Contributor Post: HIIT Workouts

Ya'll know that on Monday's I like to post workouts. This Monday I need to workout especially... I do not know what the deal was this weekend but man was I enjoying some food... I'll post one of the recipes later this week. ANYWAY, I figured today would be a great day for Mal to do her first post. So here she is!

When Elora asked me to help her with the fitness portion of her blog I was ecstatic! Fitness has been a HUGE part of my life ever since I was little and I am excited to share the knowledge and experience I have gained over the years with all of you!

I decided I want to start off with talking about one of my favorite forms of exercise, HIIT, or High Intensity Interval Training.  These workouts are usually pretty short (5 to 30ish minutes) so they are great when you don’t want to spend hours in the gym.  The best part of these workouts…they help your body to continue to burn fat hours after you stop exercising! Umm… awesome?!!

So…what exactly is a HIIT workout?  Basically it is short bursts of high intensity work followed by a small “rest” period.  You can do HIIT workouts using plyometric training, a rowing machine, treadmill, elliptical, stair master, bike, etc… I personally like to do my HIIT workouts on the treadmill.  Here are a couple of my favorites:

TABATA CLIMB

(Taken from Candace at hungrymotherrunner.com)

Warm-up: an easy 1 mile jog

For each of the following inclines/speeds complete a 4 minute tabata.

A tabata is 20 seconds of work followed by 10 seconds of rest. (So you would do a total of 8 tabatas)

Round 1: 2.0 incline and 9.0 speed

2 minute walk at 0 incline

Round 2: 5.0 incline and 8.0 speed

2 minute walk at 0 incline

Round 3: 7.0 incline and 8.0 speed

2 minute walk at 0 incline

Round 4: 5.0 incline and 8.5 speed

2 minute walk at 0 incline

20 Minute Power HIIT

(Adapted from Janetha at mealsandmovesblog.com)

Optional warm-up: 5 mins at 6.0 speed and 0 incline

(not counted towards 20 mins)

-Start incline at 0

6.5 speed for 1 minute

7.0 speed for 1 minute

7.5 speed for 1 minute

8.0 speed for 1 minute

-Increase incline to 0.5

Repeat the 4 minute intervals above

-Increase incline to 1.0

Repeat 4 minute intervals

-Increase incline to 1.5

Repeat 4 minute intervals

-Increase incline to 2.0

Repeat 4 minute intervals

If those workouts don’t leave you in a heaping pile of sweat, then…you probably didn’t do it right…ha. Kidding. But seriously, these workouts should really push you so by the end you don’t want to take one more step.  And the awesome thing about HIIT workouts is you can totally tweak them to meet your fitness level.  You can lower or increase the speeds, change the interval times, etc.  Just remember you want to feel that burn of high intensity.  You don’t ever want to get comfortable during the “work” periods or it changes from HIIT to just plain ol’ cardio. 

Well, that’s a wrap for my first post! If anyone has questions or good HIIT ideas, feel free to share!