You’ve probably experienced working on a cardio machine for some time now and realized that it’s just 10 minutes only and you still have miles to go. For sure, you’ll feel frustrated by this especially when you feel you’ve been doing a lot already. Well, the good news is that there is a solution to this little problem and that is interval training. Although doing your traditional cardio routine is necessary from time to time, sometimes, adding interval training can help you kick your energy levels up not to mention your metabolism too.
Professional athletes are using interval training for years now so they will become better at what they do but you don’t really need to be a fitness buff to reap the benefits of interval training.
Changing the intensity of your workout can actually cause to burn more calories compared to working out at a sedate pace. Plus, it makes your fitness routine more interesting too.
Interval Training Basics
Interval training is basically a workout program where you can use any kind of cardio or strength training exercises in just a short period of time with minimal rest in between. For example, you will start with squats for 30 seconds, rest for 10 seconds, planks for 30 seconds, rest for 10 seconds, and so on until you complete a 10-minute or 20-minute workout. The intensity depends on your fitness level which is great because you will have more flexibility with regards to doing your fitness routine.
Benefits of Interval Training
- Efficient workouts. Most people don’t have enough time to spare to exercise for more than an hour but thanks to interval training, you don’t really have to because the intensity of the workout will definitely challenge your muscles. And the fact that you can do interval training from 10 to 30 minutes, you will have plenty of time to do your other work.
- Minimize risk of injury. Another benefit to interval training is that you are reducing your chances of injury because of the different intensity that you are using. Since you’ll only be exercising for 20 minutes or so, there is no risk of overtraining.
- Boost endurance. When you do interval training, you are actually training your heart to pump more blood to your entire body, specifically your muscles, where oxygen is then extracted allowing you to exercise with ease.
- Promote weight loss. Interval training is also effective when it comes to losing weight because the more intense your workouts are, the more calories you get to burn. Just imagine a 20-minute interval training on high intensity can burn up to 300 calories or more depending on what exercises you are doing.
- Avoids boredom. If you’re sticking with the usual cardio or strength training routine, you’ll probably get bored eventually and may even stop altogether. With interval training, this won’t be a problem because there will be always something new to try out. Besides, you get to mix and match your exercises and even increase the intensity if you feel like it.
