What’s the meaning of cardio?

Cardio is a type of exercise that, if done properly, brings a lot of benefits. But if you use it the wrong way, it can become a problem and a barrier to your body fitness.

That’s why you should focus on 3 main things:

Step 1: In the fitness industry, the best form of cardio is walking, jogging, and running, especially when you’re already in a good shape.

Step 2: You should not do cardio before or during your main workout. But why?
Let’s say you’re doing barbell workouts, suddenly you leave that and jump into some running or cardio during the resting period—that’s like mixing cardio with weight training. That’s not right.

Step 3: There’s no rule that only cardio will burn fat. Cardio mainly helps your health improvement.
If you use cardio just for fat burning, then you’ll need to work a lot harder, follow restrictions, and you won’t see quick results.
If your goal is to lose fat, can you do 1 hour of weight training plus 30 minutes of cardio daily?

There are 2 answers to that:

NO 1: There’s nothing wrong with doing 30 minutes of light cardio after gym or workout—but most people don’t have the time or energy left after 1.5 hours of workout. It becomes difficult, even if you’re highly motivated.

NO 2: If you focus on weight training, then an easy solution for cardio is this:
If you eat 3 major meals daily, just do 10–15 minutes of cardio after each meal.
That means, 3 meals x 15 min = 45 minutes of cardio per day. This helps with digestion too!

Now, let’s see the benefits of cardio:

 1. Heart Benefit

Through cardio, you can lead a healthy lifestyle. One of the most important parts of your body is your heart. Cardio helps control blood pressure and keeps your heart in a good condition—without any medicine.

 2. Benefit for Chronic Pain

Cardio activates many muscles in your body, which helps prevent long-term pain in your joints, bones, etc. It also helps in reducing body weight, which directly reduces back pain.

 3. Benefit for Brain Power

As we age, our brain tissues become weaker and start to reduce. Research shows that after the age of 30, brain power starts to slowly drop. But aerobic exercises (like cardio) can help improve brain function and slow down this process.
So basically, aerobic exercise helps both your body and brain stay healthy.

 4. Benefit for Weight Management

Cardio helps improve your full body structure. With cardiovascular training, you can easily lose weight—whether it’s cycling, swimming, walking, or running, anything works. It also increases your strength and helps with weight training, getting you to your fitness goal faster.

 5. Helps Control Blood Sugar

Daily cardio helps balance your insulin level and keeps your blood sugar low. This is especially helpful for diabetic patients, but not only them—cardio is useful for people of all ages.