Running is a pretty good way to lose weight. A downside is that some of the weight you can lose through this method is going to be muscle weight, so you should always augment your running with some time doing resistance training. (weight training) A benefit to running is that you get an additional hour of increased metabolism after you are done running.
Actually that works with any sort of exercise that gets your heart racing and your blood pumping, and that definitely is true enough when you talk about running. But what is “running?” I’ve gotten this question a number of times. Is there a difference between running and jogging or is there a speed that turns a jog into a run? The simplest answer is, no. Jogging was just a made up term back in the seventies that caught on. There is no difference whatsoever, although some people may try to tell you differently. It’s one of those “you say tomato and I say tomahto” kind of things. Running is any movement to transport you, by foot, in a given direction where one foot is generally in the air at any given time and both feet are occasionally in the air at the same times. This differentiates it from walking where one foot is always on the ground at any given moment.
Running is one of the most efficient ways of burning calories, which isn’t really what you want when you are trying to lose weight. An inefficient burning is optimum. So what do you do to burn more calories while you run. You basically have two options.
You can run on slopes. Running up or down hill is challenging because your body is not generally acclimated to running like that. The upward and downward run challenges different muscles, so they really can help you to burn calories.
The second option is to do interval training when you run. This is, in my opinion, the optimal way to increase your burn. In interval training you want to pick landmarks and increase and decrease your pace. First do a near sprint for a hundred yards or so, and then take your speed down a couple notches to catch your breath. Once you have caught your breath, you repeat the cycle. I’ve had people who run in the city and alternate pace for each block. That seems as good a method as any.
If you are really up to a challenge you can combine these two methods, and do interval training on hills. Take it easy at the start of this sort of thing, or you will definitely be paying for it in the coin of sore muscles for a few days to follow.
Hope this gives you a few ideas to implement and happy running to you.