How Many Calories are Burned Using An Elliptical Machine

April 10th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

If you genuinely would like to get an intense workout and burn calories, an elliptical trainer is one of the best pieces of exercise equipment that you can get. People are concerned in finding out about how many calories are burned on elliptical trainers, and although this will unquestionably vary depending upon your gender, body fat percentage and other individual characteristics, there are a few general estimates of the number of calories that are burned using an elliptical trainer.

General Estimates of How Many Calories Are Burned

For a 150 pound adult female doing 30 minutes of elliptical exerice, the count of about 387 calories will be burned. For a 180 pound adult male doing about 30 minutes of the same exercise, anywhere from 464-500 calories will usually be burned. A few of the factors that will determine how many calories are burned on an elliptical machine, include the workout duration, interval training, elliptical tension settings, body composition, state of the cardiovascular system, weight, and sex.

Tips

If you want to make sure that you always get the most out of your workouts and are burning as many calories as possible, one of the best things that you can do is establish intervals. Most elliptical gym machines available these days offer incline and tension settings that you can adjust, and you should use these features to your advantage.

You should try progressing in 30 second incline intervals every couple of minutes, as this will slowly increase the intensity of the workout and allow you to burn the most calories. Another idea to increase the number of calories that are burned, on an elliptical trainer, is to take advantage of the backward and forward directions. Rather than just staying on one or the other, try switching it up, and going back and forth you will be adding more intensity to your workout and burning more calories as a result.

Also keep in mind that no matter how hard you work out, if you do not have the proper nutrition and drink adequate water you will not be getting the best results. It is important to live a generally healthy lifestyle in combination with proper exercise, to achieve the results that you desire. An elliptical trainer is just one of the many different pieces of exercise equipment that you can choose from. In order to burn the most calories you should have at least two or three pieces of equipment to exercise with.

For another great article on elliptical machines visit
elliptical machines


Benefits of an Elliptical Trainer

April 10th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

Go into almost any gym these days and you will see row after row of shiny new elliptical machines, but the big question is: What are the benefits of elliptical training over conventional cardio training? One of the oldest and most tried and true tools of cardio training is the treadmill. Elliptical training has many outstanding benefits over training on a treadmill. The first is that elliptical training is truly a full body workout, while treadmill training is primarily focused on your lower body.

The arm workout on an elliptical significantly increases the calories burned per hour on the machine, so you can spend less time working out and more time doing other things, if you train for fitness on an elliptical. Likewise, elliptical training is gentler on your joints. When running on a treadmill, each step exerts many times your body weight upon your knees, legs, hips, and feet.

As you get older and older this continued damage adds up. An elliptical machine has nearly no impact on your joints. You are not stepping down so you are not exerting the same downward force on your lower body. Instead because of the swinging motion of an elliptical, the energy and stress is used by your muscles and tendons, which is the goal of every workout.

Elliptical Training Versus Stationary Bike

Another tried and true method of cardio training is the stationary bike. Bikes provide a very good way to get a strong lower body workout with very little impact. Unfortunately, bike training does even less than a treadmill for your upper body. The less muscles you use when doing cardio exercise, the less calories you burn.

The fewer calories you burn, the longer you will be on the machine. Although riding a stationary bike has very little effect on your joints, it is not any less than an elliptical. With far less return on the number of calories burned, it should be obvious what the benefits of elliptical training over stationary bike training are.

Elliptical Training Versus Stair Master

They are very similar, the stair master offers the same full body workout as an elliptical but with a good deal more punishing effect on your body. Both offer extreme calorie burning, but where the elliptical has very little stress on your body, a stair master creates quite a pounding on your muscles and joints. If you already use a stair master and are trying to get the same workout without the all the pain, try an elliptical machine.

For another great article on elliptical machines visit What are the advantages of an elliptical machine