Multiple short workouts

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nehaad88
nehaad88 Posts: 159 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I am currently doing 2-3 short 15 minute workouts spread across the day. Body weight exercises in the morning, rowing in the evening and walk/jog at night.
Are these equally effective to a single hour long exercise routine? I don’t think I have stamina to complete an hour long workout.

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  • iam4scuba
    iam4scuba Posts: 39 Member
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    I doubt 2 15 minute workouts is equally effective as a 1 hour workout, but who cares? Do what you're able to and improve from there.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,902 Member
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    Back in 2012, my mom was planning a hiking trip in the Grand Canyon and upped her usual 2-3 mile walks to 6-9 miles, plus more hills to train for this. So yes, longer was more effective for her for building up endurance.

    For you, just continue what you're doing and reevaluate as your stamina and time allow.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,874 Member
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    nehaad88 wrote: »
    I am currently doing 2-3 short 15 minute workouts spread across the day. Body weight exercises in the morning, rowing in the evening and walk/jog at night.
    Are these equally effective to a single hour long exercise routine? I don’t think I have stamina to complete an hour long workout.

    There are definitely benefits from longer duration exercise, particularly where mitophagy is concerned. But everyone starts somewhere. Fitness is something that is built brick by brick over time, so it is important to just do what you can do and then you just keep re-evaluating as you progress.

    When I first started, I found walking my dog around the block to be a challenge. A couple years later I was training and riding 1/2 century and century rides on my bike. For reference, a century ride is a solid 6.5 to 7 hours on a bike with relatively continuous effort.

    Do what you can do and build your fitness.
  • SnifterPug
    SnifterPug Posts: 746 Member
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    If a longer workout is simply going to be exactly the same as your shorter workouts, but done consecutively, then it probably doesn't make a whole lot of difference, though it might make some difference in terms of general endurance improvements.
  • westrich20940
    westrich20940 Posts: 878 Member
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    Not sure that it really matters until you get really deep into splitting hairs or anything.

    Physical activity is important full stop...so if it's not possible for you to do a 1/2 hour or hour long workout --- then absolutely break it down into smaller intervals. It might be marginally more beneficial to respiratory/cardiovascular health to have your HR up for longer maybe ... but I don't really know that and I'm not a doctor/researcher soooo....do what you're doing it's fine.

    Also - you may find that you can't do an hour long workout right now but as you continue to be consistent in your shorter workouts, it will become possible for you if you want to.

    When I started running (after some years of ... low motivation let's say) I was walking, when I felt like adding running I'd run for like...30 seconds to a minute and feel like I'd die. LOL. It gets easier and easier to keep going and going....You'll see. =D
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,170 Member
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    You will work your way up to endurance, if that's your goal.

    Short workouts, repeated across the day, are an excellent on-ramp.

    Keep pushing duration, intensity, frequency . . . keep it manageable, but just a nice bit challenging . . . that's the route to progress.

    You're doing great.

    P.S 2-3 x 15 minutes < an hour, objectively, in benefits. Don't worry about that. If 2-3 x 15' is manageable, just that bit challenging, you're doing fine. Work your way to 2-3 x 16, 17, 18; or a little more intensity at 15; or 3-4 x 15, or a combination . . . as you're able, as it fits into your life with good balance (enough time & energy for everything else important to you). That's how to make progress, in happy, manageable, positive increments.

    Wishing you much success!
  • springlering62
    springlering62 Posts: 7,463 Member
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    Do what you can do. That’s THE most important thing and breaths the heck out of doing nothing.

    You’ll build up endurance. It may not feel like it now.

    The first time I did a Pilates class I wanted to curl up in a ball and die. Ditto for running the first couple months. Just keep plugging away at it.

    It’s anecdotal and not very scientific, but my personal experience has been the longer the period of workout, the more my tracker records. I’m not phrasing that very clearly.

    If I go straight from the house to a hot yoga class, I may record 200 calories for the class.

    I often go for a run before class, immediately collect my mat, and go straight in to class. Because my heart rate is already up, I record more calories burnt in the class, by roughly 10-15%.

    It’s not scientific, but for it’s consistent. YMMV, but for me, longer workouts or back to back workouts are more effective if the calorie burn is what I’m after.

    I’ve tried doing some short video classes, even doing several in a row, but imho, by the time the intro is made, and i’ve peered at and caught the jist of what they’re doing, the class is almost over. I just don’t feel like I accomplish much with short classes.

    But, they’re a start, and there’s certainly no shame in them. You’re already accomplishing more doing those than 95% of the population. And you’re experimenting and have an opportunity to discover new types of workouts you may enjoy.

  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,170 Member
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    springlering62 wrote: »
    Do what you can do. That’s THE most important thing and breaths the heck out of doing nothing.

    You’ll build up endurance. It may not feel like it now.

    The first time I did a Pilates class I wanted to curl up in a ball and die. Ditto for running the first couple months. Just keep plugging away at it.

    It’s anecdotal and not very scientific, but my personal experience has been the longer the period of workout, the more my tracker records. I’m not phrasing that very clearly.

    If I go straight from the house to a hot yoga class, I may record 200 calories for the class.

    I often go for a run before class, immediately collect my mat, and go straight in to class. Because my heart rate is already up, I record more calories burnt in the class, by roughly 10-15%.

    It’s not scientific, but for it’s consistent. YMMV, but for me, longer workouts or back to back workouts are more effective if the calorie burn is what I’m after.

    I’ve tried doing some short video classes, even doing several in a row, but imho, by the time the intro is made, and i’ve peered at and caught the jist of what they’re doing, the class is almost over. I just don’t feel like I accomplish much with short classes.

    But, they’re a start, and there’s certainly no shame in them. You’re already accomplishing more doing those than 95% of the population. And you’re experimenting and have an opportunity to discover new types of workouts you may enjoy.

    Wellll . . . this may be disagreeable, but . . . just because your tracker estimates more calories, it doesn't mean more calories are burned, necessarily.

    If I work out when it's very hot outside, my tracker may estimate that I burn more calories because heat and dehydration increase heart rate for reasons that have nothing to do with the number of calories being burned by the activity being performed at the time.

    The activity itself (rowing or whatever, if same distance/pace) burns about the same number of calories, super hot day, or cool day. When it's very hot, my heart beats harder to cool my body (may burn a tiny number of extra calories, but mostly it's just increasing bpm to make cooling work better). If I'm dehydrated, my heart beats harder because blood volume is lower so it needs more beats to push the blood around, basically.

    Heart rate goes up for a lot of reasons. One of the reasons a pure HR estimate for something like interval workouts is more likely to be an overestimate is that heart rate stays high in the rest intervals, even though there aren't materially more calories being burned while resting than when resting without exercise before/after bracketing that rest. Someone - maybe @sijomial? - had some nice data from a power-metered cycling situation, illustrating this pretty clearly.

    If your first exercise session improves your energy level or something like that, so that your 2nd workout is more effective/energetic/intense, then back-to-back workouts would burn more calories vs. doing those same workouts with a long recovery period between them. Otherwise, unlikely.

    If the 2nd workout isn't improved in intensity by the first, it's just an example of HR drift, basically, not more oxygen demand. It's oxygen demand that correlates with calorie burn; heartbeat counts are a proxy, and a very imperfect one.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    @AnnPT77
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    Sorry @springlering62 but Im going to disagree with your conclusion, your method of estimation is misleading you I'm afraid.
    The OP can probably achieve greater exercise performance right now by splitting their workouts as they will be starting each session fresh and recovered.

    If I was estimating my indoor biking by HR then my (apparent) calorie burns would have gone up massively recently as the cooling fans in my gym have been taken away (due to COVID). The drift upwards in HR even at perfectly stable power output and calorie burns is pretty rapid when sitting in still air instead of moving air.

    Yes there is a very slight calorie increase purely from your heart having to pump more blood to your skin surface for cooling but a HRM is interpreting a raised HR as demand from your working muscles (trying to use HR to estimate oxygen uptake) and going to badly over-estimate calories.

    I calibrated an old HRM (Garmin FT60) over time to match power-based calorie estimates for steady state. But it over-estimated by about 20% if I did hard intervals instead of steady state and that's with a fast recovery rate.
    For a different example my power output and resulting calorie burns at top end of HR zone 2 now match what I used to have to be in zone 4 to achieve. Same calorie burn, far fewer heart beats.

    I would say though that HRM based estimates can achieve the fairly low requirements of being reasonable enough to be usable for calorie counting purposes if someone is either lucky or has the sense to adjust based on results over time, doesn't mean they are accurate though.


  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,902 Member
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    springlering62 wrote: »
    Do what you can do. That’s THE most important thing and breaths the heck out of doing nothing.

    You’ll build up endurance. It may not feel like it now.

    The first time I did a Pilates class I wanted to curl up in a ball and die. Ditto for running the first couple months. Just keep plugging away at it. [snip]

    Reminds me of the first time I did this. It was laughably pathetic. I've now been doing it regularly for 8 months or so and have greatly improved.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIdAPUA3GY4&amp;list=PLUXvX9BaxgqG9yO5XWB3gA_QshvrrcjVr&amp;index=4&amp;t=10s
  • nehaad88
    nehaad88 Posts: 159 Member
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    Thanks for the responses people.

    My other issue, if I stretch and do a longer workout is that it leaves me starving and I end up eating much more.

    I will be trying to find a middle ground so that I improve my fitness without compromising my calories.

    Any tips for that are also welcome.
  • JBanx256
    JBanx256 Posts: 1,473 Member
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    springlering62 wrote: »

    You know what? You’re being mindful of what you’re doing, and stopping and thinking of how it’s affecting your body and your appetite.


    Agreed. No matter what the "perfect" workout is on paper, if it doesn't fit with your particular needs or you don't like how you respond to it...it obviously isn't perfect FOR YOU. So whatever fits your lifestyle and current level of ability, roll with it! As you make progress in your fitness, you can make adjustments and continue to improve.
  • ValkyrVex
    ValkyrVex Posts: 13 Member
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    I've been doing this and I'm seeing improvement. I'll do a pole or aerial silks flow for 10-25 minutes in the morning and at night with a walk or run in the middle of the day. I've been seeing amazing strength and flexibility gains even in small intervals, and it's more manageable to just workout for a stint between jobs than to wait and hope I'll have the energy for a long workout at the end of my day.
    The best workouts are the ones you do.

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