In the short term, cardio is better. In the long term lifting heavy is better. Let’s dive in.
The Short Term
If you only had a month and absolutely had to lean down with little time, I’d just crank up the cardio on you. I’d STILL keep at least 3 days of lifting in your regimen as well. Ultimately, if fat loss is the goal, it’s a matter of calorie expenditure versus calories coming in. Cardio burns the most calories in the shortest amount of time.
But There is a Catch...
The other beauty about cardio is there are different types you can do. HIIT would for sure burn the most calories out of every option for losing weight. However, this comes with tradeoffs. You could burn more calories in 15-20 minutes of HIIT than 40-50 minutes of steady state cardio, but the body can only handle so much. It is assumed along with cardio, you are eating less than normal. This means your body isn’t getting a sufficient amount of calories to keep you at 100%. If you aren't at 100%, then you can only do 2-3 days max of HIIT before you’d most likely burn out. It’s high impact, and high intensity after all.
On the flip side, you could do steady state cardio everyday, but that not only gets monotonous, you only burn whatever you did in that session. HIIT keeps burning calories after you are done (EPOC), to catch up to all the intense work you did in such a short time. On the plus side, it’s such low intensity that it is the lowest risk of losing muscle while in a deficit.
There is also just a matter of incorporating more steps throughout your day to increase the expenditure. For most people, this is the easiest option, as they don’t have to worry about setting aside time specifically for going to the gym. They can just incorporate moving more throughout the day, which makes adhering to it long term more sustainable.
The solution:
2 days - these can be done after a workout or on their own day - 30 minute steady state cardio (could be jogging on treadmill, playing basketball, swimming, etc. Enough to get your heart rate up but you can still carry on a conversation just a little bit)
1 day - HIIT Cardio - on a non-workout day - For those just starting out focus more on doing HIIT cardio in the form of sprints on a bike, rower, or even outside on the track. 5 minute warmup, 4-6 30 second sprints with 1-1.5 minute break in between, then cooldown for 5-10 minutes.
Just keep in mind, no matter what you choose to do, once a month passes (different for everyone), your body starts adapting to the stimulus being placed on it. Instead of continuing to burn fat, it will now start preserving fat (for survival), and eating away at muscle.
The Long Term
The more muscle you have on your body, the more CALORIES you burn at rest. You are basically getting the opposite effect, long term, when compared to cardio. Instead of preserving fat due to lack of food coming in, the addition of muscle, or the stimulus of needing to keep the muscle you currently have, forces your body to preserve muscle mass and get rid of the fat.
Muscle is calorically expensive to have. In a deficit, your body needs a damn good reason to keep it on. Resistance training with progressive overload provides that stimulus. The person with more muscle will burn more muscle at rest, than if that same person had less. The great thing about this long term is, whether you're bulking or dieting, you are now able to eat more calories without gaining weight. Let’s be real. Most people don’t want to be doing 6 days of cardio if they can avoid it. Having an allotment of more calories, allows you the potential option of having a higher caloric intake to lower from initially in a diet. This can delay adding cardio (or doing as much to hit your fat loss goals), because you now have more room to lower calories within your diet, instead of just adding cardio to increase the expenditure.
The Solution:
3 Full Body Workout days - 1 exercise per muscle group - 3 sets of 6-8 repetitions (choose a weight where you can hit that rep range and only have 1-2 reps left in the tank).
If you incorporate a balanced plan of 3 full body days, with 2-3 cardio days (to start), you should be well on your way to seeing a fat loss of about 1-2lbs a week. If you have already been doing this much cardio, it may take more though so keep that in mind. Also, don’t forget the third option of just increasing your NEAT through more steps throughout the day.
