Exercise is a vital part of any healthy lifestyle.

While eating a healthy diet will help you lose weight, building exercise into your daily routine will help you achieve your goals much faster.

In this article we’ll introduce the 500 Calorie Workout and some of the ways you can burn calories to help accelerate your weight loss.

• Simple ways to burn 500 calories
• Burning calories at home
• The importance of tracking your progress
• Recovery days

Regular exercise comes with many other benefits including improved flexibility, stronger bones, healthier heart and it gives you a strong immune system; so it is well worth the effort.

Continue reading or use the links below to jump to the relevant section.

500 Calorie Workout

As we’ve said previously on 500 Calorie Fitness, the specific number of calories you burn isn’t that important. If you plan a workout routine that is roughly 500 calories, that’s great.

No one can tell you exactly how many calories you will burn doing certain exercises, as the actual number will depend on a host of factors including your fitness and weight.

You may find trying to burn 500 calories in one workout too intense to start with, so don’t be afraid to break these sessions down further. For instance you could instead find a routine that burns 100 calories that you can stick to 5 days a week.

For the best high calorie burning exercises, you have to focus on cardio. This raises your heart rate and helps you to burn lots of calories in a short space of time.

Some simple ways to burn 500 calories includes:

• Jogging – Going for a gentle jog for approximately 45 minutes. In the gym, the treadmill is one of the machines that burns calories in the shortest amount of time, so if you do aim for the 500 calorie workout and you’re short on time, this is the way to go.
• Body weight exercises / Aerobics – If you extend your 7-minute workout routine to somewhere between 45 minutes and an hour, this is a great way of burning 500 calories in the comfort of your own home. You can also achieve the same result in an aerobics class or similar.
• Swimming – Constant swimming for roughly an hour
• Cycling – This can be an excellent way to burn 500 calories. Even at a leisurely pace, you can burn 500 calories in roughly 90 minutes cycling. Or if you wanted to do a high intensity spinning class, you could expect to burn the same about of calories in half that time!
• Exercise classes – Group classes like Zumba are an excellent way to have fun and burn calories at the same time. On average you can expect to burn between 500 and 1000 calories per hour of Zumba.
• HI-YO Aquatic Interval Training – Combining high intensity workouts and yoga movements in the swimming pool, HI YO is a really effective way to lose weight. Aquatic Interval Training can burn up to 400 calories in just 30mins!
• Sports – Playing team sports is a great way to burn calories, as you are often more focused on the game than the actual exercise itself. Something like baseball will easily burn 500 calories in just 90 minutes.

You can easily increase the intensity of your workouts by adding more resistance using things like ankle weights, wrist weights or weighted vests.

Below we’ll look in more detail at even simpler ways:

• Walking
• Push ups
• Burning calories at home

Walking as Part of your 500 Calorie Workout

Walking is a great way to get started with exercise. A brisk walk can burn 500 calories in an hour.

People that are overweight are sometimes scared of exercising, they’re not ready to go to the gym, and don’t feel fit enough to go out and start jogging.

So if you want a really easy way to start your weight loss journey, think about simply walking more.

A few more steps a day is better than doing nothing. And a little every day adds up to a lot.

Many fitness tracking devices are available today that will help to track how many steps you are taking. These provide a useful reference and help to set a target, but are by no means essential to your plan.

For example, I use a FitBit tracking device that I wear on my wrist all the time. It sets a daily goal of 10,000 steps that I try to meet each day. If I’m honest, some days I do, and some days I don’t.

But I definitely think about my activity levels more.

Just yesterday, I was having a lazy Sunday indoors but I decided it’d be good to get my 10,000 steps in for the day, to give me a head start on my exercise goals for the week.

According to my tracking device, the 59 min walk I took in the afternoon burnt 492 calories.

It was a pleasant, brisk stroll on a Sunday afternoon. And it contributed to my fitness goals as well. Win, Win.

You don’t even have to start out at this level though. A simple 5 minute walk might be the best way for you to get into it, then gradually build up overtime.

If you’re looking to lose weight and don’t want to join the gym or a fitness class, before you get disheartened, think about walking more!

Adding stairs to your workout will help to burn some extra calories.

The Everyday Push up Routine

Push ups are a great way to exercise.

They’re totally free, you can do them any time of day and they’re really good at working some key muscle groups that will help to improve your fitness and physique.

According to Livestrong “you burn between 1/2 and 1 calorie per push up, depending on your weight and how vigorously you’re exercising.”

So to get to 500 calories you’re looking at a minimum of around 500 push ups, not easy at all!

However, starting out with even a moderate number of push ups will help to improve your overall health and will help you towards achieving your goals. If you build press ups into part of a regular workout routine, you’ll start to see the benefits very quickly.

A great site to help you build up to 100 push ups is the 100 Push Up Challenge. While this is by no means an easy challenge, the values fit nicely with those of 500 Calorie Fitness:

Think there’s no way you could do this? I think you can. All you need is a good plan, plenty of discipline and about 30 minutes a week to achieve this goal!

Having the right mindset is a really key part of achieving any goal and that definitely applies here.

And for the perfect push up, check out the video below by BuiltLean.

Don’t be put off if you struggle with press ups initially. They really are a great way to keep your weight in check and improve your overall physique.

Once you start to get more confident with press ups you can start experimenting with different ways to make it more difficult, such as changing your arm positions or using a balance board.

500 Calorie Workout Resources

• There is a great article from Fitness Blender that lists 50 ways to burn 500 calories, covering everything from cleaning the house to surfing.
• WebMD has an excellent calculator that will help to give you a reasonably accurate estimate of the calories you can expect to burn from a wide variety of exercises. People often wonder what burns the most calories, and this tool is excellent for answering this question.
• If you are looking for a more high intensity workout, Shape.com has put together a list of 5 workouts that burn 500 calories in 30 minutes.

Burning Calories at Home

Many people are put off starting an exercise routine because they think it involves joining a gym, or a fitness class and spending lots of money on equipment. But this doesn’t need to be the case at all.

Or perhaps you’re fine with the cost, but you’re self-conscious about working out in front of lots of people.

Maybe it’s neither of those things, maybe you just don’t have the time.

Actually none of these things are an excuse for not getting enough exercise, because there are lots of ways that you can burn calories in the privacy of your own home, with little or no cost.

500 Calorie Fitness is a way of life, it’s not about going to a class, eating diet supplements or becoming a gym buff. It’s about how you incorporate simple mindset changes into your daily routine that will have a positive and long lasting impact on your health.

How to get started

Firstly, all the information you need is freely available on the internet, so while buying workout DVDs or a fitness program might be appealing, you probably don’t need it.

As we’ve mentioned before, it’s pretty straightforward to build your own workout routine, tailored just for you.

The same goes for exercise equipment. It’s easy to fall for the adverts that proclaim the latest device as the “best thing ever for toning your abs”, but it comes at a cost. Also, there really is no shortcut to fitness, so don’t be fooled.

If you’re just starting out exercising, there are plenty of body weight exercises that you can do that are completely free!

If you want to start adding light weight to your program, water bottles or bags of shopping are a perfectly suitable alternative to dumbbells.

Take a look at our post on the best home exercise equipment, you might be surprised to see what was most recommended.

Make a daily exercise routine

Most people don’t think about the calories they burn on a day to day basis, whilst just going about their daily routine. And it is very easy to increase this number by making some tiny tweaks throughout the day.

• Do it first thing – If you’re not ready to start a full workout routine, you could still add a few small exercises each day as you’re getting ready in the morning. This could be 10 push ups as soon as you get out of bed, or 10 squats each time you walk in the front door.
• Do it in front of the TV – While relaxing in front of the TV there are simple things that you can do to burn a few extra calories, or keep your body in great shape. For example you might want to try some light balance board exercises, low intensity stretching or a session on a mini stepper.
• Everything you do is an opportunity to burn calories – You can even burn calories while simply putting the shopping away. If you stopped and did a few bicep curls each time you put a tin in the cupboard, the small amount of calories you burn each time would quickly add up.
• Stop thinking of the housework as a chore – Every time you pick up a duster or switch on the hoover you are raising your heart rate, which also means you are burning more calories as well.
  • This is especially true for home improvement and gardening.

These small changes can help to set you up for bigger successes in the future, and while they might not have a huge impact in their own right, it certainly all adds up to a positive impact on your overall health.

There is no reason you couldn’t build up to a 45 minute full body workout at home, that will give you almost all the same benefits of going to the gym, but without the price tag.

Tracking your progress

Tracking is something that we’ll cover specifically in its own post as it merits further attention. But needless to say, if you want to get the most out of your exercise sessions, then you should start logging what you are doing.

To start with this might be a simple exercise diary where you record the types of exercises you perform and the duration of those exercises. This data will allow you to make educated improvements to your routine based on the results that you are seeing.

If you wanted to take this a step further you could invest in a fitness tracker that will enable you to monitor your heart rate and calories burned among a host of other things, but this is by no means a necessity for a beginner.

There are a ton of them out on the market today. Samsung has one, Fitbit has several that have become very popular.

When you’re on a specific diet like the 500 calorie diet, devices like these can be really useful for understanding your calorie deficit, which in turn helps you to set attainable goals.

Recovery: Take a Day off Exercise

500 calorie workouts can be intense.

It is important to remember that regular exercise doesn’t have to mean every single day of the week.

Your muscles need time to repair after you work out and if you deny them that recovery period, then you have a much higher chance of injuring yourself.

Working out before your body has recovered properly only delays your progress. It’s great to be psyched about working out, but when you overdo it you’re not doing yourself any favors. Listen to your body, you may find that an intense workout 3 days a week is more than enough.

On your down days, you can still burn some extra calories by going for a walk, or keep your body in excellent condition by doing some low intensity stretching or balance board exercises in the comfort of your own home.

Other types of exercise such as Tai Chi or Yoga can help to train different parts of the body, without the strain and stress that comes with a more intense workout. If you’re new to yoga you might want to check out our post on yoga block uses.

For best results remember to get the balance right

If you want to be generally healthier and happier, a great way to start is simply just by raising your level of activity, maybe just by walking more. Other simple changes to your lifestyle such as taking the stairs more could also be a good option for you.

You can also supplement this increased activity with longer exercise sessions every so often to build some strength and burn some extra calories.

There are a lot of routes you can decide to go with your workout and exercise routines, but if you’re looking for fast results then you should consider the 500 calorie diet and using it with 500 calorie workouts. Remember, you don’t have to start off doing a 500 calorie workout each day.

It’s something that you build your way up to over several weeks and then maintain it going forward.  So don’t let the high goal at the end discourage you from giving it a try.

There’s been an enormous amount of success with the 500 calorie diet and that success is only strengthened when it is tag teamed with the 500 calorie workout.