How to Sneak Fat-Blasting Cardio Time into Your Day

Why Parking in the Back of the Lot Isn't Enough

Ever wonder why those little lunchtime walks and brisk trips up the stairs that everyone recommends don't help you lose any substantial weight? That's because they simply aren't intense cardio routines. If you really want to lose weight, you have to get your heart rate up for at least forty five minutes or so a day, and for most of us that's just a minimum requirement. The problem is, with packed schedules and to-do lists, not many of us have forty five plus minutes a day for cardiovascular exercise. Most of us are doing good to park at the back of the lot to increase the amount of walking we get in from the car to our offices. Don't give up hope just yet, though. There are ways to sneak in that exercise for weight loss purposes, so read on.

First, and you won't want to hear this, but you really can just set that alarm clock about fifty minutes earlier if you want to find a time to just get the whole workout done and out of the way at once. Yes, that first week you'll be guzzling caffeine to stay awake at work due to the loss of that precious hour of sleep, but in the long run your better fitness level will pay off in more than enough energy and better sleep during the night to take care of that problem. You may have to make some schedule adjustments in your day at first to be able to make sure that you still receive eight hours of sleep each night (extremely important), but you will also find that getting up an hour early will have your mind prepped and your day planned out before it is well underway, making it easier to get through. A little time saving tip to this approach is to make sure that you don't have to travel to the gym for your exercise. Get up, throw some clothes on and start jogging around the block or exercising to a cardio DVD. Gyms are great, but most of us never go to them because of the commute and the expense. Just get moving and make the most of your time as soon as you open your eyes in the morning.