Do Women Need More Cardio Then Men?

A friend asked me this question a while back and I really didn’t know how to respond. My instinct was to immediately answer this question with a resounding “no”, but I felt that I needed to do a bit more research.

I Googled my heart out and came across an article where Alwyn Cosgrove specifically addressed this question.

To those of you not familiar with Alwyn, he is a Tae kwon-do international champion and has worked with a wide variety of clientele including several Olympic and national level athletes, five world champions, and professionals in a multitude of sports such as boxing, martial arts, soccer, ice skating, football, fencing, triathlon, rugby, bodybuilding, dance, and fitness competition.

Alwyn points out that while physiologically there is no difference between men and women, because women tend to weigh less then men, they do need to find ways to a means for extending energy expenditure from exercise.

The example Alwyn gives is as follows:

Client A: 200 lb male. Maintenance calories = 2500.
Client B: 130 lb female. Maintenance calories = 1560.

Goal: To decrease body fat for each individual by 10 lbs. A typical guideline is to start with a 500 calorie deficit or 20% of maintenance, whatever is smaller.

If we cut Client A’s caloric intake by 20%, we get 2000 calories per day (and a 500 calorie deficit). When we add in the calories burned from exercising, we can expect him to reach his goal in about 5 – 10 weeks.

But, if we take our female client down 500 calories, that would be 1060 calories per day. Being that we don’t want a woman to take in less than 1200 calories, we would cut her calories by 20% to around 1250. That’s a 310 calorie deficit which means we’re looking at 12 – 16 weeks for the same results.

As such, for the female to attain the same fat loss as the male client, she would need to accelerate fat loss by including additional training, which may include cardio.

Great answer Alwyn! Thanks.

Train hard; stay strong.

Peace.

Susan