We live in a society dominated by stress and haste. We want to train but we don’t have time, hardly even to eat. Last minute meetings, going to pick up our children and a thousand other reasons serve to summarize our day to day. For this reason, high-intensity exercises are ideal for reaching everything and not running out of our daily training routine. Just 15-20 minutes a day will be enough to continue with our work plan with the pleasure of having trained.
What are high-intensity exercises?
High intensity exercises, also known as HIIT (high intensity interval training), allow you to alternate moments of high intensity (with anaerobic type exercises) with others of low or medium intensity, and other moments of complete rest. They are ideal for those who want to tone their body and strengthen their muscles, but do not want to spend too much time and want to avoid those famous marathon sessions in the fitness room.
It is possible to put this type of training into practice in all kinds of places, be it at home, in the gym, in the office or in a simple park. Its secret is in combining short intervals of high intensity work, with others of lower pulsations. With this scheme, it is possible to maximize the results obtained using less time. Come on, it is much more efficient than in any kind of normal routine where we would need more time to achieve the same goals.
However, despite needing little time (HIIT workouts can range from 5 to 45, although the average is between 15 and 20 minutes), the necessary physical base is high. Therefore, it is necessary to have a previous route before starting this type of routine. Thus, it is also possible to reduce the risk of suffering any type of injury that leaves us in the dry dock. Over time, high-intensity exercises have been perfected with the emergence of variants such as HIPT (High Intensity Power Training), which focuses work on certain muscle groups, leaving cardiovascular activity as a complement. From this type of variants other disciplines emerged as popular as cross fit, another of the strengths in the offer of the main gym chains worldwide.
Benefits of high-intensity training
At first glance it may seem like just another routine, but high-intensity exercises, and this great variety of pulses and the need for adaptation of the different muscle groups, have enormous benefits for our body. The most prominent are the following:
- It allows training with very little time. One of the great excuses for not training is the lack of time to do it. HIIT debunks this myth. With just 15 or 20 minutes you can complete a complete routine.
- High-intensity exercises allow you to burn fatter. According to a Trapp study, carried out on three groups of women (the first without training, the second after traditional cardio and the last with HIIT training), it was concluded that high-intensity training promotes fat burning for up to 24 hours after completion Of the routine.
- It doesn’t burn muscle. All those who do cardio, as a complement to muscle mass gain, always have one eye open. Performing very long intervals of aerobic activity positively causes fat oxidation, but also muscle. However, HIIT workouts allow you to keep muscle mass intact, while favoring the goodbye of fat reserves.
- Promotes a healthy lifestyle. HIIT favors a better breathing system and is less likely to suffer sudden death, than in continuous running exercises such as the half marathon or the full marathon. In addition, this type of training also favors the production of growth hormone, which allows you to accelerate the cream of calories and slow down the aging of people (yes, as you hear it, it allows you to be younger inside and out).
As if that were not enough, high-intensity exercises are also highly comfortable. They can be done in any type of place, and do not require the use of almost any material, as would be the case in a dumbbell routine. You only need to give your body moments of high intensity during a period of 20 minutes. In addition, this type of training raises the adrenaline, becoming a real challenge for the athlete.
How to do high intensity exercises
Still, there are multiple ways to put high-intensity exercises into practice. One of the most traditional HIIT routines consists of combining series of squats, push-ups, sit-ups, lunges and jump ropes. For 15-20 minutes alternating each set with 30-second breaks. The idea is to take five exercises that encompass the main muscle groups such as the chest or arms, and repeat these series for a certain time with breaks between series that should never exceed 30 seconds. In fact, you can increase the intensity even more with a Tabatha-type workout. This routine lasts less time, between four and five minutes. However, it’s 20 seconds per set and 10 seconds off. Four exercises are combined that are repeated in two series each up to a total of eight series in four minutes. It is very common in abdominal sessions.
If your goal is to tone your body, you should opt for a HIIT core type routine. It is put into practice through different exercises to your liking, and as you feels more comfortable. An example would be spending up to 12 minutes to achieve this goal by combining abdominal exercises in series of 50 seconds and 10 rests... In this way you can perform a total of 12 series, that is, take four exercises and perform three series of each. On the other hand, if your goal is to tone up your muscles exclusively, you should apply the Tabatha method combining exercises such as push-ups, weight lifting, squats or burgees. It can even be combined with another type of training exclusively for lifting weights. However, it is necessary that this weight routine be before HIIT to prevent the fatigue caused by high intensity exercises from affecting your performance.
On the other hand, if your only goal is to lose weight and lose that annoying fat from your body, HIIT also has a routine prepared specifically for fat burning. It is ideal and has multiple advantages over low-intensity cardio. Walking, jogging or cycling at low speeds will lose half as much fat as half an hour of well-planned and well-performed high-intensity exercise. Thus, any type of training explained above would serve to activate your metabolism and start burning calories and, consequently, fat. Thus, if you combine this with a correct diet to lose weight, you will find the most direct way to achieve your goals.
All in all, high-intensity exercises have a wide variety of uses and can be adapted to a large number of different audiences. It doesn’t matter if you want to lose weight, tone up or gain muscle mass. The enormous number of possibilities offered by HIIT routines will allow you to reach your goals in a simple and fun way. You will surely find your place in this training scenario.