Let’s not fool ourselves, the fundamental objective of most of those who decide to start exercising every day is to lose weight. Science has amply proven the benefits of physical exercise for our health, but the scale continues to prevail over all of them for the majority of mortals.
Finding at all costs the sport that burns the most calories is the priority of those who want to lose weight and see in numbers what will later supposedly translate into a loss of body fat. Can you imagine a workout that not only burns a lot of calories but continues to do so as the hours go by? Well, it exists and science explains why.
HIIT is a type of training that alternates high-intensity intervals and short recovery periods that can help you improve your overall health. In addition, due to the demand it represents, it can offer you benefits for a longer time than traditional exercises, but training for less time. Likewise, it helps improve oxygen consumption and causes fat and calories to be lost just by training for a few minutes .
Science surrenders to HIIT
A study published in the ‘International Journal of Obesity’ followed a group of people who exercised for 15 weeks straight. The researchers found that fat mass decreased much more in those who did 20 minutes of interval cycling three times a week compared to those who did 40 minutes of constant cycling the same number of times. HIIT burns more calories than continuous exercise due to the afterburn effect. And as the researchers concluded, you’ll continue to expend energy for about two hours after class ends.
Another study published in 2015, in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, managed to verify these benefits of HIIT and reached the same conclusion. Caloric intake was evaluated in different training sessions: HIIT, weight lifting, running and cycling. In this way, it was evidenced that in high-frequency interval training it is possible to burn up to 30% more calories than in other training sessions .
Sports Medicine reached the same conclusion, the researchers found that high-intensity interval training (HIIT) “significantly reduced total, abdominal, and visceral fat mass, with no difference between the sexes,” because it leads people to exceed the “90% of maximum heart rate”, which is what makes it most effective. “HIIT is a time-effective strategy to decrease fat mass stores, including abdominal and visceral fat mass,” the researchers concluded. The study’s verdict is clear: a few HIIT sessions a week will turn the human body into a fat-burning “machine”.. And the good news is that the routine will cause the practitioner to start burning more fat not only during HIIT sessions, but also when doing other types of activities, such as brisk walking, swimming, and playing sports.
In record time
But also, all this is achieved in a much shorter period of time. That is what a study from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario has shown: after 12 weeks of testing, athletes who performed one minute of intense exercise three days a week have had the same gains as those who have trained for 45 minutes at a moderate intensity. After 12 weeks of study, the scientists concluded that one minute of intense exercise a day is as effective as 45 minutes of moderate-low routine. The key? push the body almost to the limit during those 60 seconds.
Short, high-intensity training is gaining more and more followers among scientists every day. Several studies have proven the positive effect of high-intensity exercise in sedentary or overweight people and have established that an improvement in cardiometabolic health can be achieved with just a 4-minute workout routine. For people with a very low fitness level, this can mean a significant decrease in mortality risk.
