If you sweat more while exercising, do you burn more calories?
A Hong Kong personal trainer says sweat levels are linked to your physiology and the climate you are working out in, not the number of calories you are burning
Is it true that, the more you perspire the more calories you burn?
The short answer: No.
Chances are a long run in the hot afternoon sun will leave you drenched in sweat, but it doesn’t necessarily mean you have burned any more calories than usual. That’s probably not what you want to hear, but the truth is, perspiring profusely after a workout doesn’t translate to anything more than water loss (sorry!).
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According to Nathan Solia, a holistic personal trainer, and managing director of Elite Personal Training in Aberdeen, perspiring is our body’s way of keeping cool when our body temperature increases. “When the body reaches a certain temperature, our sweat glands produce sweat, a salty liquid that’s made up almost completely of water, with small amounts of salt, sugar, ammonia and urea,” he explains. “This liquid is released through our pores and settles on the surface of the skin. As it comes into contact with the air, it evaporates. this evaporative cooling is how we regulate temperature.”
Perspiring a lot during a workout session only feels like you’ve burnt more calories because most of us equate perspiring excessively with extra physical effort.
When you perspire excessively during a workout, it just means that you have lost water.
But Solia says that you don’t have to sweat profusely to burn a lot of calories. Take weight training, for instance. While this activity does not exactly work up a sweat, it certainly uses up a high number of calories.