Intervals vs. Steady State Cardio Part II

Previously I went over what intervals were.

Today, I'm going to sum it all up and explain why intervals are superior to low intensity steady state cardio when it comes to fat loss.

The term is known as Excess Post-exercise Oxygen Consumption(EPOC).

When you start working your muscles, your heart rate increases (thus also increasing your breathing) in order to get oxygen to those working muscles at the rate that is needed in order to sustain that activity. Once you are done doing that activity, your body is still going to take in more oxygen than you were before doing the activity for a period of time in order to continue to repair the muscles (as well as other functions) that you just worked.

You can try this yourself. Check your heart rate for 15 seconds. Then run in place as quickly as you can for 30 seconds. Check your heart rate after you’re done for 15 seconds. The heart rate is elevated above your pre-run-in-place rate. Now check it again in a minute, and you’ll still find that it’s above the rate that it was at prior to running in place. That’s EPOC. Your body continues to need oxygen at above the pre-activity rate in order to bring the body back to the pre-activity condition. And during this EPOC time period, your body is still burning calories from the result of that activity.

How does this relate to Intervals?

Let’s say you took a walk at a normal pace for 45 minutes. Let’s say you burn 150 calories during that time. Since the work you perform on the muscles is not very intense, the amount of EPOC needed after the exercise is not that big. You may only need about an hour before your body is back to your pre-walk condition. So the amount of calories you continue to burn from the walk, after the walk is very small.

Now let’s say you get on the bike and do Intervals for 20 minutes. The intervals are intense and require a lot of work of large muscle groups in your legs. The intensity is so much that within those 20 minutes, you may burn 125 calories.

But, the key is the EPOC. Because the intensity of the exercise was high, and large muscle groups in the legs were used, it’s going to take a longer EPOC in order to bring your body back to the pre-bike condition. It may take up to 24 HOURS for your body to get back to that pre-bike condition, and that means that during that EPOC, you are still burning calories. How many calories burned depends on a variety of factors but it could result in another hundred or so calories being burned.

This is not only why intervals are great for burning fat, but also why strength training is a great fat burner as well. When you strength train, it could take up to 48 hours for your body to return to your pre-exercise state, thus meaning 48 hours of calorie burning for an activity that you did 2 days ago!

Bottom Line. Do the intervals. They hurt, but I can tell you with absolutely certainty, if you do them consistently along with a strength training plan, fat WILL fall off.

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Intervals vs. Steady State Cardio Part I

I've gone over why lifting weights is an important part of a fat loss program, as well as why keeping your eating line is also essential.


But now I'm going to go into over the next few days why intervals are much more effective to fat loss than steady state, low intensity cardio.

First I'm going to go over what intervals actually are and how to do them.

An interval session normally starts with a warm up at a moderate pace. Intervals can be done on any exercise equipment such as the treadmill, stationary bike, elliptical, etc. Note though, you're going to get the most bang for your buck running, second choice would be the stationary bike. The elliptical, well, it'll work but, in my opinion, just avoid it.

After the warm up, you then go at 90% of your max pace for a short period of time. Might be 20 seconds, might be 30 seconds, or 45 or maybe a full minute. If you're on the bike, it's more important to increase the resistance first, then be concerned about the cadence. You want to keep the resistance and speed at a pace where you could really only pedal between 80-90 RPMs. If you're spinning really fast at a cadence of over 100 RPMs, then you need to increase the resistance you're using.

After the high resistance/high speed pace, you then reduce the resistance and the speed for a period of time down to the rate you were going at during the warm up. This really depends on the amount of experience with intervals. If a beginner, take about 60-90 seconds at the lower rate. If more experienced, you could use twice the amount of time for the rest as you did for the high intensity part (example, if you were going 30 seconds hard, take 60 seconds at the lower pace).

Once time is up on your active rest period, increase the resistance and speed again and go at it for the recommended amount of time. Keep doing this until you've done 6-12 of the high intensity intervals (again, based on your experience with intervals).

After you've completed the number you're going to do, slow down and do a cool down for 3-5 minutes at a nice easy pace. In the end, you're interval workout is probably going to be 20-30 minutes.

Important point to remember though. When I say 90% of your max pace, I mean based on your subjective max pace. If you're in good shape, been working out for a number of years, a max pace for you might be a full blown sprint. For someone just starting out, it might just me a faster pace walk and as you get more experienced with it, progressively increase your pace a little faster.

Next up, what this all means and why intervals are better for fat loss than low intensity steady state cardio.

www.leanbodyfitness.com

Soda - Bad

Are you a soda junkie? Can’t get through the morning without at least one 20-ounce bottle of your favorite soda?

Well, I’m here to tell ya, that soda can really pack on the pounds.

First, some background on calories.

In order to lose a pound of body fat, you need to burn 3500 calories under your maintenance calorie level. The same goes for gaining a pound of fat too. Take in 3500 calories more than what your body needs to maintain your weight, and you’ll put on a pound of fat.

So let’s look at how soda affects this.

Take regular Coca-Cola Classic. There are 242.5 calories in one 20-ounce bottle.

Let’s say that you only drink one bottle a day. What that means is that if you were to stop drinking it, and didn’t make any other changes to your lifestyle, in the course of 26 weeks (6 months), you would be taking in 44135 less calories than if you kept drinking that one coca-cola a day. That means you would lose roughly 12 ½ pounds during that time period. And that’s only if you’re drinking one a day!

Addicted to Mountain Dew? Mountain Dew has 275 calories in one 20-ounce bottle. If you were just drinking one a day and decided to stop drinking it cold turkey and no other changes to your lifestyle, within 6 months you would lose over 14 pounds.

So if you’re addicted to regular soda, start pulling yourself off of it and the weight WILL start to come off.

But what do you drink in place of soda? Simple. Water. No calories, no added sodium, no man-made ingredients. And your body will love you for it.

Test Time

Take a look at this article with a calorie test. I'm not sure if getting them right or wrong is good or bad.

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Fat Loss Challenge

Take a look at this website.

It's a great idea and I tip my hat to the governor of Indiana for coming out and recognizing the seriousness of the obesity epidemic and coming up with a program to slowly get people active as well as eating healthy.

Sign up for the newsletter. You can never receive to much information.

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A Lot of Food Part II

I mentioned in this post the difference that needs to be made between eating a lot and eating often and how sometimes when you see someone eating something and don't think they are eating "a lot," what that person might be eating is loaded with calories to truly make it eating "a lot."

Well, take a look at this article. You'll be shocked at the calorie counts in those foods. Just another example of how people completely underestimate their daily caloric intake.

You've been warned. Again.

www.leanbodyfitness.com

As I Was Saying

I mention in this post that the cost of health care is growing at super speed rates and that if this continues, people are going to be forced to start paying a lot more for it out of their pockets than a free (or close to free) ride that we've been getting thus far.

This article talks about changes that employers are making to their health insurance options.

The article states that according to a recent poll of employers:

The poll found that 5 percent of companies offered only a high-deductible plan in 2007, and that figure will rise to 9 percent in 2008.

A high-deductible plan works pretty much like this:

Depending on whether you have a single person plan or a family plan, the participant involved in the plan has a high annual deductible (over $1000). Whenever you go to the doctor, you've have to pay for the services out of pocket. Once you reach that deductible amount, then your insurance covers it from that point on.

But, there are tax advantages to this. What you are allowed to do is take money and put it in a health savings account (HSA) pre-tax (works similar to your 401k) and after you go to the doctor and pay the bill, you send a copy of the bill to the HSA provider and they then take money out of your account and cut you a reimbursement check. So you essentially paid for the medical services pre-tax.

One last thing about those accounts. You can also take a portion of the money in that account and place it into a separate account that is moved in and out of markets like what you have with your 401k.

There's a limit a the amount you can put in an HSA every year. And until you reach a certain age, you can only take money out of that account for "qualified medical expenses." But, after you reach a certain age, you can start taking that money out for any reason you want.

The good news is that it gives you another pre-tax shelter for your earnings. The bad news is, it's a pretty high deductible to meet before your insurance kicks in.

But, the reality from what the article says is that it's starting to gain traction among employers because it can substantially decrease their monthly health insurance premium that they pay for their employees. I don't think it's going to take long for more and more employers to change to only making this type of policy available to employees.

If this trend continues, I think you know what it means. Those that are healthy and just don't have the need to go to the doctor much are going to be able to take advantage of the tax shelter to save for retirement. For those that are not healthy, well, it's going to end up costing you.

So again, here's your choice. Start exercising and eating healthy, and in the long run, it's going to save you money. Don't start exercising and continue to eat unhealthy and take on other unhealthy activities in your life, and well, I think you can figure out what happens.

www.leanbodyfitness.com