HIIT workout

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  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,478 Member
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    Treadmill or elliptical are best for any type of HIIT cardio in my opinion. Pretty much want to start with a 3-5 minute warm up, walk for 2 1/2 minutes on speed 3 then jog for 2 1/2 minutes on speed 5. Once your warm up is over, you want to try an focus on 1 to 3 minute intervals of a run jog pace. Something like run for 1 minute on speed 9 then jog for 30 seconds or a minute on speed 6. If you have to walk at any point, that's fine. Just try and make it as strenuous as possible. Do the run/jog pace for at least 20 minutes. The more you do this style of training, the better you will get with it. So if you need to walk more than jog and jog more than run, that's okay! Just push yourself. Then comes a 3-5 minute cool down, this is where you put the speed down to a power walk type speed, maybe like 4.5 to start.. Then as the minutes go by, you can put an incline on as the speed gets lower every minute till your done. This is a good way to burn more calories and make the cool down as challenging as possible.

    That's not HIIT bbut run/walk intervals. You can actually calculate calories relatively realistically with
    0.3* weight in lbs * distance in miles for walking
    0.65ish* weight in lbs * distance in miles for running.
  • GainsLevelIncreased
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    So what you're telling me is... A run which should be a sprint for 30 seconds or 1 minute, followed by a jog for 30 seconds or 1 minute... That type of pace for 20 to 30 minutes, not including the warm up nor the cool down, is not high intensity?
  • livingleanlivingclean
    livingleanlivingclean Posts: 11,751 Member
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    So what you're telling me is... A run which should be a sprint for 30 seconds or 1 minute, followed by a jog for 30 seconds or 1 minute... That type of pace for 20 to 30 minutes, not including the warm up nor the cool down, is not high intensity?

    No.
  • GainsLevelIncreased
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    Lol
  • livingleanlivingclean
    livingleanlivingclean Posts: 11,751 Member
    edited January 2018
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    HIIT is a technique in which you give all out 100% effort in quick, intense bursts of exercise... followed by, short sometimes more than active recovery periods. Which gets and keeps your heart rate up, and burns more fat in less time. Sounds a little like what I just explained yeah?

    No. If you're giving 100% effort for 30-60 seconds, there is no way you'd recover enough to do it again in 30-60 seconds, and you shouldn't be able jog your recovery. You also. Wouldn't be able to it that many times.

    When I do HIIT, my high intensity periods last 10-20 seconds, and I feel like I'm going to puke and/or pass out at the end of each one. My legs can barely move.
  • bendyourkneekatie
    bendyourkneekatie Posts: 696 Member
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    HIIT is a technique in which you give all out 100% effort in quick, intense bursts of exercise... followed by, short sometimes more than active recovery periods. Which gets and keeps your heart rate up, and burns more fat in less time. Sounds a little like what I just explained yeah?

    No
  • GainsLevelIncreased
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    I do it 4 times a week... 130 minutes a week.. I guess I'm Superman.
  • livingleanlivingclean
    livingleanlivingclean Posts: 11,751 Member
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    I do it 4 times a week... 130 minutes a week.. I guess I'm Superman.

    No, you're just doing interval training.
  • bendyourkneekatie
    bendyourkneekatie Posts: 696 Member
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    I do it 4 times a week... 130 minutes a week.. I guess I'm Superman.

    It's not hiit. Do fartleks all you like but it is what it is and it's not what it's not
  • livingleanlivingclean
    livingleanlivingclean Posts: 11,751 Member
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    I do it 4 times a week... 130 minutes a week.. I guess I'm Superman.

    It's not hiit. Do fartleks all you like but it is what it is and it's not what it's not

    I had to Google fartleks. I think it's my new favourite word! Haha
  • bendyourkneekatie
    bendyourkneekatie Posts: 696 Member
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    I do it 4 times a week... 130 minutes a week.. I guess I'm Superman.

    It's not hiit. Do fartleks all you like but it is what it is and it's not what it's not

    I had to Google fartleks. I think it's my new favourite word! Haha

    It's like IKEA made up a word for running
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,558 Member
    edited January 2018
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    sijomial wrote: »
    HIIT simply isn't a high calorie burn (despite the marketing and people who don't understand the limitations of using heart rate monitors). The rest/recovery periods drag down the average burn.

    If you only have a short amount of time (or only want to spend a small amount of time...) then to maximise your burn go as hard as you can maintain for the entire duration of your time available. Beware though that is taxing and will impact your recovery. It's why people limit their maximal effort training and make it just a small part of their training plan.

    Example:
    Last night I did interval training with 5 min easy, 3 min hard for an hour. My average power output was 155 watts (558 net cals).
    It felt reasonably hard and would impact me to a small degree if I wanted to cycle again today.
    Steady state at 155 w is just an easy everyday cycling pace for me, can do that for hours with no recovery issues at all. Same duration, less effort, same calories.

    If I wanted to go flat out for the whole hour my burn would be c. 210 watts (756 net cals) but that would really cause recovery issues - something to be done rarely.

    In exercise there are ways to be more efficient in training but no free lunches!
    For big burns you can't beat longer duration.


    PS - why are you doing a body part split for your strength training? That's hugely inefficient compared to full body compound lift workouts. You could get back far more time by changing your strength training rather than your cardio.

    Natalie, thank you for your detailed answers to my questions: They were very helpful!

    I wanted to help you, but I don't think I can give you a better answer than @sijomial has given. It's really excellent.

    The best thing for your goals would be to take the time it's practical for you to devote to cardio, and work steadily at an intensity you can sustain comfortably but slightly challengingly for that entire time period (and feel as if you could keep going longer). If you arrive feeling well recovered to go again the next day, that's perfect.

    For something you plan to do every day (or near to it), that's the calorie burn/weight loss sweet spot!

    One thing I'd expand on: It's true that working at maximum intensity, even in intervals, is exhausting, and requires more recovery for health and fitness effectiveness.

    For someone whose priority is weight loss, there's another reason to avoid regular daily workouts at high intensity: When we leave a workout exhausted, that tends to carry over into the rest of our day. It's sort of a "fatigue penalty". We're more likely to drag through the rest of our regular waking hours.

    The net result is that we are a little less energetic for those 14-15 other waking hours in the day, unintentionally and unconsciously change what we do in subtle ways to conserve energy, and therefore burn somewhat fewer daily life calories! (We may even sleep a little more.) In effect, we cancel out part of our workout calories through fatigue. (I've read some decent research that showed this; I'm sorry that I didn't save a link.)

    These recovery and "fatigue penalty" issues are especially acute for beginners to cardio, who are not yet well-conditioned to their exercise. You're still pretty new to cardio, so likely still in this camp. (I am very impressed by your devotion and consistency with your overall workouts, though - good show! :) ).

    In your case, any kind of "HIIT" that had a strength component, as some of the bodyweight/calisthenics routines do, would be particularly counter productive, as it would mess with the recovery for your weight training. (BTW, I'm not commenting on your weight training split, which is not my expertise. ;) )

    I'm sorry that some other people used your thread to get in a pointless abstract argument about HIIT. Unfortunately, HIIT has been seriously misrepresented and over-sold in the pop fitness and trend-obsessed weight loss markets, so now some react to the term like a red flag to a bull, and others become True Believers who defend it (without much real exercise physiology science to back it up) because it's what all the cool kids do these days. SMH: So not helpful.

    Kudos to you on your workout dedication. I'm sure you'll make some changes that sharpen up the cardio side and burn some extra calories to help with your goals. And congratulations on the upcoming wedding!

    Edited: typos
  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,344 Member
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    Treadmill or elliptical are best for any type of HIIT cardio in my opinion. Pretty much want to start with a 3-5 minute warm up, walk for 2 1/2 minutes on speed 3 then jog for 2 1/2 minutes on speed 5. Once your warm up is over, you want to try an focus on 1 to 3 minute intervals of a run jog pace. Something like run for 1 minute on speed 9 then jog for 30 seconds or a minute on speed 6. If you have to walk at any point, that's fine. Just try and make it as strenuous as possible. Do the run/jog pace for at least 20 minutes. The more you do this style of training, the better you will get with it. So if you need to walk more than jog and jog more than run, that's okay! Just push yourself. Then comes a 3-5 minute cool down, this is where you put the speed down to a power walk type speed, maybe like 4.5 to start.. Then as the minutes go by, you can put an incline on as the speed gets lower every minute till your done. This is a good way to burn more calories and make the cool down as challenging as possible.

    That's aerobic intervals. It's not HIIT.
  • robertw486
    robertw486 Posts: 2,390 Member
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    AnnPT77 wrote: »


    Natalie, thank you for your detailed answers to my questions: They were very helpful!

    I wanted to help you, but I don't think I can give you a better answer than @sijomial has given. It's really excellent.

    The best thing for your goals would be to take the time it's practical for you to devote to cardio, and work steadily at an intensity you can sustain comfortably but slightly challengingly for that entire time period (and feel as if you could keep going longer). If you arrive feeling well recovered to go again the next day, that's perfect.


    I would also back up the comments made by @sijomial HIIT (regardless of the type) will not burn as many calories in the same time, and since the OP @NatalieHarr1993 has some weight loss as a primary concern, the HIIT will just mess with recovery and might impact the lifting days.

    I can consistently burn more calories just shooting for my max pace for the given amount of time vs doing intervals of any intensity. Once you bump up output levels into the anaerobic range, you just can't do it for very long. Even at true HIIT levels, the intensity and time are factors. Tabata tested another protocol that was higher intensity and time, less intervals, and a longer rest between intervals. It didn't have the same impact, and they found that the intensity level made power output taper off sooner.
  • MeanderingMammal
    MeanderingMammal Posts: 7,866 Member
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    So what you're telling me is... A run which should be a sprint for 30 seconds or 1 minute, followed by a jog for 30 seconds or 1 minute... That type of pace for 20 to 30 minutes, not including the warm up nor the cool down, is not high intensity?

    Given the time it takes for a dreadmill to speed up and slow down I'd suggest is unlikely to be HIIT.

    If you want to use during intervals as a training mechanism them it's something for a track, not a dreadmill.
  • NatalieHarr1993
    NatalieHarr1993 Posts: 42 Member
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    So I've got a HITT (Or whatever you guys class it as) program from a trainer in my gym & my god its though! 20 sec treadmill decline - You've got to force the treadmill conveyor belt to maintain at 10km/h for 20 seconds on & 2 min break off. Repeat this 3 times & every 2 weeks add an extra rep on. The next exercise is the Prowler Sled 75m push - 2 min break then repeat x 3 times. Again you add 1 more rep every 2 weeks. I do this burnout after a workout & It's safe to say ITS A KILLER!