If you burn just an extra 500 calories a day, you can easily lose a pound a week. Exercise doesn’t have to be monotonous, painful or unenjoyable. In fact, making sure that it’s not can help you avoid burning out. If spending 60-70 minutes on the gym’s elliptical every day of the week sounds mind numbingly boring to you, as it should, try pulling from any of these more interesting ways in order to keep yourself interested.
Skipping rope
You see pretty much every athlete in the world spending time on the skipping rope – and it’s with good reason.
Skipping is a great way to burn fat, and studies have shown that you can burn 10-16 calories per minute – even at a moderate pace.
It also helps to build agility, speed and bone density – plus, it’s great for your mind, and some people even describe getting into a meditative state when they revisit the schoolyard classic. Try 10 x 30 second efforts over 20 minutes to begin with, and then build on it as it becomes easier.
Bear crawls
Bear Crawls have a lot of health benefits. They improve your rib and pelvic positioning, they boost your shoulder stability and strengthen your hands, wrists, and core, and they target both your thighs and upper body, making it an excellent exercise for fat burning.
I would do a one minute work, one minute rest for 20 minutes if you choose to do bear crawls for that amount of time – which is no feat for the faint-hearted!
Burpees
Yes, burpees are in here… because of course they are. As we all know, the exercises we hate (that’s maybe a bit off a strong word!) are often the best for us, and this challenging bodyweight exercise simply cannot be skipped. Burpees work the core, glutes and arms. They also build strength and endurance and raise your heart rate, allowing you to burn fat and improve your cardiovascular fitness, while working out your whole body.
Most people won’t want to do burpees for a full 20 minutes (the struggle is real) but this is truly a fat-torching exercise, and should be incorporated into your routine, if weight loss is one of your goals.
Sand running
If you want to lose weight fast, my number one exercise is soft sand running. Running on the sand is a lot harder than running on a flat surface as with each foot strike your feet sink in, forcing you to exert more energy to move forward. In fact, you are likely to burn around 30 per cent more calories here, than you would on a treadmill, for example.
Furthermore, running barefoot forces your smaller stabilizing muscles to work harder, therefore strengthening them, which may help prevent common injuries when running on a harder surface later on.
This a great cardio workout that also works your stabilizing muscles and is good for your joints.
If you just want to take it slow, I suggest starting with a 15-20 minute jog which you can progress after a week or two. Otherwise, try 6-10 80 metre sprints in the sand.
Sprint interval training
There is no doubt that interval sprint training is an excellent way to burn fat – and fast! Aim to do 30 second efforts. When starting out do a 30 second sprint, with a one minute rest. Then after a week or two progress it to 30 seconds work, 30 seconds rest.
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