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Author, The Cardio-Free Diet and #1 New York Times bestseller, The Business Plan for the Body, and Flip the Switch;
Fitness Contributor on ABC’s Good Morning America;
Host of Couch Potatoes on ABC News Now;
Founder of Jim Karas Personal Training, LLC, which has worked with over 500 clients in Chicago and New York, including ABC’s Diane Sawyer and Cynthia McFadden, CNN’s Paula Zahn, and actors Hugh Jackman ( X Men 3: The Last Stand), Rachel Weisz, Candace Bergen and Emma Thompson;
Graduate of the Wharton School of Business.
CBN.com – KISS THE TREADMILL GOODBYE
Author and weight-loss expert Jim Karas says you can kiss your treadmill goodbye. He says cardiovascular workouts burn a few calories, but far fewer than you think. From 1987-2000 the number of people exercising on treadmills increased by 900 percent, meanwhile obesity doubled. Using this and other research, Jim developed a new approach to weight-loss: The Cardio Free Diet.
Your body functions like an equation, Jim says, where we look at calories in and calories out. For too long we’ve focused on the first part of the equation when trying to lose weight. Instead, Jim notes that looking at dieting like that is what has led many people to fad dieting.He stresses the need to burn calories and says that interval strength training is the best way to do that for a few reasons:
1. It provides absolute enhanced heart health. Skeptics fear that eliminating cardio-exercise will put people in higher danger for heart problems, but Jim says that’s not so. It’s your heart-rate variability that he says really counts -- how fast we respond to stimuli. If you’re walking 30 minutes on a treadmill at one pace, your heart rate is at a steady rate, but that doesn’t replicate life. “We live our lives in spurts, not marathons,” Jim says. Giving examples like running after your toddler in the grocery store, or running to catch a bus, he thinks your exercise pattern should match the pace of your life.
2. Interval strength training provides greater flexibility.
3. Interval strength training increases lean muscle tissue and increases metabolism. Jim says that you can lose weight doing intervals of cardio- exercise also, but that cardio will not build your lean muscle tissue in the same way that interval strength training does. Besides that, Jim says cardio can actually be detrimental. “It kills your time, your energy, your joints, and your motivation.” He says the only people who should ever do cardio are those who really enjoy it. Others should cut it out completely.
JIM PRACTICES WHAT HE PREACHES
Jim says that, truth be told, he was not always fit. On his Web site, he shares the story of how he grew up eating all the time and hating athletics.
“Growing up, polishing off a bag of chips or a box of donuts was about as commonplace as brushing my teeth. If you can believe it, I was actually taken downtown once for simply borrowing a couple of donuts from a local grocery store to satisfy an instant craving,” he writes.
In college, Jim says he took up smoking and found that he was losing weight. Unfortunately, he was also losing the ability to walk without stopping for a breather. Eventually, he realized the damage smoking had on his body and decided to quit smoking and keep a healthy eating and exercise program. With that goal in mind, he succeeded, and says he felt so much better that he couldn’t imagine going back to the way he was before.
Today, he helps others lose weight and feel good about their bodies using research that he and his staff members have studied. He’s worked with celebrities like ABC’s Diane Sawyer and Cynthia McFadden, CNN’s Paula Zahn, and actors Hugh Jackman (Jim got him in the best shape of his life for filming X Men 3: The Last Stand), Rachel Weisz, Candace Bergen, and Emma Thompson. He believes that you can’t give advice until you have done the research, tested it, and determined its effectiveness. Jim clearly practices what he preaches.
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