Let’s face it, losing weight is hard. It takes so much dedication, hard work, and discipline, it’s no wonder so many of us never meet our weight loss goals. But I’ve found my key to weight loss success, and it could be yours too! Kickboxing!
Kickboxing is an extremely effective way to lose weight. To lose weight, you need to burn more calories than you consume. Kickboxing has been shown to burn between 350-500 calories per class depending on the intensity of the workout. This can translate into 2 pounds monthly with just 3 classes per week. If your goal is to lose body fat and maintain muscle mass, kickboxing is a great option.
But there’s more to losing and keeping the weight off than meets the eye. Kickboxing isn’t a great way to lose weight simply because of the calories you can burn during the workout. There’s so much more to it! Let’s take a deeper dive into how and why kickboxing is such an effective and powerful tool to help you burn fat and get the body you’ve always wanted (or used to have!).
Kickboxing is a Calorie Torching HIIT Workout
What is HIIT? HIIT is an acronym for high-intensity interval training. HIIT has been around for more than 30 years and can be used by everyone from professional athletes to beginners. This type of workout is extremely popular with fitness enthusiasts due to its versatility, quality, and effectiveness.
The goal of HIIT is to push you beyond your normal limits in a short amount of time with short and intense bursts of exercise followed by recovery periods. HIIT has been proven to burn more calories in a shorter amount of time than a longer, low intensity workout. It also provides an “afterburn” effect in which your metabolism and calorie consumption is increased for up to 48 hours after the workout.
There are many variations of the HIIT workout that can be achieved through a combination of kickboxing drills in order to maximize your cardio routine.
Most kickboxing drills include a combination of different strikes done with maximum intensity for 1-2 minutes with a short recovery in between drills. Kickboxing is the ultimate workout for integrating high intensity interval training, and this is one of the many reasons kickboxing is such a powerful tool for weight loss.
Kickboxing Helps You Lose Belly Fat
Kickboxing is a cardiovascular workout that improves overall fitness by increasing stamina, strength, and endurance. Kickboxing helps you shed fat faster because this HIIT type of workout stimulates your metabolism for up to 48 hours after each session.
This high-intensity workout also increases lean muscle mass while reducing body fat. In addition to improving health and fitness levels, the added calorie consumption from these changes results in weight loss over time which leads to belly fat reduction.
Because kickboxing engages your core during the majority of the workout, you will also tone and strengthen all of the abdominal muscles, helping to flatten and tighten the stomach area. You won’t find a cardiovascular workout that is more beneficial in losing belly fat than a HIIT kickboxing session.
Kickboxing Maintains Muscle Tone to Maximize Calorie Burn
Muscles play a crucial role in the body’s energy balance. According to science based research, muscles consume calories and the more muscular you are, the higher your resting metabolic rate is. Muscle tissue is metabolically active, meaning it requires energy to sustain itself and to perform its necessary functions within your body.
In general, a pound of muscle demands approximately five calories per day just to keep up with daily activities. This means that for every 10 pounds of additional muscle you gain throughout your life, your metabolic rate can increase by an estimated 50 calories per day. In short, the more muscle you have, the more calories your body consumes.
In this study it is noted that “both amateur and elite-level male kickboxers are characterized by… well-developed muscle mass and low body fat percentage.” Striking a punching bag engages and develops all of the major muscle groups, which will in turn increase metabolism and calorie burn. So if you are looking to lose weight while maintaining your muscle mass, kickboxing is the way to go.
Kickboxing is Motivating
It’s often difficult to stay motivated to workout, but kickboxing can be your cure. Not only does it provide a great workout, helping you burn calories and shed pounds of fat which can be super motivating on it’s own, it also builds confidence in your physical fitness and encourages you to improve your overall health.
The intensity of the workouts keep you focused on your goals and pushes you harder than other workouts might. The high-energy atmosphere in a class makes it easier to reach your fitness goal because there are always people around that are going just as hard as you are, which in turn gives you more inspiration to push yourself even further.
The variety you can have in each workout keeps things fresh and interesting so you never get bored.
The physical benefits kickboxing offers are numerous, which is also very motivating. Finding yourself getting stronger and having more stamina, flexibility, and balance at a much quicker pace than most other workouts will drive you to continue to work toward your goals.
There are many ways to lose weight, but not all of them will keep your interest in the long term. To lose weight, you need to find a workout that you will stick with and continue for for months or years.
Kickboxing classes are a fun alternative that offer an intense workout in a short amount of time. I never dread my kickboxing training sessions. In fact I look forward to them and if I could, I would do kickboxing everyday. It’s that fun and motivating!
Kickboxing Can Be Done Anywhere
Since you can do kickboxing at the gym, at home, or even outside, you never have a reason to skip a workout. Having the option to do some or even all of your training at home helps you stay consistent.
Kickboxing is extremely versatile. You can practice anywhere with no equipment if necessary. It doesn’t matter if you’re broke, extremely busy, or live in a tiny space, there are no excuses with kickboxing. If there’s a will there’s a way.
If there is ever a time when you’re unable to get to a class, or you have to workout when the gym is closed, you always have the option of doing an online class from a YouTube video in your garage, living room, or at the park. You can always make it happen because you can do kickboxing anywhere.
Kickboxing Can Be Done With or Without Equipment
You can literally do kickboxing with absolutely no equipment. So if you’re strapped for cash and can’t afford gym fees, you can simply push play on a YouTube kickboxing tutorial and start your workout. You don’t need gloves, or a punching bag- you simply need a space to move. It’s that easy and cheap.
Being able to jump in and start kickboxing without buying anything makes this workout accessible to everyone and anyone. So often when you begin a new sport there are expensive purchases that need to be made in order to get started. There is no entry barrier for kickboxing. It’s truly something you could start doing the minute you finish reading this article!
Of course, if you have higher goals than just losing weight, there are many things you can buy to help you achieve those goals. In this article I have listed all of the equipment you might need if you’re planning on taking kickboxing to the next level or if your have more specific goals you want to accomplish.
If you join a kickboxing gym, oftentimes they will supply everything you need. But if you’ll be punching anything (a bag, an opponent, etc..) the one thing you’ll want to get yourself are some good gloves.
Kickboxing Relieves Stress
Kickboxing is a great stress reliever. Why does this matter when your goal is to lose weight? There’s no doubt that stress affects our weight. When we feel stressed, our bodies produce hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline which give us a burst of energy to make it through the stressful situation.
Elevated cortisol can cause stored triglycerides (the fat in your blood) to be relocated to your visceral fat cells, predominantly the ones under muscle and in the abdomen. This is exactly what you don’t want and why it is so important to keep stress to a minimum when trying to lose weight.
Physical activity in general has been proven to reduce stress. This study evaluated 145 college students and found that “students with moderate physical activity had nearly half the odds of better stress management as compared with students with higher physical activity.”
Because kickboxing is both aerobic and anaerobic, feel good chemicals called endorphins will be released in the brain during and after your workout. These endorphins will decrease stress and improve your mood.
Besides this positive chemical reaction that is created when kickboxing, you can also reap the benefits of getting into a sort of meditative state during your rounds. When your mind is so clearly focused on your workout and you think of nothing else, this psychological state is known as “flow”. Getting into this state of flow has also been proven to greatly reduce stress.
The sport of kickboxing lends itself to getting into this focused state because it requires you to keep your eye on a target while honing in on striking accuracy and practicing good form.
When you become completely engaged in your performance you will often lose your perception of time and lose yourself and your worries in the moment. It’s difficult to be thinking about the bills you have to pay or the argument you had with your coworker when you are so intently concentrated on your training.
This combination of exercising in a flow state, along with the increase in endorphins is the perfect prescription to ease your stress. And less stress leads to a decrease in the fat magnet hormone called Cortisol.
Kickboxing = More Endorphins. More Endorphins = Less Cortisol. Less Cortisol = Less Fat. It’s the perfect equation for weight loss!
Kickboxing is Fun
Of all the many different ways I have tried to lose weight, I would say that hands down kickboxing is the most fun! I have tried running, swimming, weightlifting, cycling, rowing, and the list goes on and on… but nothing beats the enthusiasm I have for kickboxing.
With a wide array of different strikes involved in kickboxing, there are countless options for new and varied combinations and workouts. There’s something so satisfying to just punch and kick with everything you’ve got. It allows you to release your aggressions in a positive way. It’s fun and exhilarating and there is always something new to work on and master.
For most people, a workout routine has to be something they really enjoy to be able to stick to it and stay consistent. Kickboxing has all of the components of being fun while at the same time being extremely effective for getting fit. This blend of fun and real results will keep you coming back for more.
Kickboxing is a Faster Way to Lose Weight than Many Other Workouts
As mentioned earlier, kickboxing can be an amazing HIIT workout. And HIIT has demonstrated in many research studies to be the fastest way to burn calories and lose weight.
You can turn other exercises like running or cycling into HIIT workouts by increasing your intensity for short bursts and then recovering in an interval pattern. But from experience I know that this can get extremely monotonous. Kickboxing has so much variety involved, the intervals never get boring.
Kickboxing also burns calories faster than other exercises because it engages so many major muscle groups throughout the workout. Incorporating strength training with high intensity intervals fires up the metabolism and burns through those calories like nothing else.
As you can see, kickboxing is an incredibly efficient and powerful workout for losing weight, maintaining muscle, de-stressing, and staying motivated.
If you want to learn more about the different styles of kickboxing and which one is best for you check out this article. If you’d like to learn more about the equipment you’ll need for kickboxing read this post. It has all of the gear listed in the order of most to least important according to your goals.
And finally, if you need some recommendations on the best gear for kickboxing, look at my recommended products page. Now go get your fight on!