shpalman wrote: ↑Sun Jan 08, 2023 11:35 am
I think the aim of people in this thread would be to burn off some of their visceral fat rather than the glycogen stored in their liver, but then most people would benefit from better aerobic fitness and any calorie burned is a calorie you can eat without adding to the fat store.
Yes this is why energy pathways used during exercise are largely irrelevant for fat loss, although the concept of a fat burning zone can be useful for people performing hours-long endurance activities trying to avoid bonking by preserving glycogen stores.
For weight loss, if you burn more fat during activity you'll just burn more glycogen later, and vice versa. The only way the ratio of pathways can have an effect is if someone completely crashes their glycogen stores so they barely move afterwards and so reduce their later energy expenditure. But, even for someone cutting carbs during a diet, this is going to require at least 90+ minutes of running, pretty vigorous cycling, or similarly intense activity.
More intense activity will basically always result in more fat loss per unit time or distance run/cycled/etc even if slightly less fat was burned during the activity itself. Less intense activity can be performed more often, requires less recovery and produces less stresses on the body so is probably a better idea in most cases anyway. Personally, I think the best change in activity almost everyone could make if they want to lose weight, regardless of their current fitness and activity level, is to walk more. Once you factor in not needing to change clothes and shower you'll even burn more calories per minute than you would for shorter runs and other activities too.