0 How Can Cycling Help you Lose Weight?

With so many varieties of exercise, it’s difficult to know which one is best for you. If you’re looking lose weight, improve muscle strength and increase the overall health of your body, cycling can do just that.

De-stress to find a Healthier You

For many people, stress can cause unnecessary weight gain and an unhealthy lifestyle. If you’re anything like me, stress either leads to emotional eating or my body’s natural defences storing food sources until I begin eating regularly again. All in all, being stressed can cause havoc within your body – and your waistline. So how does cycling fit into the equation? Leisurely cycling can create a calming effect over the body, helping you to relax and decrease stress levels. Countless studies have also shown that regular exercise promotes a healthier mental state, helping to prevent depression and other illnesses. Exercise also releases endorphins into the brain, creating a feeling of happiness and well-being.

Along with various other health benefits, reducing your stress levels, through exercise, can help you to maintain a healthy weight.

You’ll Cycle More

Nobody likes to be stuck in a sweaty gym, day in and day out. When choosing to add cycling to your daily exercise routine, you’ll quickly find that you’ll spend more time cycling than you ever would in a gym. Following the logic of this pattern, more exercise means more weight loss, which will help you to achieve your desired results in a much faster time frame.

Cyclists tend to spend more time exercising, in comparison to runners, due to the lack of strain placed on the body. Excessive running can cause leg and back pain, often leading to more serious injuries. Cycling is much kinder on the body, placing less stress on knee and hip joints, allowing you to exercise more regularly and for longer periods of time.

You’ll also spend more time cycling than doing regular exercise, because it’s an activity that can also be enjoyed on the weekend, with family or friends. Finding something that you both enjoy and that is healthy for you is often a rarity in life, making cycling a hidden gem of the exercise world.

Variety

Cycling provides a variety of riding options, also meaning a variety of exercise choices. Many exercise regimes can become repetitive, but cycling provides a wide range of options for riders, from mountain biking and cross country trails to leisure rides and competition racing. Mountain bikes are great for people wanting to lose weight, as the terrain of mountain biking continuously varies, offering new challenges and endless opportunities for developing muscle strength. As previously mentioned, leisure riding also provides a great, family-friendly activity, while competition racing is perfect for increasing heart rate and burning extra calories.

The health benefits of cycling seem virtually endless, particularly for those who want to lose weight. Don’t get stuck in a boring gym for one more day, get the most out of your exercise routine and start seeing results sooner.

Trent is a Professional Cyclist from Brisbane, Australia. He recommends cycling as a fun way for people to lose weight and increase their fitness levels. Trent recommends checking out 99 Bikes for a great range of mountain bikes and road bikes for men, women and children.