The Best Running Pace for Weight Loss

One way to determine the best jogging speed for weight loss is to monitor your heart rate. Elevating your heart rate so that it is in the optimum zone for losing weight can help you achieve your weight-loss goals.

The key is determining the right zone for you individually and then monitoring your heart rate during exercise to ensure you are in that zone.

Your resting heart is an effective measure of your current physical condition. To measure your resting heart rate, take your heart rate soon after waking over the course of three to four days. Feel your radial or carotid pulse for one minute and count the number of beats. The average of those measurements is your resting rate. If your resting heart rate is over 90, see a doctor before starting a running regimen.

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Your maximum heart rate represents the most times that your heart can beat in a minute before health-related problems can occur. To calculate your maximum heart rate, subtract your age from 220, says Mayo Clinic. As you exercise, monitor your heart using a heart rate monitor. You can buy a strapless monitor to wear during your runs. If your heart rate approaches your maximum, slow down or stop entirely and let your heart rate return to its resting rate before continuing.

ExRx suggests that, for a fat burn running speed, you stay within 55, 65 and as high as 90 percent of your maximum heart rate. As you run, focus on setting your pace fast enough to get your heart rate up into this zone for at least 30 minutes and up to 60 minutes per training session.

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There are many ways to run to elevate your heart rate into the fat-burning zone. One way is to find a steady pace that gets your heart rate into this zone. Another way is to include inclines, or hills, and sprints followed by steadier, slower jogging. On a straight-away perform high-intensity interval training, or HIIT.

The American Council on Exercise Fitness says that interval training produces EPOC — excess post-exercise oxygen consumption — which is the phenomenon responsible for burning more calories after you've finished working out.

Performing intervals is one of the most effective ways to run to lose weight. For a HIIT run, simply race all-out for 30 seconds to a minute and then slow down to an easy jog for two minutes. Repeat the pace for up to 20 minutes. When you run regularly, your body adjusts to your exercise and it becomes harder to reach the necessary zone. Continually modifying your runs to increase the challenge can help you lose the weight.

While a steady pace burns calories, your running speed and how much you weigh makes a significant difference in the total number of calories burned. An easy 30-minute jog burns 180 calories if you weigh 125 pounds and 266 calories at 185 pounds, according to Harvard Health Publishing. Pick up the pace to a 6 mph run, and you'll burn between 300 and 444 calories in 30 minutes. Runners who can maintain a 10 mph pace burn between 495 and 733 for that same half-hour run. Changing your running speed can make a difference in the amount of calories burned and weight lost per week.

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