There are many types of exercises people do everyday to either get fit or reduce weight.
All of these exercises can be classified as either steady state endurance exercise or variable cyclic exercise.
Recent scientific evidence have shown variable cyclic exercises to be more beneficial than steady state endurance exercises.
Some of the benefits of variable cyclic exercises include increased anti-oxidant production, reduce risk of joint damage and increased residual metabolic rate after exercise which is beneficial for weight loss.
One of the most effective variable cyclic exercises to reduce body fat is wind sprints or hill sprints.
In wind sprints you would add several short burst of high intensity exercises in the middle of your aerobic training.
These high intensity exercises is where you would go faster or increased your resistance so that you would breath faster after 20 to 40 seconds.
Also most competitive sports such as football, basketball, tennis, hockey consist of highly variable stop and go motion.
Weight training is another type of exercise that is effective in reducing body fat and increasing lean muscles.
In weight training you would have a short burst of exertion followed by a recovery period.
Doing endurance exercises can also be beneficial for weight loss if it varies between high and low intensity.
For example a workout on a treadmill that varies between high and low intensity might look something like this

• Light jog 3 to 4 minutes to warm up
• Interval 1 - run 8 miles per hour for 1 minute
• Interval 2 - walk 4 miles per hour for 1 and 1/2 minutes
• Interval 3 - run 10 miles per hour for 1 minute
• Interval 4 - walk 4 miles per hour for 1 and 1/2 minutes

You then repeat those 4 intervals 4 times for an intense 20 minutes.
To get a beneficial response from your exercises in terms of body fat reduction, it is suggested that your workouts vary between high and low intensity.
The type of exercises that have variations between high and low intensity is wind sprints.
Also many sports incorporate highly variable stop and go motion.
In addition endurance exercises on a treadmill that alternate between intensive running intervals and less intense walking intervals is also effective in reducing body fat.