Mike Mahler Bodyweight and Kettlebell Circuit

by Rob Fischer

How can a shorter workout yield more impressive results? By making it more intense!

v (HIIT) can burn more fat and provide a better workout in less time than a conventionalaerobic training. Let’s say that you’re running, biking, or walking briskly five days per week. By just replacing two of those workouts per week with HIIT, you’ll experience some amazing results!

The concept behind HIIT is that you engage in an exercise or series of exercises alternating between short burstintervals at maximum output with longer intervals of moderate exercise. Those short bursts are anaerobic, while the longer recovery intervals are aerobic.

Just a 10 minute HIT routine will out-do 30 minutes of traditional aerobic exercise in a fat-burning contest. Andhigh-intensity interval training can boost your aerobic capacity three to four times faster than conventional endurance training.[1]

Why HIT works

Exercise in general is one of the keys to optimizing health of the mind and body. Physical activity helps burn fat, regulates the production of insulin, helps maintain proper blood glucose levels, boosts the immune system, promotes brain health, improves balance and coordination, increases bone strength, and a host of other benefits.

The key to why HIT works is that it deprives your muscles of oxygen for short periods of time (anaerobic). Doing so triggers metabolic changes in your body that continue to operate up to an hour after stopping the exercise. So your body continues to burn fat well past the end of your workout.[2] In fact, your body develops greater efficiency inburning fat under other conditions as well.[3][4][5]

 Benefits of HIT

Achieve greater results in less time. In about one-fourth the time you’d spend in a traditional aerobic workout, you can achieve greater results in terms of both fat-burning and cardiovascular endurance. Burn more fat. Due to its high intensity and anaerobic properties, HIIT not only burns more calories during your workout, but following it as well. Increase aerobic fitness and muscle strength. High-intensity interval training has been shown to build muscle and maximize aerobic fitness more effectively and efficiently than conventional routines. Retain muscle while losing fat. A traditional aerobic workout regimen not only burns fat, but often results in muscle loss along with it. The anaerobic nature of the HIIT workout helps you keep and build your muscle. Stimulate the production of human growth hormone (HGH). Human growth hormone gives us vibrant health and strength and is important in the production of estrogen and testosterone. Once again, it’s the anaerobic element of HIIT thatfuels the production of HGH. You’ll find that HIIT workouts will boost your energy and increase your sexual drive.