Thread: endurance cardio

hello. I've started doing cardio to lose weigh, mainly hiit on the treadmill (or bike)(15 min) + I changed my diet, and I'm wondering if to lose fat (and not the muscle mass) it was okay to do endurance cardio... like running one hour or so (I used to jog in the woods).

Also, how come marathon runners don't have 6 packs? I mean, they look very skinny and I assume they have a low body fat percentage.
Is it because they lack the muscles?

thank you

There is a difference between cardio for reducing bodyfat and cardio for increasing endurance capacity or how hard your heart and lungs can work over a long period of time.

For bodyfat reduction I'd agree that HIIT is more effective (and I'm an endurance athlete at this point). It's also less time consuming. If you want to be able to run 10km, you have to train your aerobic fitness level.

Marathon runners rarely have a traditional six pack because they don't train for size and strength - you can see their abs (and everything else usually) because of their low bodyfat levels (which aren't that low sometimes anyway).

Just as an aside I've been successful at retaining my lean mass keeping with endurance cardio of 4-5 hours per week and have cut my bodyfat quite nicely.