Gone are the days when Cardio used to mean countless hours of work-outs, runs and jogs. Welcome to the new age approach to cardio that offers not only better benefits but also takes a much shorter duration to relieve you off your excessive body fat. For anyone aspiring to take their body to a new level of fitness, it is essential to understand the importance of including interval training in your regime. Intertwining intense work out phases with brief interludes for revival ensures that you burn enough fat to transform your body and give it the fitness level you desire.

If you are still the type to prefer long drawn out cardio workouts, here is a guide on why HIIT might be a superior system to achieve your fitness goals.

HIIT – The fine points

A HIIT usually involves few initial workouts for warm up and that is followed by a series of intense exercises for short durations. These high intensity workout sessions are immediately followed by a period of rejuvenation with moderate intensity workouts which again is followed by a series of low intensity exercises. The moderate intensity workouts are generally done at half the intensity with a medium number of replications. That is, one can go for 30 seconds of intense sprinting followed by another minute of jogging or walking or any other form of workouts of lower intensity. Since the whole session lasts for a maximum of 30 minutes, it is a highly efficient technique that can be completed in quick time.

HIIT – The Gains

Tabata, Timmons, Gibala, or the Peter Coe regimen, whatever the type, these workouts that last anywhere between 5 to 30 minutes have a wide range of benefits.

Heightens Metabolism

The beauty of HIIT is that it helps you enhance the total amount of fat burnt, in quicker time. Since the intensity of workouts is higher, it translates to a much longer duration of exercises and consequently an increase in the overall amount of fat burnt. A Higher intensity workout reduces the amount of oxygen taken in by your body. This deficiency causes your body to consume more oxygen post the workout sessions as a result of which the metabolism is substantially amplified. So you end up burning fat even after the sessions are over for the next 24 hours at least. Professionally this is called an EPOC or the Excess Post-exercise Oxygen Consumption.

Improves glucose tolerance and decreases aging

HIIT ensures that your body muscles take up the responsibility of absorbing Insulin thus preventing the increase of blood glucose and assuring an enhanced Glucose tolerance level. With the increased burning of fat, the aging process slows down and you get to maintain a form that is much younger and healthier.

Helps stay lean without losing muscle

Dieting might ensure that you become lean but only at the cost of losing significant muscle mass. Dieting causes you to drop muscle along with the fat and to regain the lost muscle mass becomes another headache altogether. HIIT provides the perfect answer to that problem by ensuring that you retain your muscles while burning the excessive fat from your body. Through HIIT you tend to burn fat not from your muscles but from the innumerable fat storehouses in the body. These high intensive workouts kindle hormones that serve to build muscles and as a result you burn fat while keeping your muscles intact.

Increased endurance and aerobic power

HIIT is also said to greatly enhance athletic performance by increasing endurance levels and speed. This is made possible by augmenting the amount of oxygen taken in by your body.

Cardiovascular benefits

The High Intensity Interval Training serves to improve the cardiovascular system. During the sessions your heart rate increases substantially which in turn improves your cardio power and fortifies your heart. Plus these intense workouts, the short revival sessions improve your capacity to get back to normalcy at a much faster rate.

Speed and Efficiency

The modern world has left little time for ensuring better health and fitness. For those of you with an extremely busy and tight schedule, HIIT is the perfect partner to bring in a high level of fitness and well being into your life. Whether you would like to workout during your office breaks or get yourself a fantastic figure before an important and key occasion, if you are restricted in time by social, familial and professional pressures, HIIT gives you the perfect weapon to win the battle against fat and bulge. A 20 minute regime, in accordance with quite a number of researches, is said to burn more fat than a low intensity, longer duration jog or workout.

A Low Intensity or steady state cardio can work for those who are pregnant or advanced in age but for those who are looking to turn their lives around within a shorter span of time, HIIT shows a great new way. Perfect for the present generation that lacks the time and access to healthier and better food habits, HIIT ensures a body that is fit, robust, lean and enduring.

Check with your physician before starting any exercise program.