Is High Intensity Interval Training evidence-based?

This month we stick with the theme of INTENSITY.

If you have been living in a cave for the last 10 years and have just come back to exercise, first of all welcome back and second, let’s talk about HIIT.

There is no evidence that spending hours in the gym doing low level Cardio is valuable time spent when we all lead busy lives.

Forget the fat burning zone in the gym and replace it with light activity throughout the day.

The Gym is a place to train. But you don’t need a Gym to workout.

All you need is the motivation and a small investment of your time.

HIIT or High Intensity Interval Training delivers the same if not better biological markers of fitness in an incredibly short amount of time.

Protect your workout time and guard it with your life.

You can get all the exercise benefits in just minutes.

This Medical Doctor in the above BBC 2 Video, is being educated about Exercise.

Check out the full video from Horizon: The Truth about exercise

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17177251

From a recent study of HIIT (Gilllen et al, 2016 - see previous blog) medical markers of fitness like muscle, blood sugar, maximal oxygen uptake and body fat can all be changed in accumulated minutes over a 12 week training programme.

It is about intensity rather than duration.

However, intensity comes at a price.

Welcome to the pain cave!

I would also like to correct his posture, but that’s another Blog!

Take home message:

VALUE INTENSITY

Bulletproofbodies Team

Can you get Fit with only ONE MINUTE of exercise?

Do you have a minute?

Because the latest studies show that only 60 seconds could be all you need!

These days it is all about time-effective workouts.

If you are trying to get fit quick you might want to read this study that shows that only ONE minute of Intense exercise can be beneficial and that only 3 minutes of high intensity, weekly exercise can equal 150 minutes of moderate exercise.

Sounds interesting doesn't it?

The study is by Gillen, Martin, MacInnis, Skelly, Tarnopolsky & Gibala (2016) from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

The study divided the 27 participants (Sedentary Males) into 3 groups:

1. Control group

2. Moderate Intensity Continuous Training (MICT)

3. Sprint Interval Training (SIT)

The SIT group followed the following exercise protocol on an exercise bike:

2 minute warm up 

20 second sprint

2 minute active recovery

Repeated 3 times

3 minute Cool down

3 x 20 seconds of intensity = 1 minute of pure intensity accumulated.

The study lasted 12 weeks and the participants trained 3 x Week.

The High Intensity group (SIT) had cycled for only 6 hours (36 minutes of intensity) whilst the MICT group had cycled for 27 hours.

The results were surprising!

After 12 weeks (3 Months) of training both the MICT and SIT groups had improved insulin sensitivity, Cardio-respiratory fitness, and skeletal muscle mitochondria (the powerhouse of the cell).

There was no significant difference in fitness between the two groups.

The only difference was the training volume and time committment.

50 minutes or 10 minutes, which would you prefer?

The high intensity (SIT) protocol involving 10 minutes total time per session and 1 minute of intensity per session, totals 3 minutes of intense intermittent exercise per week, within a total time commitment of 30 minutes.

The study by Gillen et al (2016) concluded that 30 minutes plus 3 minutes of intesnity is as effective as 150 minutes per week of moderate-intensity continuous training.

This is exciting stuff and backs up the ideology of the CrossFit founder Coach Greg Glassman, "value intensity."

So now, how much intense exercise have you done this week?

Bulletproofbodies team

Check out Dr Phoenix's channel below:

https://www.youtube.com/user/DrPhoenyx

Read the full study on the link below:

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0154075

Citation: Gillen JB, Martin BJ, MacInnis MJ, Skelly LE, Tarnopolsky MA, Gibala MJ (2016) Twelve Weeks of Sprint Interval Training Improves Indices of Cardiometabolic Health Similar to Traditional Endurance Training despite a Five-Fold Lower Exercise Volume and Time Commitment. PLoS ONE 11(4): e0154075. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0154075