HIIT- Fat burning in a flash

Artist: Bruce Mars

HIIT- Fat burning in a flash

by John Harris Fitness

Despite April weather, summer is getting closer every day and there is less and less time to get in shape physically. That's why many are still looking for a workout that is as effective as possible and delivers bikini-worthy results in no time. In order to be able to integrate it optimally into the stressful everyday life, it should of course also be time-saving. What sounds like high demands, however, can be summarized super easy in one term: HIIT! This fitness trend is an absolute miracle weapon in the fight against annoying body fat and takes a lot less time than conventional fitness training. In this post, we'll tell you everything you need to know about HIIT, which is literally a hit.

What exactly is HIIT?

The abbreviation stands for High Intensity Interval Training and, as the name suggests, it is a workout that is phased. Basically, there is always a high-intensity phase, which is followed by a regeneration phase. This rhythm can then be repeated as often as desired. The goal is, of course, to steadily increase the number of phases over the course of the workout.

High intensity phase

This is about pushing yourself to your physical limits. The goal is to push yourself to your limit and go full throttle during each high-intensity phase. It should last about 15 to 60 seconds. What sounds like little, however, is a long time at maximum physical exertion and your heart rate skyrockets.

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Recovery phase

Each effort phase is followed by a period of recovery, which should be about two to three times longer than the high-intensity phase. With moderate effort, your heart rate can come back down a bit and you can gather new strength for the next power phase. You should keep this regeneration time until you feel confident to go full throttle again.

Basically HIIT is very flexible, because you can do it very individually. Whether on the treadmill, the cross trainer or on the TRX bands - HIIT works on all cardio equipment, or by means of exercises such as burpees.

What does HIIT do?

Through this rapid, repetitive change of physical exertion, your circulation and metabolism is stimulated, which of course already burns calories. However, the magic bullet of HIIT is the afterburn effect. This causes that even after the workout fat is still reduced. Because the greater the difference between your normal metabolism and that during the high-intensity phases, the longer the body needs to come back down and the more calories are burned afterwards. This also makes HIIT a more effective workout than, for example, conventional endurance training, because fat burning stops at the same time as the workout. This also justifies the short duration of the HIIT workout. In total, including warm-up, it should not last longer than 30 minutes. After the training session, you should not forget to stretch, so you can mentally and physically optimally conclude with the workout.

In the beginning, HIIT is definitely demanding, because pushing yourself to your physical performance limit is not easy. For beginners, therefore, rather short phases are suitable, which can be increased in the course of the training more and more. Biting through is definitely worth it, because you will notice the first results after a very short time - both visually and physically.