Welcome to the Get Fit Guys, quick and dirty tips to slim down and shape up.

My name is Ben Greenfield, and I'm the Get Fit Guy.

In the very, very first Get Fit Guy episode called Which Exercise Machine Burns the Most calories,

you learn that running is a full body workout

that can burn 600 to 1,200 calories per hour. And specifically, that running up an incline on a

treadmill is one of the best ways to boost your metabolism for hours after you finished

exercising. But is the treadmill a natural way to exercise? How can you get

the most out of your treadmill workout? What are the best treadmill workouts to get a combination of

cardio fitness and fat burning? Well, in this episode, you're about to find out. So let's start

with this. Are treadmills actually natural? Well, a fascinating study released this week, and my inspiration for recording this particular episode,

found that if a running wheel is placed outdoors in a natural setting, wild animals will actually

come and run on it voluntarily.

In the study, the researchers conducted a simple experiment. They set up a running

wheel in their backyard and then used an infrared camera to capture on tape how animals in the wild

would respond. The researchers claim that the wild animals chose voluntarily to run on these

wheels and one mouse in particular for an astounding 18 minutes because they enjoyed it.

And this experiment put to rest the argument about whether mice in the lab are running on wheels

simply because they live in cages or for some other reason.

It turns out that wild animals will run in place anywhere they get an opportunity. Well, in exercise science research,

a treadmill is to humans as a running wheel is to mice, rats, hamsters, or any other running

rodent. So this study suggests that it may not be so unnatural for us humans to actually be

kind of fond of running on a moving belt. Although,

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