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HIIT Me with Your Best Shot Written by Madeline Engelking, dietetic student at Miami University of Ohio

in The Too Busy to Diet Blog on May 22, 2016

HIIT Me with Your Best Shot

Written by Madeline Engelking, dietetic student at Miami University of Ohio

    In a rush or only want to work out for 20 minutes ? Maximize your calorie burn, rev up your metabolism, and stimulate the human growth hormone all from interval training. One of the best parts of this exercise is that you can get a significantly better workout in half the time you usually spend on the elliptical or treadmill. For those of who say you don’t have time to work out, here is your fix!

Most people are misled because they believe that the longer they work out, the better and more effective it is for their body. News flash, you are wasting your time! An interval treadmill work out of a 30 second sprint, followed by a 1:30 rest of walking, for just 15-20 minutes is shown to be extremely effective. This type of HIIT workout (High intensity interval training), is so successful because when you are working this hard, not enough oxygen is being supplied to your muscles. When you are finished working out, oxygen levels increase due to the debt lost during exercise. The result is your metabolism speeding up (“8 Amazing Fat-Burning…,” 2016). The key to this workout is that you will continue burning calories hours after you are finished, something a 3 mile, steady pace run won’t do!

The benefits of HITT training don’t stop there. A magical hormone, called human growth hormone, is released during training. This hormone is responsible for promoting fat burn abilities, increasing caloric burn, and significantly slowing down the aging process (“Can You Naturally Increase..,”2016). One important tip to take note of is that high glycemic foods should be avoided up to 2 hours after an exercise. Your blood sugar will rise and the result is an inhibitory affect on the HGH hormone. Frustrating, I know, for those who always enjoy a crunchy apple post workout! All you have to do is avoid sugar and you are in the clear.

So, why not boost your metabolism, increase lean muscle, and have significant calorie burn in half the time. I couldn’t agree with you more that a 45 minute run on the treadmill gets boring. Try this workout and you won’t have TIME to get bored. You will definitely be gasping for air, but don’t worry, it doesn’t last long!

Sources:

“Can You Naturally Increase HGH Levels?” LIVESTRONG.COM. LIVESTRONG.COM, 2016. Web. 19 May 2016.

“8 Amazing Fat-Burning Intervals.” Men’s Fitness. Web. 19 May 2016.

Photo source:

HIIT Treadmill Workouts: Improve Your Running & Burn Fat. (2016). Retrieved May 21, 2016, from https://www.runtastic.com/blog/en/sports-fitness/hiit-treadmill-workouts-improve-your-running-burn-fat/