Results with HIIT???

fitnessgoddess17

Hey is anyone out there doing just HIIT workouts and if so are you seeing results? I keep hearing how you can burn so much more with a 20 minute HIIT workout than a 60 min cardio workout. I have to say it is tempting, I usually workout while my baby naps. 20 minutes is easier to get in than an hour with time left over for house work. i've tried them the last few days and they are intense. However it's been ingrained in me that 20 minutes isn't a workout it's a warm up. Course what we know about fitness is always changing so curious to hear anyones stories of success or not with it.

Thanks peeps.

MostlyWater

I think it's a poor idea to rely on only one kind of workout.

MeanderingMammal

I keep hearing how you can burn so much more with a 20 minute HIIT workout than a 60 min cardio workout.

That's nonsense. High intensity intervals aren't magic, contrary to the BroScience disciples that preach it. You'll burn more doing a high intensity intervals session for 20 minutes than you will in a moderate intensity steady state, but if you go to threshold pace for 20 minutes you're going to be about the same.

What HIIT gives you is an improvement to your VO2Max, so that if you sustain the training for three months or so you'll start to see a small increase in your ability to consume calories at rest. Post exercise oxygen consumption for HIIT is about 14% rather than about 7% for steady state, of course if you're only talking about 7% of 100 calories that's not a significant difference.

I have to say it is tempting, I usually workout while my baby naps. 20 minutes is easier to get in than an hour with time left over for house work. i've tried them the last few days and they are intense. However it's been ingrained in me that 20 minutes isn't a workout it's a warm up. Course what we know about fitness is always changing so curious to hear anyones stories of success or not with it.

To get best effect you need to have a mix of CV sessions; long duration moderate intensity builds aerobic capacity, shorter duration higher intensity threshold sessions will improve exercise efficiency and endurance at higher intensity and HIIT improves your VO2 Max. You're not going to get the best from the latter two if you're not doing the first, whereas the latter two really sharpen up your ability by building on the base.

Optimally you need to complement your CV with some form of resistance training as well.

SweatLikeDog

I typically burn 400 calories in 18 minutes with high intensity kettlebell intervals of 30 to 60 seconds with rest intervals of 30 to 90 seconds respectively. Measured with a chest strap heart rate monitor. Max heart rate usually reaches mid 170s from baseline of mid 70s. High intensity means HIGH intensity HIGH velocity motion. It should scare you.

The original high intensity interval concept came from Japan:

http://www.tabataprotocol.com/

fitnessgoddess17

I guess I should clarify. The program I'm looking at doing is 3 days with 20 minutes Hiit and 3 days with 45 minutes of cardio. Still though 20 minutes doesn't seem like enough to do anything.

fitnessgoddess17

I keep hearing how you can burn so much more with a 20 minute HIIT workout than a 60 min cardio workout.

That's nonsense. High intensity intervals aren't magic, contrary to the BroScience disciples that preach it. You'll burn more doing a high intensity intervals session for 20 minutes than you will in a moderate intensity steady state, but if you go to threshold pace for 20 minutes you're going to be about the same.

What HIIT gives you is an improvement to your VO2Max, so that if you sustain the training for three months or so you'll start to see a small increase in your ability to consume calories at rest. Post exercise oxygen consumption for HIIT is about 14% rather than about 7% for steady state, of course if you're only talking about 7% of 100 calories that's not a significant difference.

I have to say it is tempting, I usually workout while my baby naps. 20 minutes is easier to get in than an hour with time left over for house work. i've tried them the last few days and they are intense. However it's been ingrained in me that 20 minutes isn't a workout it's a warm up. Course what we know about fitness is always changing so curious to hear anyones stories of success or not with it.

sity

To get best effect you need to have a mix of CV sessions; long duration moderate intensity builds aerobic capacity, shorter duration higher intensity threshold sessions will improve exercise efficiency and endurance at higher intensity and HIIT improves your VO2 Max. You're not going to get the best from the latter two if you're not doing the first, whereas the latter two really sharpen up your ability by building on the base.

Optimally you need to complement your CV with some form of resistance training as well.

That's a lot of helpful info. Thanks

MeanderingMammal

Measured with a chest strap heart rate monitor.

Given that high intensity intervals take you into the anaerobic range frequently the calorie estimations using an HRM are wildly overestimated. The HRM uses HR as a proxy for calorie consumption, based on assumptions around stability of the proxy and smooth transitions.

Essentially in any kind of session where performance is anaerobic an HRM is going to be significantly higher than actual calorie consumption.

For me a HIIT session would be 15 minutes warming up at a 10 minute mile, then some variation of 400 metre, or 200 metre, or 60 second sprint intervals at anything down to a 4 minute mile with rest periods back at 8 minute miles for twenty minutes. Then cool down again with another 15 minutes at a 10 minute mile.

I'll get to about 195bpm in the peaks, down to 150 in the rest intervals.

I don't personally tend to use tabata intervals, as they'll tend to need a slightly lower intensity during the higher paced elements, so closer to a threshold session.