Interval Training

Interval Training

Week 1, Static Cycle.

Minutes	RPE	Notes
3	3	Warm up at low intensity
4	5	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	7	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
3	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	8	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
2	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
2	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
3	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	8	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
4	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	7	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
3	3	Cool down at low intensity

Week 2, Cardio.

This week we increase the intensity by altering the duration. Static cycle.

Minutes	RPE	Notes
3	3	Warm up at low intensity
1	7	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
3	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
1	8	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
2	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
2	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
1	8	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
2	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
1	7	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
3	5	Decrease resistance an/or pedal power
3	3	Cool down at low intensity

Week 3, Cardio.

This week and the following weeks, we increase the Intensity. Static cycle.

Minutes	RPE	Notes
3	3	Warm up at low intensity
2	5	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	7	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	8	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	9	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	8	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
1	7	Increase resistance and/or pedal power
1	5	Decrease resistance and/or pedal power
3	3	Cool down at low intensity

Due to the nature of this super toning routine, your nutrition must be optimum and fluid intake must be of at least 2 litres per day.

This routine was designed by Doug Lawrenson, owner of Pro-Diets.com. Doug is an expert in both nutrition and training.

Interval training: Can it boost your calorie-burning power?

Interval training is a powerful tool for novice exercisers and accomplished athletes alike. Here's how it works.

By Mayo Clinic staff

Are you ready to shake up your workout routine? Do you wish you could burn more calories without spending more time at the gym? Consider aerobic interval training. Once the domain of elite athletes, interval training has become a powerful tool for the average exerciser, too.

What is interval training?

It's not as complicated as you might think. Interval training is simply alternating bursts of intense activity with intervals of lighter activity.

Take walking. If you're in good shape, you might incorporate short bursts of jogging into your regular brisk walks. If you're less fit, you might alternate leisurely walking with periods of faster walking. For example, if you're walking outdoors, you could walk faster between certain mailboxes, trees or other landmarks.

What can interval training do for me?

Whether you're a novice exerciser or you've been exercising for years, interval training can help you jazz up your workout routine. Consider the benefits:

• You'll burn more calories. The more vigorously you exercise, the more calories you'll burn — even if you increase intensity for just a few minutes at a time.
• You'll improve your aerobic capacity. As your cardiovascular fitness improves, you'll be able to exercise longer or with more intensity. Imagine finishing your 60-minute walk in 45 minutes — or the additional calories you'll burn by keeping up the pace for the full 60 minutes.
• You'll keep boredom at bay. Turning up your intensity in short intervals can add variety to your exercise routine.
• You don't need special equipment. You can simply modify your current routine.

How will my muscles respond to interval training?

During intense exercise, muscles produce waste products that can contribute to muscle soreness. Too many accumulated waste products can make exercise painful and exhausting. But by alternating bursts of intense exercise with easier intervals, you'll help reduce the buildup of waste products in your muscles. The result is more comfortable exercise.

Are the principles of interval training the same for everyone?

Yes — but you can take interval training to many levels. If you simply want to vary your exercise routine, you can determine the length and speed of each high-intensity interval based on how you feel that day. After warming up, you might increase the intensity for 30 seconds and then resume your normal pace. The next burst of more intense activity may last two to three minutes. How much you pick up the pace, how often and for how long is up to you.

If you're working toward a specific fitness goal, you may want to take a more scientific approach. A personal trainer or other expert can help you time the intensity and duration of your intervals — which may include movement patterns similar to those you'll use during your sport or activity — based on your target heart rate, the ability of your heart and lungs to deliver oxygen to your muscles (peak oxygen intake) and other factors. This type of interval training also adds variety to your workout, but it requires more discipline and concentration.

Does interval training have risks?

Interval training isn't appropriate for everyone. If you have a chronic health condition or haven't been exercising regularly, consult your doctor before trying any type of interval training.

Also keep the risk of overuse injury in mind. If you rush into a strenuous workout before your body is ready, you may hurt your muscles, tendons or bones. Instead, start slowly. Try just one or two higher intensity intervals during each workout at first. If you think you're overdoing it, slow down. As your stamina improves, challenge yourself to vary the pace. You may be surprised by the results.

Interval Training Builds Fitness Fast

Vary Your Training Intensity to Boost Your Performance

By Elizabeth Quinn, About.com Guide

Updated: April 19, 2009

About.com Health's Disease and Condition content is reviewed by the Medical Review Board

Interval training has been the basis for athletic training routines for years. The first forms of interval training, called "fartlek" involved alternating short, fast bursts of intensive exercise with slow, easy activity. Fartlek was casual, unstructured training that perfectly fit its English translation: "speed play."

What is Interval Training?

The interval programs of today have become highly sophisticated methods of structured training for athletic performance enhancement. Physiologists and trainers have designed interval programs that are specifically suited to individual athletes. These sessions include precisely measured intervals that match the athlete's sport, event and current level of conditioning. Often the appropriate intensity and duration of the intervals is determined by the results of anaerobic threshold testing (AT) that includes measuring the blood-lactate of an athlete during intense exercise.

How Interval Training Works

Interval training works both the aerobic and the anaerobic system. During the high intensity effort, the anaerobic system uses the energy stored in the muscles (glycogen) for short bursts of activity. Anaerobic metabolism works without oxygen. The by-product is lactic acid, which is related to the burning sensation felt in the muscles during high intensity efforts. During the high intensity interval, lactic acid builds and the athlete enters oxygen debt. During the recovery phase the heart and lungs work together to "pay back" this oxygen debt and break down the lactic acid. It is in this phase that the aerobic system is in control, using oxygen to convert stored carbohydrates into energy.

The Benefits of Interval Training

This repetitive form of training leads to the adaptation response. The body begins to build new capillaries, and is better able to take in and deliver oxygen to the working muscles. Muscles develop a higher tolerance to the build-up of lactate, and the heart muscle is strengthened. These changes result in improved performance particularly within the cardiovascular system.

Interval training also helps prevent the injuries often associated with repetitive endurance exercise, and they allow you to increase your training intensity without overtraining or burn-out. In this way, adding intervals to your workout routine is a good way to cross train.

According to the American College of Sports Medicine, more calories are burned in short, high intensity exercise. If you are counting calories burned, high intensity exercise such as intervals are better than long, slow endurance exercise, but you may pay a price. Read more about the benefits and dangers of high intensity exercise.

You don't need to be a world-class athlete and have sophisticated blood analysis to take advantage of the benefits of interval training. The standard "speed play" training of fartlek works well for the rest of us. This type of interval work is based upon your subjective needs. Simply pay attention to how you feel and set your intensity and duration accordingly.

Interval Training Safety Tips

• Warm Up before starting intervals
• Assess current conditioning and set training goals that are within your ability
• Start slowly. (for example: walk 2 minutes/ run 2 minutes) In general, longer intervals provide better results
• Keep a steady, but challenging pace throughout the interval
• Build the number of repetitions over time
• Bring your heart rate down to 100-110 bpm during the rest interval
• To improve, increase intensity or duration, but not both at the same time
• Make any changes slowly over a period of time
• Train on a smooth, flat surface to ensure even effort
• You can also use circuit training as a form of interval training

Advanced Interval Training Workouts
You can take a more scientific approach to interval training by varying your work and recovery intervals based on your pre-determined goals. Here are the four variables you can manipulate when designing your interval training program:

• Intensity (speed) of work interval
• Duration (distance or time) of work interval
• Duration of rest or recovery interval
• Number of repetitions of each interval

The Science behind Fat Loss Training

by Stephen Holt, Stemulite Fitness Pro

Alwyn Cosgrove’s Real World Fat Loss Manual points out that…

* A 2004 diet study that shows a simple change can increase dietary compliance and fat loss by 96% — (and it’s not “eat less”!)
* A 1998 study that showed that the addition of 45 minutes of hard aerobic training, 5 times a week for twelve weeks – had no effect on fat loss
* A study from 1994 showed an interval training method that actually reduced body fat (skinfold measurements) nine times more than traditional cardio training — despite taking less time, and actually burning fewer calories per session
* A 1999 study showed that the addition of a specific resistance training program increased fat loss by 35% over diet plus aerobic training
* That same study also showed that 3 aerobic sessions of up to 50 mins, for 12 weeks (36 sessions) only increased fat loss by one pound over dieting alone
* A 2002 study used an Afterburn-type approach to training – and showed an elevation of metabolism for 38 hours post workout.

Alwyn Cosgrove – from Afterburn Extreme Fat Loss Training – Part II

by Stephen Holt, Stemulite Fitness Pro

Caloric expenditure

Fat loss is all about caloric expenditure. We must burn more calories than we take in, and the real key to doing this, as mentioned before, is not aerobic training, which will burn calories while you are doing it, its anaerobic training, which burns calories while you are doing it AND increases the calories burned for hours afterwards.

In the case of weight training, if we build muscle and keep it, that burns calories forever more. Even when you sleep!

The key with anaerobic training is what is known as EPOC. Anaerobic exercise burns a ton of calories while you are performing it. However, the metabolism remains elevated following this type exercise.

This was, at one time, referred to as the oxygen debt, but is now referred to as the excess post-exercise oxygen consumption (EPOC).

The recovery of the metabolic rate back to pre-exercise levels can require several minutes for light exercise (aerobic training), several hours for very heavy exercise (anaerobic cardio training), and up to 12 to 24 hours or even longer for prolonged, exhaustive exercise (interval training or circuit weight training).

The EPOC can add up to a substantial energy expenditure when totaled over the entire period of recovery. If the oxygen consumption following exercise remains elevated by an average of only 50 ml/min or 0.05 liter/min, this will amount to approximately 0.25 kcal/min or 15 kcal/hr.

If the metabolism remains elevated for five hours, this would amount to an additional expenditure of 75 kcal that would not normally be included in the calculated total energy expenditure for that particular activity.

This major source of energy expenditure, which occurs during recovery, but is directly the result of the exercise bout, is frequently ignored in most calculations of the energy cost of various activities.

If the individual in this example exercised five days per week, he or she would have expended 375 kcal, or lost the equivalent of approximately 0.1 pounds of fat in one week, or 1.0 pounds in 10 weeks, just from the additional caloric expenditure during the recovery period alone.

This is the key to maximizing the return on your exercise investment.

The next obvious idea is – if you trained the next day while your metabolism is still elevated, will we have an even higher return – is the effect accumulative? Is the whole greater than the sum of the parts? (these are great questions. where are the answers?)

Science has yet to give us an answer, however in the real world, I think so. I have seen amazing results with my clients using this exact protocol.

Interval training

So is there a better way of performing cardio workouts to prevent these adaptations, and rapidly improve fat loss results? Yes. The key is to perform what is known as interval training.

Interval training simply refers to a series of intense activity separated with short rest periods.

Through using interval training you are able to exercise at a higher intensity without getting tired. In other words – because we alternate the periods of high intensity work, with periods of lower intensity work – you are able to do much more work in the same time period than you were before.

The beauty of this is as you improve, the work intervals can get harder and harder, and the recovery intervals can be shortened, or performed at a higher speed.

In fact, there is no end in sight, and no downside to interval training (other than it is really hard).

How to Do Interval Training

By eHow Sports & Fitness Editor

Introduction

To tap into a new, higher level of fitness and fat burning, try an interval workout. The combination of aerobic and anaerobic training will give a real boost to your health and make the rest of your workouts seem easier.

Instructions

Difficulty: Challenging

Steps

1

Step One

Begin with 5 to 7 minutes of low-intensity work in your exercise mode. For example, walk or jog lightly to start.

2

Step Two

Stretch the major muscle groups, paying particular attention to the lower body.

3

Step Three

Exercise at a higher intensity for 10 minutes. Let your body continue to warm up and get ready for the workout to come.

4

Step Four

Start cycle 1: Exercise for 3 minutes at a pace you could maintain for the entire workout. Then for 1 minute push yourself hard, with a short burst of activity that you couldn't do for longer than a minute.

5

Step Five

Recover for 30 seconds or longer, but keep moving, and let your breath return to a normal workout level.

6

Step Six

Understand that the cycle is 3 minutes aerobic/recovery and 1 minute anaerobic (3-to-1).

7

Step Seven

Complete eight cycles, the first four becoming progressively harder, with the hardest cycles being four and five, then decrease the intensity with cycles six, seven and eight.

8

Step Eight

Keep moving for another 3 to 4 minutes or until you feel your heart rate coming down.

9

Step Nine

Stretch the major muscles again, this time more deeply and for 20 to 30 seconds.

Tips & Warnings

• Always use the first 30 seconds of the aerobic portion to recover and literally catch your breath.
• Think of the cycles as going up and down a mountain - as they ascend, it's hard and there's not much oxygen at the top, then the descent gets easier.
• Note that 1 minute may be too long for a beginner, so try shortening the anaerobic (without oxygen) cycles - even 10 seconds is an effective way to start.
• Notice that your heart rate is going way up and then way down; it should peak and valley quite a bit during interval training.
• Plan to interval train only once or twice a week.
• Allow for 48 hours of recovery between each session. It's OK to exercise during the 48 hours, but avoid strenuous exercise and anything high-impact.
• Drink lots of water.
• Please consult your physician before attempting this or any other strenuous physical activity. Listen to your body.
• This advice is not intended to substitute for advice from a physician, physical therapist or personal trainer.

http://www.ehow.com/how_6013_interval-training.html

Interval Training for Weight Loss

Source: intervaltraining.net

Do you want to lose weight, more specifically fat?

Do you feel paralysed after failing time and time again to lose those extra pounds?

Don’t you just get hopping mad when you do a ton of exercise and you really don't lose any weight at all? You may try and fool yourself that it’s ok but every time you look in the mirror, it doesn't lie. Are you finding it harder and harder to be motivated because you are starting to feel a little hopeless?

Well If I can show you a way to lose all your fat in weeks, are you willing to spend no more than 20 minutes three times a week achieving this? What would it mean to you if you could walk around in your costume and feel fantastic about it?

By the time you finish reading this article, you will know how to consistently lose 2 pounds of pure fat every week so you can actually fit into those fantastic clothes you just bought. You are about to discover a type of exercise that causes a chain reaction in your body to burn fat…a LOT of fat, for hours...…but first let’s talk about what doesn’t work.

Skip to the programs

interval training for weight lossFor years, we've been told low-intensity aerobic exercise is the best method for burning off our extra body fat. Research also indicates that the lower the intensity of the exercise the more percentage of fat is used as fuel for muscles, so in low intensity aerobic activity the body operates in a ‘fat burning’ zone which burns more fat than at higher intensity. Unfortunately according to modern research, this just doesn't seem to work very well.
In fact tens of experiments have all concluded that aerobic exercise does nothing for large scale fat loss.

So unfortunately, like you, there are thousands of people trying desperately to lose weight by doing some work on the treadmill or something similar. And for the most part, all of these people are not going to lose any fat. (If you want some proof go look at a local fun run, these people are fit but are they shape you want to be?)

Not too many benefits for all that work… So what to do? Well, there is an exercise routine that apart from speedy fat loss has a multitude of benefits which include:

* Losing at least two pounds per week and I am being conservative with this figure…
* Getting a toned, athletic look - don’t just lose weight, mould your body into a shape that will be turning heads;
* Tons and tons of energy - Imagine having energy for a full exciting life, you will have more energy than you know what to do with;
* Super fitness - having a lot more cardio endurance and fitness than the guy who spend two hours on the treadmill each day;
* Chase away disease - this exercise does wonders for lowering blood pressure and staving type 2 diabetes away; and
* Automatically as you body loses weight, you will become aware of extra energy and vitality

How would you like it if you had dozens of people desperate to find out your weight loss super secret while they still were failing? Get used to it, it will happen a lot.

And think now what will you do with that new toned body, take it to the beach, buy new clothes or shake it on the dance floor.

Ok, enough trying to motivate you, the secret to this wonderful metamorphosis is a type of interval training called High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). Study after study has proven the incredible fat burning effects that HIIT can have on the body, in fact in the first bit of research that set interval training as the benchmark for fat loss; the participants lost 9 times as much fat as those doing standard aerobic exercises.

Skip to the programs
It works so well because of a process called EPOC

interval training for weight loss 3EPOC occurs in the body after intense exercise drains muscles of their inbuilt energy source. This has to be replenished in the body, and it can take up to 48 hours to happen. During this time your body has no alternative but to draw and burn up your fat reserves. So for the next two days while you sit at work, watch TV or have that peaceful nap, your blood cells are rushing around that belly or those thighs, grabbing as much of the fat as it can and taking it away to use it as energy, without you having to do much...

And EPOC is only the immediate benefit; over time your body’s ability to convert energy directly into the muscle increases. The muscles ability to store energy increases so your demands for fat release go up, and interval training starts convincing the body to funnel new energy to the muscles instead of sending them to your fat stores. All of this increases the more you do interval training, so as you can see the better you get at this, the more of a fat burning machine your body turns into.