Weight Loss Day 43
Day 43
Are you keen to get some acceleration to your weight loss? Ramping up the exercise can really help, but if you’re looking to lose some extra kilos, pounding the pavement or running on the treadmill for 30-40min can seem like a boring and time consuming way to go about it.
Many exercise programs designed for weight loss focus on regular moderate exercise based around walking and running, some of which have produced minimal weight loss results.
Let’s look at ramping up the intensity to accelerate weight loss
There is however an alternative that is more time efficient and has been shown to be as or more effective for losing weight. It’s called high intensity interval training (HIIT) and it involves very short bouts of all out efforts resulting in less exercise time with greater results. Here is how it works.
Protocols for HIIT involve repeatedly sprinting for 30sec to several minutes with 1-5 min recovery and repeated 4-6 times per session with 3 sessions per week. When compared to continuous moderate exercise (CME) HIIT burns more energy and accelerates post exercise fat oxidation and energy expenditure. HIIT has been shown to significantly reduce subcutaneous fat as well as body mass. HIIT causes greater recruitment of muscle tissue resulting in greater energy expenditure and increases your production of adrenalin, the hormone responsible for fat breakdown. HIIT also has been found to reduce apatite helping you to restrict calorie intake.
Apart from weight loss the benefits of HIIT are vast and have a huge effect on mortality. Superior effects of HIIT over CME include reduced blood pressure, improved cholesterol, and insulin function just to name a few. Obviously HIIT is not for everyone and regular exercise and good diet are still considered to be an effective way to lose excess weight and should be strongly encouraged always. If however you are looking to accelerate your weight loss, HIIT is an extremely effective way to achieve it.
So give it a go! 3-4 30 sec sprints on an exercise bike with 4 mins active recovery between 3 times per week is all it takes to start your path to better health.
If you’re just starting a workout program your goal your first goal should simply be to get to a fitness level where you no longer hate to exercise. And for that all you need is consistency.
When you first start your program don’t force yourself to do anything too hard or unpleasant, just make sure that you stick with it and never quit. If you hate running, why not try and run a few steps at a time until you get tired. You might make it 10 metres at a time, or maybe a km, if you do it consistently, it won’t be long until you can actually enjoy running a distance if you want to – because you will have the base fitness to do so.
There’s no reason to torture yourself at the gym. Once you’re in better shape you will enjoy pushing yourself a little harder every now and then. But until you get there, just make yourself do something. Anything. Just do it regularly and don’t make excuses.
The key to being consistent is making your workout so easy/convenient/fun/awesome that you really miss it when you don’t do it.
Try and add a little intensity to your exercise. Make it appropriate for you, but push yourself in bursts to get a bit of HIIT into your routine.
Apart from weight loss the benefits of HIIT are vast and have a huge effect on mortality. Superior effects of HIIT over CME include reduced blood pressure, improved cholesterol, and insulin function just to name a few. Obviously HIIT is not for everyone and regular exercise and good diet are still considered to be an effective way to lose excess weight and should be strongly encouraged always. If however you are looking to accelerate your weight loss, HIIT is an extremely effective way to achieve it.
So give it a go! 3-4 30 sec sprints on an exercise bike with 4 mins active recovery between 3 times per week is all it takes to start your path to better health.
If you’re just starting a workout program your goal your first goal should simply be to get to a fitness level where you no longer hate to exercise. And for that all you need is consistency.
When you first start your program don’t force yourself to do anything too hard or unpleasant, just make sure that you stick with it and never quit. If you hate running, why not try and run a few steps at a time until you get tired. You might make it 10 metres at a time, or maybe a km, if you do it consistently, it won’t be long until you can actually enjoy running a distance if you want to – because you will have the base fitness to do so.
There’s no reason to torture yourself at the gym. Once you’re in better shape you will enjoy pushing yourself a little harder every now and then. But until you get there, just make yourself do something. Anything. Just do it regularly and don’t make excuses.
The key to being consistent is making your workout so easy/convenient/fun/awesome that you really miss it when you don’t do it.
Try and add a little intensity to your exercise. Make it appropriate for you, but push yourself in bursts to get a bit of HIIT into your routine.
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