What is HIIT and should you consider doing it?
For starters, HIIT’s full form is High Intensity Interval Training. And as the name suggests, in HIIT, people do intense short sessions of anaerobic exercises like burpees, push-ups, planks, lunges, jumping, on the spot sprinting etc. and then take a small period of rest between 10 seconds to 20 seconds(max.) before taking another intense session. These sessions are repeated again and again until one is completely exhausted.
On an average ,these HIIT workouts last till 20 minutes or 30 minutes. Due to this training regime, people can avail maximum health benefits under shorter period of time. Therefore, HIIT is a blessing in disguise for those who are health-conscious but can’t afford to give 1-2 hours of their day for their fitness and also don’t have the proper gym equipment.
So yeah, if you are willing to reach your fitness goals but don’t have much free-time in your daily routine and don’t have the proper gym equipment at your home, you should definitely go for HIIT. But you must be prepared to do HIIT as it is one of the most extreme training regime. If you start doing it at an intense level from the beginning, then you would suffer from early-demotivation. Thus, I would suggest to increase the intensity of your HIIT gradually as you start increasing your stamina.
Now before I tell you about whether it is helpful in weight loss or not, I would like to introduce you to the many benefits people can avail by doing HIIT-
- MORE CALORIES, LESS TIME– This is one of the major asset of this training regime. It has been shown through studies that by doing HIIT for 30 minutes, you tend to burn more calories than by doing any other aerobic exercises like jogging, cycling for 1 hour . Here is an article about this- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25162652/
- HELPS IN MAINTAINING OR BUILDING MUSCLE MASS– HIIT involves various strength exercises like push ups, lunges, burpees, planks etc and because of these strength exercises our body starts building or maintaining our muscle mass (during weight loss) our muscle mass.
- HIGH METABOLLIC RATES AFTERWARDS– Because of HIIT’s extreme nature, our body keeps its metabolism rates at your previous level ,that is, the level present during your HIIT program. And this results in burning more calories even after your workout. Here is a study proving the above written idea-https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27747847/
- INCREASED BREATHING ( It’s a good thing!!) – Due to the high intensity of HIIT, we tend to breathe in more Oxygen than ever for respiration. And because of this increased oxygen consumption, we treat ourselves with many benefits like increased stamina, concentration, helps in relief from stress and pollution, in relaxing.
So these all are the benefits which you could enjoy by following ‘High Intensity Interval Training’. I hope you would have understand these benefits and, now I will discuss, on the basis of these benefits, whether HIIT really helps in weight loss or is it a myth.
Does it helps in weight loss ?
See, as I have discusses earlier also that by doing HIIT, we tend to burn more calories than by doing low intensity, time-taking training regimes. Also we enjoy many underlying benefits of it. Thus, HIIT WORKS!!!
BUT WAIT !!!!!
If you think that only by doing HIIT on a regular basis will result in weight loss, then you are GOING THE WRONG WAY. Just by doing any type of training regime WILL NOT result in weight loss. You have to take care for your nutrition like are you in a calorie deficit by doing HIIT, are you hydrating yourselves properly etc.
If you are looking forward to know the proper knowledge behind weight loss, then kindly visit the below post otherwise you will land in no man’s land if you think that only exercise can help you in weight loss.
If you have read the post I attached to this one thoroughly, then you are fully ready to perform weight loss !!
GOOD LUCK !!
