Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Short, Effective Workouts

A lot of us don't have time to workout an hour or even a half hour every day. The solution is interval training, also called high intensity interval training (HIIT). The goal is to get your heart rate pumping! HIIT is very effective for fat loss as well. You burn up to 9x as much fat doing HIIT cardio as opposed to long, steady state cardio. Interval training also spikes your metabolism and burns fat for hours after your workout. I've also found that it improves my overall cardiovascular endurance. You can do HIIT on the treadmill, running outside, biking, or on the elliptical. Personally, I've been doing it by running outside because it is easier to throw Elliott in the jogging stroller and quickly do a 15 minute HIIT run.

For starters, do 30 second sprints followed by 1 minute recovery. Your workout would look like this:
3 minute warm up
30 second sprint
1 minute walk
30 second sprint
1 minute walk
30 second sprint
1 minute walk
30 second sprint
2 minute walking cool down
Total time = 15 minutes

For more advanced, do the following:
3 minute warm up
1 minute sprint
2 minute light jog
1 minute sprint
2 minute light jog
1 minute sprint
2 minute light jog
1 minute sprint
2 minute light jog cool down
Total time = 15 minutes

Always stretch out your legs when you are done!

As usual, everything comes down to diet. You won't see results by exercise alone. But interval training is a great way to save time and to spike your metabolism for all day fat burning.

No comments:

Post a Comment