I can believe this…….go look up “fasted cardio” for another take on this……Fasted Cardio is what skyrocketed me into my weight loss……paired of course with MFP 🙂 But yes……it does get tiring……for the 3+ years I’ve been working out now, It seems every couple months, some “new study” comes out…….and from what I’ve heard, a lot of it also depends on what your “goal” is……if your goal is to gain muscle, then by all means, do weight training FIRST…….so you have your full potential of energy stores available to get your best lifts possible……..then afterwards, do your cardio as a sort of “cool down” before you head home for the night……The couple times I have tried doing cardio AFTER weights, I just didn’t feel as good about my output during the cardio session…..like I could have ran faster/longer/etc…..but that’s due to the fact that I lifted FIRST, which didn’t leave much energy left for cardio 😉

But yea, I do recall reading an article somewhere, something to the affects of:

For muscle gains: weights first…..
For fat loss: cardio first……

And it seems to have helped me……80+ lbs lost….after 2 years (as of September 18th….the day I actually started “counting” calories, workouts, etc……with MFP). The year+ before……I was pretty much the casual guy at the gym…..come in, jump on a couple machines…..do my thing, then leave…….hehe

Brilliant. RPE is nice… if you are in tune enough with your body that you can accurately tell how much exertion you are using. Secondly, not a particularly good resistance routine to begin with. Thirdly – oh, you don’t want to get the HR up too high, so that’s why you think you should start with cardio? OK, do the cardio later, but with less intensity. Lastly – for this post, anyway – this order is best for whom/what, exactly?

My cousin is a physical therapist and she said no matter what you do first, end with 20 minutes on the treadmill to reduce the chance of pulled and strained muscles… so I always did my workouts 60 min cardio, 60 mins weights, 20 mins walking on the treadmill

I don’t agree at all with this. I train hard on the weights and always leave the cardio at the end. Anecdotally and from my own experiences if I train cardio first I lose far to much in strength gains while lifting. It doesn’t make sense that you should burn up valuable glycogen stores doing cardio and then hit the weights with the same intensity. I’m beginning to believe the majority of these ‘new’ studies are just designed to put some Grad student through his final year project and have no basis in real situations at all.

In my experience, not only with myself but with my clients, a cardio workout first is best. There is no evidence that cardio before strength takes away from the strength workout. Cardio uses different muscles (slow twitch) than strength training (fast twitch). Finally, when you are sufficiently warm, you will be able to lift “more” due to the increased blood flow, fuel and O2 going to your muscles. If you feel you might get too depleted (from fuel) to do a proper strength workout, then do a shorter cardio session on your strength days.

I do agree with Ron (below) though, this is only one study, and because there are too few subjects it would probably not be accepted in a scientific journal. The media tends to take one study and promote it as if it were the one and only truth, but then they promote a completely opposite study the next week! Science doesn’t work like that. Massive amounts of evidence must be uncovered before a hard decision can be made. Consumers need to get smarter and not be swayed so easily by this. It’s much better to ask an expert (with education, experience, etc) than try to figure it out yourself by reading popular media.

more Bro-science….sheesh

It was always suggested to do some cardio first then hit the weight cause cardio gets your blood flowing. Suppose to help when lifting weights.