Interval training – Ideal for a Busy Schedule

Interval training is the way to go if you can only manage a 20 minute exercise session but you want all the fitness benefits of a much longer session.

Why is that?

In a long session your body will make the most effort at the start of the session while it gets used to the level of exertion you are asking of it.

If that intensity doesn’t change throughout the session, your heart reaches a “steady state” after a short time and it does not have to make as much effort/expend as much energy to maintain your pace.

You are then coasting along for the remainder of the session – making an effort, of course but not really pushing yourself or using as much energy as you could.

With interval training you work at a higher intensity in intervals with a more moderate recovery pace between bursts. The bursts of higher intensity exercise can last from as little as 30 seconds to as much as a few minutes with the moderate intensity periods being just enough to recover from your high level exertion – usually about one and a half to twice as long. So you might jog for 2 minutes and then run at top speed for a minute and then recover by jogging for two minutes before picking up the pace again.

With this pattern your heart does not reach a steady state – every time you have a burst of higher intensity exercise your heart rate is elevated again and as a result you use more energy to keep your body moving throughout the session, not just during the higher intensity bursts.

If you follow this pattern for 20 minutes you will find that you use as many calories as you would in a much longer session and you will become fitter faster. As well as training your heart, intervals help build new capillaries within your cardiovascular system giving a boost to your endurance. All those new blood vessels mean that you will be better able to take in oxygen as well as deal with the waste products of exercise such as the lactic acid which causes burning and sore muscles.

October 23, 2008 | Filed Under Fitness Tips