RIO Fitness Chicago® Exercise & Nutrition Blog

RIO Fitness Chicago® Tip:

What's the best exercise for abs/arms/butt/etc? The answer: there is no "best" exercise. If we have jiggly arms, or a booty that needs firming, just focusing on those areas is not going to work. There is no such thing as spot reduction, other than liposuction surgery. We need to strength train from head to toe, and do cardio properly to be burning majority calories from fat and not energy calories.

Start strength training three to four days per week. Strength training burns four times more calories than cardio, and keeps your metabolism high twenty-four to thirty-six hours. The most effective way to strength train to get lean & tone quickly is HIGH INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING.

HIIT Examples:

Do 60sec of walking lunges while doing dumbbell bicep curls, then with no rest in between do 60sec of side to side pushups. Then rest 60sec and repeat for three sets.

Do 60sec sit/stand on a chair/bench while doing dumbbell shoulder presses, then with no rest in between get in a pushup position and for 60sec do a jumping jack. Then rest 60sec and repeat for three sets.

Google/YouTube High Intensity Interval Training for more.


Four to five times per week start doing cardio properly to be burning majority calories from fat, not energy. Doing more than 30 minutes of cardio is going to be majority energy calories; more than an hour is going to burn muscle. To do cardio properly to burn majority fat calories do just 25 minutes of 60 second high then low intensity intervals of cardio.

Cardio example (treadmill):

Warm-up 60sec @ 3.0 speed
Minute 1 - Speed 5.0
Min 3 - Speed 5.0
Min 5 - Speed 5.0
Min 7 - Speed 5.0
Min 9 - Speed 5.0
Min 11 - Speed 7.0
Min 13 - Speed 7.0
Min 15 - Speed 7.0
Min 17 - Speed 7.0
Min 19 - Speed 7.0
Min 21 - Speed 9.0
Min 23 - Speed 9.0
Cool-down 60sec @ Speed 3.0

That's it just 25mins of cardio to burn body fat! All the even numbered mins (2,4,6, etc) you come down to Speed 3.0. This is just an example, adjust it to your fitness level.

There's no wrong time to do cardio, but the two best times are: as soon as you wake up before consuming calories, and after strength training.