Search

 

 

Informative Articles

15 Simple Metabolism Boosting Secrets
Your metabolism is the rate at which your body burns calories. The faster you burn calories the more weight you can lose even if you eat the same amount, so it makes sense to do everything you can to boost your metabolic rate if you're trying to...
Diet and Exercising for Weight Loss
Obesity is now being called an epidemic in the health community. In fact, it will soon be the leading cause of preventable death in the United States, even ahead of cigarette smoking. Obesity leads to type two diabetes, high blood pressure, heart...
Exercise Nutrition: How To Keep That Energy Up!
How many times has this happened to you? >> You psych yourself up mentally (you are GOING to do it!) >> You don the outfit (you can practically feel the energy flowing through your veins!) >> You lace up the running shoes (Nike: Just...
Lose Weight Faster With High Intensity Interval Training (hiit)
The one of the latest buzzwords in fitness and weight loss circles is High Intensity Interval Training or HIIT. This method of exercise has the potential to allow an exerciser to lose weight faster that any other form of “aerobic” exercise. Although...
Reaching Nirvana With Winsor Pilates Workout
Have you ever seen Winsor Pilates workout on television or heard it from the other medium of communication? If not yet, here are some facts about Winsor Pilates workout. As a Body-Sculpting System Winsor Pilates workout became popular for...
Should You Douche?
The only thing a woman can say for certain about her vagina is that it is drenched in mystery. And with this mystery comes a bounty of myths. One myth marring the woman’s body is the concept that her vagina is a filthy pit. Frequent marketing of...
 
Interval Training for Fat Loss Not Aerobic Training

Announcing Interval Training for Fat Loss

Forget long steady state aerobic training if you want to lose fat.

Why?

1. Its boring! Who really wants to spend half an hour or more running, cycling, rowing, etc.

2. Your body will adapt to it! As you get fitter, it becomes harder to burn the same amount of calories as when you started exercising because your body adapts and becomes more efficient. So what do you do to burn the same amount of calories as you used to? Well if you continue with aerobic training the answer is either go for longer or do the same time quicker neither of which are particularly enjoyable.

3. The fat burning zone or heart rate training doesn't work. Yes, you burn a higher percentage of fat at a submaximal intensity but the overall calories burnt are less than a higher intensity workout. (See the post below for more on Fat burning zone and heart rate training for fat)

4. Sprinters have less fat than marathon runners

5. Yes, you burn calories whilst doing aerobic training however it may be detrimental to your muscle growth. As i've said many times before, the more toned you are the more calories you burn whilst sitting at home. Aerobic training is largely catabolic (breaking down), which can consequently reduce the development of muscle growth.

Less muscle = lower calorie expenditure = lower fat loss

The answer? Interval Training

Interval Training is not aerobic exercise! Before I tell you what interval training is let me tell you what aerobic training is. Aerobic training (with oxygen) is exercise at a low or moderate intensity that can be maintained for a


relatively large amount of time as long as oxygen is avaialble for the muscles.

ok, so now let me tell you about Interval training. This form of training is known as anaerobic training (little or no oxygen available). The key benefits of this training method are that it not only burns calories whilst you are doing it, it also burns more calories when you have finshed as it revs up your metabolism for upto several hours afterwards, therefore helping you burn more calories through the day.

So what exactly do I do when interval training?

First off, choose an activity, running, rowing, etc. However, I recommend you do not do the same exercise every time. Remember your body will adapt! Try changing the machine or the activity every 2 sessions to avoid this.

Once you have warmed up (5 mins) increase the intensity for 1 minute. This should be full out effort or as close to as possible (not recommended for those with heart problems). Think of a scale between 1-10, 10 being the most difficult, 9-10 is where you should be at this point. Once you have completed that slow down to a comfortable (5-6 out of 10) that you can maintain for 2 minutes. This is one bout, you should repeat this between 3-6 times depending on your level of fitness followed by 3 minute cool down. The total work out should be between 17-26 mins depending on how many bouts you do carry out.

About The Author

Gavin Walsh is a personal trainer and fat loss specialist based in London, UK. For more information on guaranteed fitness results visit www.gavinwalsh.co.uk" target=new>www.gavinwalsh.co.uk.