Working at a higher intensity, even for just 30-60 seconds, puts your body into calorie-burning mode so you can have shorter workouts that give you a little more bang for your buck! If you’re like me, and don’t necessarily have 1 hour to spend on a workout 3-4 times per week, this is such a great option! Just a few benefits include:
- Burns more calories– The harder you work, the more calories you burn overall.
- Increases your endurance quicker – Working at a higher level, even if it’s for short periods of time, increases your endurance. You’ll find your other workouts get easier because of your interval workouts.
- Increases the “afterburn”- If you really go all out, your body will burn more calories for a period of time after your workout to get your body back to its pre-exercise state.
- Adds some variety to your workouts – If you usually do the same thing all the time, the same pace and the same level of intensity, interval training can add a breath of fresh air to your workouts and, because they’re so versatile, you can change them every week if you like.
- More time efficient – With exercise, the harder you work, the shorter your workouts will generally be. It’s possible to get a great cardio workout in just 15-20 minutes with interval training, leaving you more time for other things in your life.
So, what might you do? If you usually just walk, try walking some stairs or going uphill for a short period of time to get your heart-rate up a little more than usual. You can apply this principle of interval training to almost any exercise you do, just up the intensity for 20-30 seconds then continue your regular exercise for 1-2 minutes, then up the intensity again…alternate as such.