How Long Should You Exercise a Day to Lose Weight?

You never want to push yourself to the limit where you're not able to do a full workout the next day. When you first begin your weight-loss workout, you may be tempted to go all-out. And when the day is done, you may be happy thinking that you exercised for four hours and burned 5,000 calories. But it's not a one-day thing; you have to exercise for the long term. And remember, it's not so much how long you exercise as opposed to how you exercise and how you eat.

Jumping Jacks

Jumping jacks are a great way to get your heart rate going and loosen up your muscles for a workout. Make sure you have enough room to spread your arms and legs out wide while you're exercising. Do 100 jumping jacks and take a one-minute break. This should take no longer than five minutes. If you feel like you have a lot of energy, do another 50 jumping jacks and then take a short rest. This is just to ease you into your real weight-loss workout: interval training.

Interval Training

The best way to lose weight is by doing interval training. You want to do about 15 to 30 minutes of interval training a day. Interval training is just what it sounds like. Alternate between jogging and sprinting in intervals. Start off by jogging for one minute, then sprint for 30 seconds, then jog for another minute, and sprint for another 30 seconds. Repeat this process until you have worked out for 15 to 30 minutes. If you don't have enough energy to jog, replace it with walking, and if you're too tired to sprint, jog or run as fast as you can. You can do this workout every day or alternate days if you'd like.

Ski Steps

To ease out of your interval training, do a set of ski steps. For those who ski, this is easy, for those that don't know what ski steps are, don't worry about it, they're easy. Doing ski steps is similar to doing jumping jacks. Instead of jumping up and down and moving your feet side to side, you'll jump up and down and move your feet forward and backward. Start with your right foot slightly in front of your left. Jump up and land with your left foot in front of your right foot. Keep alternating and do this exercise quickly. Keep your arms in front of you as if you were holding ski poles. Do 100 ski steps. This will take no longer than five minutes.

Conclusion

All in all, you shouldn't spend more than an hour exercising. These exercises are just a general guideline for weight loss. Use a calorie calculator to find out how many calories you would burn for other exercises you may want to do. Running, jogging, swimming and biking are all great fat-burning exercises. To really lose weight effectively, you'll have to combine a solid hour of exercising with a healthy diet. Exercising is nothing if you're not eating right.