if you look at the data distributed by age, it becomes really obvious that people in their 20-30s aren't _that_ overweight--although we certainly are overweight enough.
the problem is, i think, that a lot of children and teens are very overweight. that's where people should be concerned, and rightly so.
Hey all you gym bunnies. Just remember you have to get on the
>treadmill, the bike stand, the cross-country ski machine or the stair
>climber for at least twenty minutes if you want to lose weight. Just
>pumbing iron won't do it.
>
>Chuck Grimes
i used to think like that, even though i got into weight lifting as a kid. cardio was where it was at. that's soooooooo 80s.
a newbie to lifting can gain 3-7 lbs of muscle mass. in doing so, they increase their metabolic rate since muscle burns more calories than fat. at ~10-25 calories/per hour/per lb of increased lean body mass, that adds up to a decent amount of calories burned just sitting on your bum the rest of the day.
past 30? you lose about a lb of muscle mass a year. so weight training is important to retain, if not gain back, lean body mass. of course, you need to actually train, not lift pink plastic dumb bells at low weights/high reps.
do weight training for the reasons you should do it: increasing or maintaining muscle mass, training muscles, and increasing bone strength.
do cardio for cardiovascular health. additionally, they say that the best form of training for weight loss is HIIT. High Intensity Interval Training. Basically, you alternate moderate intensity jogging/running with sprinting (or the same on a bike or on the stair master. I'm not big on machines so I don't know how that'd work and I only read ppl discussing it at misc.fitness.weights.)
ask lyle mcdonald or elzi volk at misc.fitness.weights. they'll give you an overview of the scientific research that shows that the research that once indicated that there was an "afterburn" post-cardio was significantly overstated. heres' a start: