What Is High Intensity Interval Training?

By Howe Russ


For many years, HIIT was one of the hidden secrets of the health and fitness industry reserved for elite athletes. With so many people trying to find out how to lose weight with more challenging and original methods, however, it has now become one of the most popular choices for gym members around the world.

There are a few different ways to perform this particular style of exercise and today we'll teach you how to single out the method which best suits your personal goals.

If you visit any gym around the world you will find two distinctly different types of people working out. Firstly, you will meet those who are happy to spend up to an hour working out at a steady pace on an exercise bike. Secondly, you'll meet those who deem cardiovascular exercise to be too boring and therefore they ignore it and train with weights instead.

High intensity interval training provides both groups with a stepping stone between their respective styles, offering the benefits of both methods in one workout.

It is rare that a particular training style provides two very different groups of fitness enthusiasts with equal benefits, but this does. Interval training has been proven to increase muscular hypertrophy, which is great for those looking to increase muscle mass. However, the fat loss benefits are equally as impressive so this style has truly universal appeal.

For those looking to lose fat there is one significant factor which makes high intensity interval training so appealing. This is often referred to as "The Afterburn Effect". When you finish a regular cardiovascular training session your body stops burning off calories the moment you leave the gym but with an interval workout you continue for up to 16 hours. This makes the fat loss benefits of this training method particularly great.

Like any other type of training, however, there are numerous ways to perform it. Knowing which one best fits your overall goal will allow you to get superior results.

* Tabata Interval Training.

* The Sport Specific Method

* Interval training specifically to reduce body fat.

The first method, known as Tabata Interval Training, was designed by Professor Tabata during the 1990's. This theory was put forward to increase the fitness level of elite athletes so most people who perform this particular style are already very experienced in the gym and consider themselves to be at an advanced level of overall fitness.

Despite already being considered 'elite' in their field, researchers found that a group of athletes who used this method were able to further improve their VO2 Max by a massive 28%.

Minus the necessary warm-up and cool-down periods, Tabata's involve working out for just four minutes in total. However, don't let the short time fool you into thinking that this is going to be easy. These four minutes will push you harder than any other form of interval training in existence today. The four minutes are split up into sections of 20 seconds at maximal intensity and 10 seconds of recovery, repeated eight times over.

If you are training for a particular sporting event, the second type of interval training is perhaps more suited to your personal needs. Incorporating your sporting movements into a cardiovascular exercise then switching to an exercise which works the opposing muscle groups is a great way to boost overall performance. For instance, eight circuits consisting of 300 meters on a rowing machine followed by 30 seconds of push-ups.

Finally, there are numerous people who are looking to use this training method to lose body fat. The method which has the most scientific research to support it comes from Canada. A thirty minute session which consisted of four minutes at a moderate intensity followed by a thirty second burst of maximal intensity returned superior results to any other time split.

The physical benefits of performing high intensity interval training are clear to see. Thanks to the several variations available you can make the most of this training style whether you are trying to build lean muscle or trying to shed unwanted body fat.

While HIIT is now a very popular choice among exercise enthusiasts around the world, it remains clouded in mystery thanks to the many various styles within it's category. As you can see from the three we have took you through today, it isn't rocket science. There are countless gym members out there who have been trying to figure out how to lose weight without spending endless hours on equipment they don't particularly enjoy. Thanks to this training style, now they can.




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