will continue to burn calories for up to three days afterwards.

Resistance training also nicely shapes and sculpts the muscles, as well as being a lot more fun and interesting, by using a variety of equipment like kettle bells, medicine balls, dumbbells and stability balls!

So, if you want to make your workouts varied, less stressful, more effective and burn lots of calories all day long, then it’s time to step off that stepper machine and pick up a dumbbell.

About Colin

My name is Colin Ayliffe and I’m a Movement and Lifestyle Coach and CHEK Practitioner (Corrective Holistic Exercise Kinesiologist) with over a decade of experience in the health and fitness industry.

This article is the first of my new regular columns for Cheshire Life. I’m going to be doing my best to help you achieve better health and fitness –without imposing strange regimes or shouting at you!

I hold a degree in Sport Science and I’ve worked in London, Dubai and Bermuda, training a diverse range of clients, before recently relocating to Warrington with my wife, Lisa.

I’ve found that no matter where in the world I’ve worked, everyone has one thing in common: we all want to live happy and healthy lives. I’ve dedicated my career to helping people achieve this.

I run my own coaching business at www.CoconutFitness.com and practice at The Centre for Whole Health and also Cheshire Natural Health. If you’re interested in personal coaching, then contact me at Info@CoconutFitness.com or ring 07804 920007