Mission 1, Day 36: Smaller HIIT and bigger results
Today I did a different sort of HIIT session. I warmed up for 3 minutes and then I did 30 seconds at 8.5 mph and 30 seconds at 4.5 mph. I continued this for 20 minutes (20 intervals) and then cooled down for 5 minutes for a total of 28 minutes of HIIT. My heart rate monitor had me burning 387 calories. Two days ago I did HIIT that lasted 28 minutes with longer intervals. My heart rate monitor had me burning 298 calories on that day. Thus, the shorter intervals (probably the shorter rest period) had me working harder and burning more fat.
I need to do something to kickstart my metabolism. I am not sure why I'm so concerned because I've been getting consistent results for over a month now, but I am thinking ahead. I know I will plateau eventually and I want to avoid it because I have some very specific goals I want to meet. Failure is not an option here. I know many of you might think I should just relax and make a move if the results slow down and you are probably right. Adam says that I should do Surge along with the training, but I like the results I'm getting from The New Rules of Lifting and I'm not ready to stop that program yet. I guess that means I just need to be very (extremely) strict about my nutrition. I also need to play some games with the carbs because I honestly think I'm a little carb sensitive.
Thanks to everyone for the nice comments you've been leaving. I will be recording my podcast this weekend. I had originally planned to release it on Saturday, but I'm thinking Sunday is going to be the day. If I can find the time tomorrow, I will release it then, but Sunday at the very latest. Please check back for that!
Until tomorrow...
I'm a fan of the shorter intervals too. I primarily do 30 sec intervals, but sometimes go to 1 or 2 min intervals to mix it up. I definitely find that I can push harder with the 30 sec intervals, especially since I'm a primarily fast twitch muscle person. I read some research (would have to find the reference again) that actually put the optimal fat burning intervals at between 8-12 seconds. The difficulty with these of course, is that it's near impossible to do it on a treadmill or any other machine with a lot of inertia because it takes too long to speed up and slow down the load. So it's not really practical on traditional cardio equipment. Either biking or dryland running would be easier to do it on.
It's kind of funny that HIIT has become such a phenomenom when I don't find it is that much different than traditional sprinting exercises. It's probably just one of those psychological things. A lot of exercise programs seem to promote HIIT as the fat-burning breakthrough, but if you mention the phrase "wind sprints", for most people it just brings up pictures and feelings of agonizing pain from being out of breath.
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Raiden, I totally agree. When I first read about HIIT and what a "new" thing it was, I realized immediately "That's just 'run the straightaways, walk the curves' my coaches had me doing in high school!" Wind sprints....ahhhhh!!!!
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