san-diego-personal-trainer-leap

Why HIIT Training is So Effective for Fat Loss

Have you heard the buzz about HIIT?

It stands for High Intensity Interval Training, and it’s taken the fitness world by storm. Numerous studies have shown the many benefits of this style of exercise—but what are they, and what exactly does this type of training entail?

Bootique Fitness in San Diego offers outdoor personal training classes specifically designed to incorporate HIIT, so when you attend, you’ll reap the benefits—and if you have questions about it, we’ve got the answers! Before you try one of our fat-burning classes for yourself, here’s some background about what it means to do a HIIT workout, and what kind of good outcomes they’re known for providing to our bodies.

How to do a HIIT workout

First of all, let’s talk about what HIIT workouts look like. They can come in many different forms: with equipment or without, indoors or outdoors, composed of several exercises or just one. That’s why it’s a great style, because it can be adjusted to fit your specific needs, or the types of movements you prefer. However, there’s one common thread between all HIIT-style workouts: they all involve short, intense bursts of activity followed by brief rest periods. It’s all in the name: high intensity means you’re giving your all during the “on” periods, and intervals means you switch off between working hard and recovering. An example of a simple HIIT workout would be sprinting as fast as you can for 30 seconds, and then slowing to a walk for 15, and repeating that set several times. The same concept can be applied to an enormous variety of movements, from squats and push-ups to jumping jacks and mountain climbers. HIIT is extremely versatile!

HIIT workouts are more time efficient

Another great point about this exercise style is that it generally takes less time to get a great workout in. If you’re doing it properly and putting 100% of your effort in for each “on” interval, you’ll likely feel nice and tired by the end of even just 15 or 20 minutes. Since it’s so highly effective, you’ll see more benefits from a 15-minute HIIT workout than 45 minutes of steady state cardio on an elliptical, for example.

Speaking of benefits, there are plenty!

The most commonly cited advantage of HIIT workouts is that your body will continue to burn fat for up to several hours after you complete your workout. Because HIIT routines are intense, your body engages in major recovery mode when you finish. It works away at repairing your muscles, and it burns fat to provide the fuel to do so. That’s why it’s important to get a good sleep after this type of workout, too, so your body has the time to rest and recover—and burn all that fat!

Finally, one of the best parts about a HIIT workout is that you don’t necessarily need to know the science or the statistics behind them; if you do it right, you feel like you got a good workout, and that’s a perk on its own. The sense of a workout well done, that feeling of having pushed your body to perform the best that it can, that tiredness that makes you feel elated when you finally get into bed and get to rest your muscles after all that hard work—that feeling of satisfaction and achievement is a benefit in itself!

If you’re interested in learning more, contact us to arrange your first Bootique session! We incorporate HIIT into many of our outdoor personal training group classes in San Diego. We’ll guide you through our high-intensity, fat-burning workouts so that you can reap the benefits of HIIT too!

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply