Exercise duration, does it matter?

LKArgh

All these years, exercise happened for me in hours: one hour pilates class, one hour lifting, one hour swimming, you get the idea.
Working from home because of covid and with gyms closed, I find it easier to do smaller chunks. Like go to the pool on my lunch break for 40 minutes, strength train for 20 minutes in the afternoon, do a 20 minute cardio video, you get the idea.
My question is, does it matter calorie wise and strength wise? Is it the same to do let's say 3 20 minute strength training session per day or 3 20 minutes cardio videos, as doing in one go? It is not the same regarding stamina, I get that, but what about strength and calories? Anyone knows the answer ?

SuzySunshine99

I kind of always wonder this in regards to walking.

If I go on a 5-mile walk, all at once...is it different, calorie-burn-wise, if I walk 5 total miles in short bursts, same pace, throughout the course of a day.

I'm guessing there's probably a slight difference, but maybe not a significant one?

Maybe someone has some insight.

NorthCascades

Of course it matters calories wise. It's the one thing with the most ability to affect calorie burn. I can burn 100 calories in 20 minutes of HIIT or 1,500 calories in a few hours on a bike.

SuzySunshine99

NorthCascades wrote: »

Of course it matters calories wise. It's the one thing with the most ability to affect calorie burn. I can burn 100 calories in 20 minutes of HIIT or 1,500 calories in a few hours on a bike.

That's not what the poster is asking.

Using your example, if you split up your bike ride into 3 parts throughout the day, would it be a different burn than doing it all at once? Same pace, same TOTAL time.

chocolate_owl

OP, I have no studies, just bro blogs and women's magazines, but generally the consensus is that breaking it up is the same or better, depending on your goals (obviously worse if steady-state cardio endurance is the goal, but that's the exception). If you do your bench press in the morning and your squat in the evening, you might be able to put a little bit more into both. There's also the health benefit of breaking up long periods of sitting if you do short workouts here and there instead of doing one long stretch then parking your butt in front of the computer/TV the rest of the day.

NorthCascades wrote: »

Of course it matters calories wise. It's the one thing with the most ability to affect calorie burn. I can burn 100 calories in 20 minutes of HIIT or 1,500 calories in a few hours on a bike.

But if you ride for an hour and burn 500 calories, take a break, then ride for another hour and take a break, then ride for another hour, you'll burn the same 1500 calories as you would riding for a continuous 3 hours, right? Maybe even a little more if your rested legs can go a little harder after each break?

heybales

Keeping all else equal, the calorie burn would be equal.

But in reality most people would likely make each exercise session a tad more intense (except walking that may have a max speed anyway), and therefore some level of improvement from it, and tad more calorie burn.
Videos with movements that have a max speed to them would likely be along those lines like walking, unless there is weight increase or more reps involved.

Strength is another good example of making lifts in separate session harder to better effect.
Like upper & lower, not a set here, and then another set there of the same thing.

NorthCascades

SuzySunshine99 wrote: »

NorthCascades wrote: »

Of course it matters calories wise. It's the one thing with the most ability to affect calorie burn. I can burn 100 calories in 20 minutes of HIIT or 1,500 calories in a few hours on a bike.

That's not what the poster is asking.

Using your example, if you split up your bike ride into 3 parts throughout the day, would it be a different burn than doing it all at once? Same pace, same TOTAL time.

Apologies for misunderstanding the question. I replied from the vet parking lot while they had my 18 year old fur baby and was not fully present, I was actually looking for distraction. She was frightened enough to pee on the vet assistant. 😭

You're right that if I go through 3 shorter rides instead of 1 longer one, that will have no effect on calories burned. As @chocolate_owl pointed out, it could affect other things, being more well rested in the evening could allow me to ride harder and burn more calories. Nothing inherent in taking breaks will change calories. I do long rides partly because I enjoy them and partly because I want to have more endurance, breaking the exercise up isn't ideal for my goal, but that's not a common reason for people here till be exercising.

Cyclists have a rule about this. If you ride to work, put in your 8 hours, and then ride home, is that one ride (with a break), or two? So we have "the beer and burrito rule," if you stop long enough to have lunch is a new ride. My point with this rambling story is this is a thing that's done frequently and it hasn't affected people's ability to keep weight off.

Sorry for the confusion.

age_is_just_a_number

For strength training, you’d want to ensure you are still doing a proper warm up to ensure you don’t sustain an injury.
Other than that, I agree with the others, the total calorie burn would be consistent.

LKArgh

Thank you, this is encouraging
Back when there was a gym available, and I worked from the office, I used to split days. So I went 2-3 days to the pool for at least one hour, a couple of days to the gym for a long strength training session etc.
Now it is not convenient. So I try to take a break during the day, like a lunch break but swim instead, split strength in shorter sessions, like core one day, lower body next, upper then and rotate, and do my cardio in short 20 minute bursts, because it all fits better. I think it has affected my endurance, and this was to be expected, so I try to catch up on weekends and go for a very long walk, 2-3 hours. It still all feels a bit of weird, but we all have to adjust I guess.

yirara

I would think the effects for the cardiovascular system would be different, where longer probably provides better training overall. But calories should be the same.

sijomial

"My question is, does it matter calorie wise and strength wise?"

Calories probably very close assuming you don't need to warm up for your particular choice of cardio.
If someone was doing more intense cardio they could go harder splitting their work into smaller chunks. Endurance is a different matter as you are finding.

For strength I'd find that 3 x 20mins and 1 x 60mins wouldn't actually be the same volume and intensity for me, but my training style may well not be the same as your training style and of course you might want to change your training style to match your duration, rather than just chop up a 60min routine into three pieces. Maybe one muscle group each short session? It's a cake that can be cut many different ways. Mmmmmm cake.....

iam4scuba

Just thinking out loud, but there is additional calorie burn after you're done with the actual exercise activity. If you split these two exercises up, do you get that additional calorie burn twice, or would you only get half that additional calorie burn each time? Or is the after exercise benefit so small that it isn't worth considering at all?

ninerbuff

iam4scuba wrote: »

Just thinking out loud, but there is additional calorie burn after you're done with the actual exercise activity. If you split these two exercises up, do you get that additional calorie burn twice, or would you only get half that additional calorie burn each time? Or is the after exercise benefit so small that it isn't worth considering at all?

EPOC (excess post exercise oxygen consumption) is highly exaggerated by the fitness industry. Many touting a 24 hour calorie excess burn (not enough studies to actually prove this). And EPOC is actually only a little extra burn, however HIGH INTENSITY exercise in anaerobic fashion has a better EPOC result. If your sprurts of exercise are short, just bust your *kitten* for that time limit with HIIT exercise if you can.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

sijomial

iam4scuba wrote: »

Just thinking out loud, but there is additional calorie burn after you're done with the actual exercise activity. If you split these two exercises up, do you get that additional calorie burn twice, or would you only get half that additional calorie burn each time? Or is the after exercise benefit so small that it isn't worth considering at all?

So small it's not worth considering for the majority of people. It's also in proportion to what you do so three smaller doses of EPOC would probably equate to one bigger dose of EPOC if total time and intensity is the same.

Figures for illustration - someone burns 400 cals from an hour of moderate cardio and gets 7% EPOC effect, 28 cals.
How many M&Ms is that?

rickc74

That's, like, 7 or 8 M&Ms - they're precious, don't trivialize them 🤣

nossmf

One bag of original is 250 calories, so that's 1.5 bags.

ccrdragon

nossmf wrote: »

One bag of original is 250 calories, so that's 1.5 bags.

Nope - he was talking about the EPOC calories, not the calories for the 1 hour ride - the EPOC calories are only 28... that's definitely not 1.5 bags of M&M's...

NorthCascades

iam4scuba wrote: »

Just thinking out loud, but there is additional calorie burn after you're done with the actual exercise activity. If you split these two exercises up, do you get that additional calorie burn twice, or would you only get half that additional calorie burn each time? Or is the after exercise benefit so small that it isn't worth considering at all?

Your "after burn" is going to be in the range of 5 to 7 % of the total calories burned by your exercise.

NorthCascades

ninerbuff wrote: »

iam4scuba wrote: »

Just thinking out loud, but there is additional calorie burn after you're done with the actual exercise activity. If you split these two exercises up, do you get that additional calorie burn twice, or would you only get half that additional calorie burn each time? Or is the after exercise benefit so small that it isn't worth considering at all?

EPOC (excess post exercise oxygen consumption) is highly exaggerated by the fitness industry. Many touting a 24 hour calorie excess burn (not enough studies to actually prove this). And EPOC is actually only a little extra burn, however HIGH INTENSITY exercise in anaerobic fashion has a better EPOC result. If your sprurts of exercise are short, just bust your *kitten* for that time limit with HIIT exercise if you can.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

High intensity interval training isn't something you should just wing when you're bored. The recovery needs are pretty high, so if you have exercise plans tomorrow you don't want to be done HIIT today. It's going to burn off a good deal of glycogen, so now you need to eat a lot of slow carbs and wait to make more.