Quick question about cardio..

[notetoself]

I'm 6'0, 15 years old, and recently started professionally body building, so excuse my (very easy) question..

My question is why do bodybuilders focus on cardio? Running on a treadmill does get your heart rate up, but I've seen many go on it for like 30 mins.. Does cardio really give you that much muscle?

[notetoself]

Oh and excuse me if this has already been asked before. I just want a quick and simple answer. I've tried researching this but I get answers that have nothing to do with my question.

[iron_worker]

Well if they're trying to get their body fat down for a show then they would do cardio like that. Cardio does not build muscle, it builds muscle endurance and more so cardio vascular endurance.

So what makes you say you're "professional?" Get your pro card? lol I'm just messin with ya.

IronWorker

[notetoself]

Haha, I meant to say I'm on a quest to become a professional body builder. Thanks for the help!

[Andrew.cook]

Steady state cardio is terrible for maintaining muscle mass. The adaptation to make your body efficient for that type of physical work is to dump body weight, including muscle.

That being said, running is never bad for you (assuming you are capable of running) but you have to limit how much you do, and what kind of running. For instance, sprints require power, and will spare muscle to a degree. Shorter duration runs will also spare muscle, or give less cause for all that muscle mass to go away.

What you want to avoid is long runs... don't train like a track athlete or a distance runner... or even a basketball player. Too much running, IMO. Of course there will always be some freak that isn't impacted by this, but as a general rule I would not go overboard.

[hrdgain81]

good explinations all the way around fellas.

I was surprised that you mentioned basketball as an example of long duration cardio andrew. I suppose your referring to how basketball players train? I am not really familiar with their training techniques, but I've always found a few pick up games to be awesome for cardio, say a few games to 21 or something. your constantly sprinting back and forth, and its more fun then running around a track IMO.

[Andrew.cook]

Hrd,

Well, I was more thinking about the kids who spend all day in pick up games of full court. It is a series of "sprints" for SOME plays, but more often than not the pace is slow enough that it really just ends up being a ton of calorie munching movement. Not bad at all if you are looking to lose fat, but for preserving muscle, I wouldn't suggest this. I just know that some of my friends and co-workers will go play in three hours of pick up games after work and there is virtually no way they can hope to build muscle doing that. Maybe if for no other reason than they just burnt up all the food they could have built muscle with. I could have just as easily said hockey or tennis or whatever. The point is that you want to get in some cardio, but when you are making it a significant portion of your overall training volume I think any kind of cardio is a liability to building muscle. I say "I think" only because there may be some example that I have not considered.

[hrdgain81]

Agreed, and thanks for the clarification Andrew.

[Andrew.cook]

Not a prob.

Let me also clarify that through my own experience (I have been known to break out in a 10+ mile run) that so long as the vast majority of your training is of the muscle building sort, your body doesn't just unadapt because of one or two workouts. Keep that in mind. However, if you are clearly dominating your workout time with cardio work, you are going to have a damn hard time putting on weight and muscle. Likewise, anyone that does a lot of cardio (women) are not likely to build masculine bodies by hitting the weights... even if their test levels were equal to a man's.

So you won't see a world class marathon runner being built like a bodybuilder regardless of their dedication in the weight room, and you won't see a bodybuilder look like a marathon runner just because they do a little running. But the more you mix and match, the less likely you are to be great at either running or bodybuilding.

[EricT]

Is your avatar pick you, notetoself? If so, the question becomes easy to answer.