Here’s The #1 Secret To Proven, Time-Efficient Running Workouts
That DO NOT Involve 1-Hour Sessions But Burn Fat Much Better
Than Other Programs Can…

So you want to start running to lose weight, but you’re wondering whether running a few miles per 60-minute workout is really the most efficient way to lose weight.

And since you’re pretty new to this, you’re pretty positive that a 45 to 60 minute continuous run is murder on your lungs and legs. Hell, you don’t even know if you could run for five minutes straight without stopping!

While most books recommend going for a rigorous, tedious workout such as this, these books were written by personal fitness instructors and were mostly meant for athletes and those who want to run marathons.

But what about those of us who just want to lose weight but just DO NOT HAVE a couple spare hours everyday to dedicate to running and working out?

Is it REALLY possible to lean down to our ideal weights without running for what seems to be hours on end?

Can beginners who can’t run for very long REALLY tone down and lose weight without taking on a workout meant for those training to run a marathon?

What if I tell you that yes, it’s VERY POSSIBLE to lose weight from a program that starts out with running for as little as 3 times a week as long as you follow this important rule rarely talked about in the fitness circles?

You can find out the #1 secret to time-efficient workouts that most fitness experts know, but would never dream of telling you about, by reading this FREE report.

Plenty of people (including myself) get excited when they’re about to start a workout program.

Doesn’t matter if it’s running to lose weight, weightlifting to build muscle, or endurance training for stamina — whatever their goal is, they’re usually very excited (not to mention motivated) during those first few workouts. They buy workout clothes, special shoes, weights, even a new iPod. They make a drastic change to their diet and decide that they’re only going to eat X-amount of food everyday and commit to it like their life depended on it.

It’s good for the first week or two, maybe even three. But after that, their excitement and motivation just starts to wane down. Suddenly, there just isn’t a desire to workout on that day. Either the weather’s bad, there’s a really good television program on, got caught up in work, etc. It’s fine, they say, they’ll just make up for it tomorrow.

But then tomorrow never comes, and it just keeps getting pushed back further and further. Until before you know it, they’re back to their couch potato habits and putting all sorts of junk in their body.

I know this because I was one of these people. It took me years and years to get off my ass and make a permanent change to my lifestyle. Hopefully, these three little tips will help you do the same.

#1: Push Yourself, But Don’t Push Too Hard

In my opinion, this is the #1 reason why people start a running regimen to lose weight, then fall out by the second or third week (if not the first). Simply speaking, they try to do too much too soon. They push themselves to the brink, and eventually fall off the cliff and never get back on track again.

While some people get a high off pushing themselves nearly to death every workout, it takes an intense amount of mind power, testosterone, tolerance to adrenaline and a little insanity to keep doing this day in, day out. Not to say that it’s a bad thing, but what if you’re just not one of those people?

If you look back at the previous times that you tried to follow a workout regiment and find that this is one of your problems for not sticking with a workout, then here’s a simple solution: aim to push yourself just a little bit past your comfort zone, and nothing more.

Bit by bit does the trick. If doing nothing is 0%, you’ll find yourself much closer to your goals if you push yourself to 10% everyday than to push yourself to 80% once and then tucking away your running shoes for the next 365 days.

#2: Reward Yourself

I love it whenever someone says, “I just don’t have the time to workout” then spend hours on the couch at the end of the day watching TV.

Fact: everybody has the same 24 hours in a day, and it’s all up to you to decide how to use it. If you watch a lot of TV (I personally cannot be torn away from Entourage, CSI, Family Guy and Friends reruns) then use that as a reward when you do workout instead of an excuse not to.

Most people have the technology to record television programs anyway. Record your favorite shows, and discipline yourself to only watch those episodes if and only if you complete a run today.

#3: Measure Your Results

Nothing can be more demotivating than putting in all this hard work and not seeing results. It could even make you think that you’re a little bit crazy if nobody else comments on how much slimmer you’ve gotten.

This is the reason why I log as much data as I can. The best motivation to keep working out is when you actually do see positive results of your hard work. I have a journal where I log everything from my starting weight, body fat percentage, actual time spent running vs. walking, distance, and intensity. Whenever I don’t forget to, I actually take pictures so I actually have visual proof of what I used to look like a week ago, 4 weeks ago, 8 weeks ago, and so on and so forth.

That way, even if nobody seems to notice your progress (yet!), at least you know that you’re going crazy. If you stick to the program long enough, however, people WILL start noticing — and honestly, that is one of the best feelings in the world.

Good luck with your running, and I’d love to hear whatever progress you make!

Before actually starting running, most beginners are still trying to convince themselves that running to lose weight is the best thing they can do to drop those pounds and keep that fat off their bellies forever. If you find yourself asking yourself those questions before you actually get out and start exercising, then maybe this story will help make up your mind.

Being in my mid-to-late-twenties, the effects of a slowing metabolism has been creeping up on me for a couple of years now. Just last Christmas, when I found myself weighing at 140 pounds — an astounding 25 pounds more than I was just a year and a half ago. I felt grossed out with myself when I saw the holiday pictures — never have I seen my face to be that chubby before!

(Before you get jealous that I was “only” 140, keep in mind that I’m a short guy — my height is 5’3”. So if you calculate my body mass index, that easily puts me at the Overweight category.)

That’s when the first “snap” moment happened, and I decided to take my health more seriously than ever. Gone are the college days when I could drink a six-pack of beer and have pizza for dinner everyday and never gain weight. I had to do something, and fast.

I took on a serious diet and drastically cut down what I ate. Because I took working out pretty seriously back in college, I knew that I should be working out — but I didn’t. True enough, I did shed quite a few pounds after a month or two and got back down to 130.

Then I went on a 3-week vacation in April.

I’m sure you know how it goes: you’re too busy to even THINK about working out. You’re eating out all the time and don’t give a damn whatsoever about calorie control. Hell, drink all the beer that you want — life is short so live it drunk!

When I got back, I shot back up to 136 pounds. In just 3 short weeks.

I KNEW that if I wanted to drop the pounds and keep them off for good, there really was no way around it; I was going to have to buckle up, bite the bullet, and *gasp* run.

My weight regulated down to around 132-134 pounds after that, but I still looked bloated. I still didn’t like the way I looked in pictures. So after having another “snap” moment, I put on my shorts and shoes, grabbed my brother’s iPod (my Zune broke while I was on vacation) and went on running.

It was difficult at first, but I managed to get that workout under my belt. I’d run an average of 3-4x per week; sometimes running only 2, sometimes going as much as 5 workouts — depending on my motivation level. I was also going through some personal issues at this time, and I found that running was an excellent way to forget all my problems at least momentarily.

A month or two of dedicated myself to running so I could lose weight, and I found myself down to 125 pounds.

The moment of truth came when I went on another 3-week vacation. Except this time, I only gained 2-3 pounds after I got back. Not to mention, my friends complimented me on how much healthier I looked, not just on how much weight I lost.

Because of the way that weight loss works, the weight loss you get from exercise is much more permanent than any prolonged period of dieting will give you (you can read here for my take on why weight loss from running and exercise is better than a short-term diet).

Before I started this website that I obviously dedicated towards the art of running to lose weight, I went online and did a bit of research on what I should be writing about.

It seemed to me that this question was on almost every beginner’s mind. They want to burn fat and lose weight, and know that running is probably the most effective way to be able to achieve their goals. However, they’re scared that they’ll never get to reap the rewards of running because they’ve never been a runner before and could barely run an entire lap without wheezing their lungs out.

That’s why I wanted to dedicate an article to speak to everybody who has this exact thought lingering on their minds.

Let me confess something to you — my whole life, I never thought I was going to find myself in a position where I’m writing about and advocating running to lose weight because truth be told, I used to HATE running with a passion.

I mean seriously, I despised it. I dreaded our quarterly mile-runs during my middle school PE class, I hated running around the track during basketball practice during high school, and avoided any forms of exercise that consisted of running at a consistent pace for a prolonged period of time. Any form of distance or endurance training, I couldn’t stand.

What happened? Age and a slower metabolism happened, and the only way that I was able to get rid of the belly fat was through running.

I believe that a lot of people have come to hate running because they were pushed too hard at one instance and simply became averse to the activity as they grew older. And I’m here to tell you that you do NOT have to push yourself to the limits in order to get the fat loss benefits that running has to offer.

In the interest of full disclosure, I’ll admit that I’m a heavy smoker, and have been for nearly a decade now (I’m in my mid-to-late-twenties, so no, it doesn’t take a math genius to figure out that I started smoking way too early). When I first started running, I could barely run for an entire minute without panting and wheezing. But it actually didn’t take long until I started seeing some improvements; just a month and a half after, I was able to run for 5 to 6 minutes straight before I absolutely have to stop to catch my breath.

So if you’re a complete beginner and are asking yourself how exactly can you start running to lose weight and actually get the benefits even if you’re not a hardcore runner, here’s my answer: START SLOW.

You don’t have to run an entire mile right away. Run as much as you can, walk until you catch your breath, then run again. Whether that means running for 30 seconds then walking for 4 minutes, it doesn’t matter. What’s important is you at least match your intensity from the previous workout, and even better if you push yourself just a little bit farther next time (that could mean running for 45 seconds next time).

The system that I detail in this manual gives you a more consistent and accurate way to measure your run-walk intervals (plus it gives you more to work with so you can plan your next workout better and set better goals), but the above method is good enough for those on a really tight budget.

How Does The Fat Loss Process Work Exactly?

Scientifically speaking, energy is what our bodies burn to keep it going on a day to day basis. This energy comes from the food that we eat, which has a certain calorie amount which is basically a unit of measurement for energy. Even without exercising, your body burns energy to keep its systems functioning — this is called the basal metabolic rate (BMR), or how much energy is burnt when the body’s at rest.

If your BMR is 2,000 calories (meaning you burn 2,000 calories everyday without exercise), and you take in 2,000 calories in food every day, your weight will stay the same.

If you take in more calories than your BMR, what does your body do with the extra calories? It turns it into fat — thus, you gain weight. If you take in less calories than your BMR, your body has to find other sources of energy to burn — and since fat is nothing but stored energy, you burn fat.

Simple, right?

Now, because you’re reading this site, I assume you’re interested in losing weight and shedding those extra pounds that you got around your waistline or burning off that cellulite on your thighs. With that said, I’m going to assume that common sense and basic arithmetic can tell you that in order to lose weight, you have to create a calorie deficit, in one way or the other.

How Exactly Does Running Help You Lose Weight And Burn Fat?

Simply speaking, running helps you to lose fat and keep it off permanently (at least, more permanently than a short-term diet) is by conditioning it to burn off more calories on a daily basis than you currently are.

That means that instead of decreasing your daily calorie intake (which slows down your metabolism), making running a constant habit trains your body to burn more energy and ends up speeding up your metabolism. And based on my informal research, it is MUCH easier to improve an “okay” metabolism than to fix a “broken” one.

Truth be told, the benefits of running and cardio doesn’t happen during the workout — the magic happens AFTER. By making running a habit, your body is slowly getting used to burning more energy throughout the day, increasing your BMR and actually allows you to eat more than you usually do!

This is exactly why I believe that running (or some form of cardio training) is a great idea for those who want to lose weight, even if they are complete beginners and have never been much of a runner before.

Why Can’t You Just Eat Less And Skip The Workout?

You can. A calorie deficit is a calorie deficit, whether you’re doing it by running to lose weight or eating less calories. But let me tell you the two reasons why I don’t believe it to be a sustainable method to burn fat and lose weight.

The first reason is that you can’t guarantee that you’re going to eat that amount forever. Most people are unsuccessful in maintaining a diet based on creating calorie deficits, and end up reverting to their old eating habits. This is called yo-yo dieting, and even Oprah blames her up-and-down weight gain with yo-yo dieting and a lack of exercise.

Second reason, and perhaps the more important one, is that while you’re starving yourself, it triggers your body’s natural famine response. Basically, it thinks that you’re going through some sort of famine/starvation period. It starts to get calories from your muscles instead of your fat storage.

And when you do go back to your old eating habits, the body thinks, “I better stock up on energy for the next time this famine happens!” and stores ALL extra calories as fat instead of distributing them to both fat and muscle.

We remember from this basic primer on that running helps you lose weight permanently by conditioning your body to burn off more calories on a daily basis.

So in order to do that, most people ask:

“Just how hard do I have to work if I want to start running to lose weight?”
“How far of a distance should I aim for with every workout?”
“How much time should I spend per workout?”
Or my favorite question: “How fast should I run?”

If you’re looking to get great results from running, here’s the real secret that nobody seems to tell you about…It’s all about having regular sessions that keep your heart rate regularly elevated for a prolonged period of time.

Now that could be a little complicated to understand for some, so let’s analyze that part by part, shall we?

“Regular sessions” — this means that you’re running AT LEAST three times a week. Having a two hour running session once every two weeks really isn’t doing you any good because it doesn’t condition your body to burn off more calories on a daily basis.

“Keep your heart rate regularly elevated” — I used to play basketball in exchange for running, but I hardly saw any weight loss. Why? Because the nature of basketball is that it’s a stop-and-go sport. While there’s a lot of high intensity activity because of all the sprints that you do, there’s also a lot of rest in between. To get any weight loss benefits from exercising, you need to be able to minimize this rest period and keep your heart rate up and going…

“…for a prolonged period of time” — It’s not just enough to get your heart rate up, because you must be able to sustain that heart rate for a certain period of time before your body considers it to be a regular activity. The industry-accepted belief is at least twenty minutes — but I like getting more results from my workouts, so I keep it at 30 minutes at the very least.

It’s useless to say that you should aim for 3 miles each workout if you’re walking all the way.

It’s equally useless to say that you should jog for 45 minutes each time if you’re barely pushing yourself to keep your heart rate elevated to an optimum level for fat loss.

And most useless is to say that you should run as fast as you can every workout if you end up giving 150% for the first 2 minutes then calling it a day.

I’m not going to take away from all the theories that fitness experts claim — I’m sure their theories are based on facts as well. But for the beginner who’s looking to start running to lose weight, keeping this simple concept in mind is probably the easiest way to get results from a running regimen and lose as much weight as you can in as little time as you could.

(To dramatically increase the effectiveness of your running workouts so you could lose weight faster and easier, I highly suggest you go ahead and download my book on running to lose weight. Tons of people had success with this running system, and it won’t hurt to take a peek.)