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Reprintable Article – Make Your Cardio Workout More Challenging and Effective With HIIT

Summary:
Burn fat and get fit faster with these intense interval training sessions.

Make Your Cardio Workout More Challenging and Effective With HIIT
by Jackie Burgmann, author of “Hot at Home” – The Transformation Solution for People Who Hate The Gym

You may be hearing a lot of people lately mentioning that they’re doing HIIT.

You may even be hearing fat loss ‘gurus’ saying things like “don’t do cardio, do HIIT instead”.

However, this is very misleading and the statement is largely designed to cause people looking to get in shape and lose fat to believe that cardio is in some way bad, and that they can get away without doing it if they buy the guru’s workout system.

But don’t let anyone confuse you. HIIT is a form of cardio. If you’re doing HIIT, you’re doing cardio.

But what exactly IS “HIIT”?

HIIT stands for “High Intensity Interval Training”.

In a nutshell HIIT is regular Interval Training with the intensity jacked up to the extreme.

While many people may hate traditional cardio and try to find ways to avoid it, this is also a type of cardio that many people hate.

But they also love it.

Or maybe they love to hate it..

Why do they hate it? Because it’s HARD!!

Why do they love it? Because it WORKS!!

Doing HIIT once or twice a week is a terrific way to make huge gains in strength and stamina quickly (not to mention that it’s a great way to burn fat and get a fantastic looking body).

You can do HIIT with almost any exercise. Running, cycling, rowing, calisthenics and even swimming.

The simplest way to perform HIIT is to take any regular interval training session and increase the intensity on the ‘work’ interval stage. You should be attempting to work at what can best be described as your ‘maximal’ effort.

Once you move to the recovery stage, the key is to make sure you’re still moving (don’t come to a complete stop), but going slow enough to actually recover enough to perform your next work interval maximally again. You may want to slow completely to a walking pace in order to achieve enough recovery to have the energy for the next maximal work interval coming right up.

However, don’t make the mistake of going too slowly either. This isn’t a ‘slacker’ interval… you’re still in the middle of your workout… so make sure you walk with purpose with your head up, shoulders back and arms swinging.

Your recovery interval should not be something best described as a stroll, nor should it be treated as an opportunity to lean against a tree and cough up a lung. Keep the energy up while you recover.

If your fitness level is already fairly high and you find that you only need to slow to a light jog and still recover enough to give you the energy to pull out another maximal interval right away, by all means, go for it.

But be sure you understand that the recovery (aka: lower intensity) stage is meant to let you RECOVER so you can actually work at your maximal effort on the next ‘work’ interval.

So if light jogging is not letting your heart rate come down far enough for you to recover enough, then move it down to a steady marching pace. Just remember that you must ‘recover’ in order to crank out that next hard work interval at maximum intensity.

One of the best ways to jack up the intensity is to do hillsprints.

Find a hill with a 30 – 45 degree incline. If it’s close to your home, jog to it for a quick warm-up, otherwise do a short, slow jog nearby to warm-up. Then, once you’re warmed up, approach the hill and at the bottom give it everything you’ve got to sprint to the top.

At the top, turn around and walk back down (no stopping to breathe or look at the scenery, just keep moving, moving, all the time moving), and at the bottom give it everything you’ve got to sprint to the top again.

You might find that every time you get to the top of the hill you just want to die or puke. But that’s an effect that working maximally will do. The best way to get through every work interval is to remind yourself that it’s only :30 seconds (or however long your interval is) and that’s not a very long time to suffer for a great cause (a better body and better fitness).

And, by the time you get to the bottom of the hill, if you concentrate on getting your breathing as close to normal as possible as you walk, you’ll feel ready to do another sprint. Do this for 20 minutes then do a slow jog home or walk around the area to cool down.

It’s a great workout, and it will get you fit fast!

You may hate every minute of it while you’re doing it but you may also find it to be a masochistic kind of hate… it’ll hurt but you’ll love it for what it’s doing for you in the long term.

Learn to love/hate HIIT and you’ll soon see how quickly you can make progress towards your fat loss and fitness goals.

Byline:
HIIT isn’t the only way to increase the intensity and effectiveness of your workouts. Learn all the tricks it takes to get a killer body fast without ever stepping foot into a gym. Get started now with “Hot at Home“.

Keywords:
HIIT, interval training, high intensity interval training, how to do HIIT

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