HIIT, if you have never heard of it, is short for high intensity interval training. In its simplest form, it is a form of cardio wherein the trainee performs an intense bout of cardio for a short period of time, normally 60 seconds, then rests for a short period of time before another intense bout. This is normally repeated for around 15-20 minutes.
Now that you have a general idea of the concept, let’s dive in a little deeper and see how you can program it into your training and some specific examples of how it is performed.
As one would expect, HIIT will produce the same effect on the cardiovascular system as moderate intensity (jogging) in about 1/3-1/2 of the time but that’s only the beginning of the benefits.
Without getting too geeky, in moderate exercise, your body uses oxygen to produce ATP (Adenosine triphosphate) which provides energy to contract muscles, among other things. However, in HIIT your heart rate will be above 80% max during the intense interval (it will drop back below during the rest periods). When the heart rate is above 80% max, your body will not use oxygen to produce ATP anymore; instead, it will burn glucose (blood sugar) for fuel.
You can probably see how burning blood sugar for fuel would be insanely effective for anyone with high blood sugar, diabetes, or inulin insensitivity. With less blood sugar in the system telling your body to produce insulin, you will become more sensitive to the insulin when it is released which will allow the cells in the body to absorb excess blood sugar which further reduces blood sugar.
See how this is all one big circle? In addition to this, HIIT will burn fat causing you to become even MORE insulin sensitive which, again, allows the blood sugar to transport nutrients to the cells and become stored as glycogen in the muscles to be used as energy later.
It is a self-reinforcing circle that can completely change how your body processes food. Many people today don’t eat carbs because their body can’t process them, and they cause high blood pressure. This is due to insulin insensitivity wherein the carbs signal the body to produce insulin to “open the cells door” for the blood glucose to deliver nutrients but, due to the insensitivity, the insulin can’t “open the door”. This leads to even more insulin being produced and it, along with all the excess blood sugar that has nowhere to go, is stored as fat.
Being fat and inactive then increases insulin insensitivity even more. See how this can be a vicious circle both ways? You want to be going around the circle in the right way.
Now that we have discussed the “why”, let’s dig into the “how”.
To start out, plan a 15-minute training session, preferably on non-lifting days. Start with once a week and move up to twice as condition improves. You will perform 60 seconds of hard, intense, all out work followed by 60 seconds of rest, repeated for the 15 minutes.
Once you start to improve endurance, start cutting the rest times down in 10 second intervals until you can complete all 15 minutes with only 30 second rest intervals. At this time you can start increasing the overall time until you reach 20 minutes of 60 seconds on/30 seconds off.
Doing this twice a week is plenty, you don’t want to overdo it with this or it will affect recovery from other training.
Some of my favorite exercises to perform HIIT with are shown below:
- Air Bike – Very low impact on the joints and can be done anywhere you have a bike.
- Sled/Truck Pull/Push – Find a heavy sled (or your car) and a lot. All out push it. Or pull it. Pretty simple.
- Hill Sprints – Sprint up the hill, rest on the way back down.
- Sprints – Exactly what it says. This is one of my least favorite unless you have a large grass field. Running on pavement is hell on the knees and a track isn’t much better.
Out of all of the above, the spin bike is by far my favorite. Low risk for injury and can be performed by almost all trainees at a high intensity which makes it a great choice for anyone.
Whatever you choose, just make sure to bring the intensity as this method, like most, is not effective when performed with sub-par effort.