Upright Vs Recumbent Exercise Bike For Weight Loss

The upright bike also works the muscles of the arms back and abs while the recumbent bike essentially works the muscles of the lower body.

Upright vs recumbent exercise bike for weight loss.

As a general rule of thumb recumbent bikes burn slightly fewer calories per hour than upright bikes. Recumbent bikes are gentle on all your joints. The upright bike clearly exercises more muscle groups than the recumbent bike. In fact upright bikes provide a total body workout while recumbent bikes do not.

This is due to the stretching of legs horizontally rather than vertically in recumbent not in the uprights. Recumbent bikes are easier on the lower back lumbar spine due to the way that you sit in the bike. The main benefit of both cardio machines is that you can easily change your workout intensity by decreasing or increasing the bike s resistance and choose how many calories you want to burn. The advantage of the vertical exercise bike over the recumbent exercise bike is that it works for more muscle groups.

While an upright bike has you hunched over the handlebars a recumbent bike encourages better spinal posture. Simulates outdoor riding so it is good practice in bad weather if you are training or preparing for a race. You will also engage the same muscle on an outdoor bike that you will on an upright bike. The recumbent bikes on the other hand are for your upper body not for the lower.

A 200 pound person can burn about 600 calories per hour on an upright bike. The same person putting in the same amount of effort on a recumbent bike will only burn about 500 calories.