Sprinting, HIIT, running really fast in between telephone poles, whatever you want to call it, you know it’s a lot of fun and you may be doing too much of it. Allow me to explain.
Within the last few years, the idea of HIIT training, sprinting for fat loss, etc., has become extremely popular. If you’re interested in just how beneficial this type of training can be, just look at some of the programs built specifically around HIIT(Turbulence Training), the success people have experienced and all of the before and after photo’s floating around online. They seem to be endless, however many have a mad love affair with this newfound way of training and some even swear by it. Some believe it’s the only way to train and that everything else pales in comparison.
On that note, while there are plenty of people with wonderful results and high praises of the almighty High Intensity Interval Training phenomenon, there is an equal amount of folks who’ve had less-than-stellar results.
I am not here to argue whether or not HIIT is superior to any other program or way of training, I am simply here to suggest some guidelines on how to get the most out of your HIIT and sprint work if you so decide to incorporate it into your training program.
High Intensity Equals Lower Frequency
You can have one or the other but you cannot have both. If you wish to train intensely, you cannot do it every day. If you plan on training at a lower intensity, high frequency is suitable but then it wouldn’t be considered HIIT now would it?
I’ve encountered many times over people who think they can substitute HIIT training for their traditional, steady state cardio. This is a faulty assumption. When you think about it, most of those who perform traditional cardio do so on the days they don’t do any weight training. For instance, it’s very common for someone to hit the gym 3 non-consecutive days and perform cardio 2-3x per week on their off days. The cardio they would normally partake in is low to moderate intensity steady-state work – not maximal effort sprint work. If your “intervals” are lasting more than a minute, they are not classified as high intensity. An intense interval is an all out effort for 20-30 seconds followed by lots of air-sucking and visions of the almighty.
I have witnessed many get on the HIIT bandwagon. They attempt to train intensely in the weight room 3 times per week as well as do sprint work 3 times per week. In 3-4 weeks time, they are either injured, dead, or feel like roasted bag of cow dung that was stomped out on someone’s doorstep. It’s just not sustainable.
Benefits and Drawbacks of HIIT
It goes without a doubt; there are many benefits to sprint work. Some of those are:
- Improved cardiovascular conditioning.
- Increased work capacity.
- One hell of an appetite suppressant (for some).
- Improved athletic performance.
- Rapid release of happy chemicals (endorphins).
Then we also have the drawbacks.
- Potentially dangerous for the unfit (high risk of injury).
- Takes longer to recover (depending on fitness level).
- Wears your ass out.
- Can impose on the recovery demands of your resistance training workouts.
- Your first time experiencing lactic acid build-up is never an enjoyable experience. You might take a ride on the vomit comet.
Life, She is Full of Compromises
In my personal experience, I have crashed and burned a few times when incorporating sprint work into my strength training routine. The main reason is because I was young and dumb, coupled with not possessing the same level of work capacity I had when I was a competitive athlete. So, as you might imagine, I learned the hard way.
My training would usually go like this:
4 strength training sessions per week (2 upper body days and 2 lower body days)
2 HIIT sessions on my off days
1 Rest day, maybe.
Now, if you cannot read between the lines, allow me to point it out for you. When you add everything up, this routine consisted of 6 high intensity days per week. This is absolutely maniacal considering I had no anaerobic capacity to speak of, not to mention that even elite athletes do not participate in high intensity training so frequently. This type of setup is not uncommon in the lay folk who get incredibly giddy at the thought of HIIT training.
So, how do I set it up nowadays? I simply group sprint work in the same category as a lower body strength session. I rarely schedule sprint training any more than once per week and when I do, something has to give. If the intervals are going to be very intense, I will add them in place of one of my lower body strength training days or I will do them in the beginning of my workout and follow up with some light work on the weights. I always take 2-3 days completely off per week to rest and recover.
So, how about you? How might you set up your HIIT training in a sensible fashion?
You will lose body fat quickly with HITT. Slower, steady-state cardio cannot match it HIIT for this. But you will burn out with too much HIIT, and you will hinder muscle gains with too much. You need to cycle it, and vary what form of HIIT you are using, i.e. sprints, bike, etc. I know, I was a national class 800 meter runner for several years and am familiar with interval training which many people new the results before Tabata ever heard of it. Talk about someone getting credit for the work of others. Anyway, got into lifting when my running career was over, and I couldn’t believe how silly a lot of people were when it came to losing body fat. Sitting on a recumbent bike having a conversation with the person next to you isn’t going to cut it.
In the ‘off season’, use HIIT every 5 – 7 days, no more. Use steady state cardio for the rest of you cardio sessions, but not so slow that you’re able to carry on a conversation as some suggest. That’s total crap, you’re not working hard enough. When you’re getting close to a time when you really want to get carved up, like summer, HIIT is on tap 2 – 3 days week for two weeks, then back off the intensity, less speed in your intervals or increase the duration of the work, but still lessen the intensity. This might not make sense to some, but it’s a standard in track and field, although the periods and work sessions are much longer than the 1 and 2 weeks I’m mentioning here. Middle distance runners aren’t worried about muscle mass, so we would have cycles 6 – 10 weeks long crammed with HIIT 3 – 5 days/ week over varied distances.
Anyway, after 1 week of lowered intensity, crank the HIIT back up full tilt for 2 weeks, followed by another week of lowered intensity. Your body fat will drop so much after 8 – 10 weeks you’ll be amazed. Yes, adjust your weight workouts accordingly. People will vary on their ability to handle HIIT, it takes time to find your sweet spot in terms of length of work vs rest. For me, ten 20 sec sprints up a steep hill (35 degree horse trail) with a 60 sec rest or 15 100 meter sprints in 15 sec with 60 sec rest are enough work to chop the body fat. You don’t have to kill yourself with 10 – 30 second rest intervals unless you’re getting ready to race etc.
Anyway, that’s my take on it. Let the rocks fly.
thanks for chiming in. While there are some parts I agree with, HIIT is not the only way to drop body fat.
As we know, contest bodybuilders have been getting lean on boring ass steady state cardio for years.
Sorry I missed this one! I credit HIIT & plyometrics with pushing me past an age related hormone plateau. Of course, I do it within reason as your article states & a great post! Well, I do eat really well too which helps me BUT I did have to play with my food too & still have to as I work thru the age hormones! Sorry if this was TMI!
just plaster it for the world to see Jody!
I still find HIIT contra-indicated for physique specialists, unless you’re doing something like Lyle’s SFP 2.0. Other iterations seem to be haphazard programs that lack clearly defined goals.
I’ve never been able to recover from hard sprint sessions. I’ll take eating less or LISS any day. Easier to pay attention to your PodCast or what have you.
word. I like running really fast but would rather do my LISS and not worry about recovery or spraining an ankle or breaking a toenail etc…
I just wander through your posts and click on the links with attractive women in them. You should do a post on that.
Best,
Skyler
and you sir, have just given me weekly content for the next year!
I was on the HIIT bandwagon on the regular for a long while and killin’ it. Then I stopped for a long while. And started again. That first session made me fell like *boiled* cow dung. Not just roasted.
“High Intensity Equals Lower Frequency – You can have one or the other but you cannot have both.”
That’s probably the most important statement in this entire article. People butcher too much of a good thing. They see that HIIT is pretty good and therefore increase their VOLUME of HIIT and screw themselves silly by never recovering. Hurts just thinking about it.
Cheers buddy.
I remeber doing HIIT 3x per week, coupled with high-rep training and drastically reduced calories…
Yeah… my cut went really well that summer. Facepalm.
What’s “high-rep”, “HIIT”, and “drastically reduced calories to you?
I ask because some dudes out there say the do 45 minutes of HIIT, that ain’t HIIT.
This is how I usually break it down:
4 Days: lifting with high intensity conditioining
2 Days: active recovery days (think low-intensity walking and maybe some very light work with resistance bands)
1 Day: completely off
Also, deload when necessary.
# Improved cardiovascular conditioning.
# Increased work capacity.
# Improved athletic performance.
Do 1minute on 1minute off will not giving the ability to make a 70-yards TD or row 2000m in under 6:00minutes etc. There are many other facets to “athletic peformance”. The one reason why people do HIIT over all other forms of cardio, UT2-AT, is that it has been stated in journals that its fatloss per minute is more effective.
sure, there are many other facets to said athletic performance. I agree. But HIIT training will improve sprint time. It will improve conditioning and will definitely improve work capacity. So where am I wrong in my statements?
I might also add that one of the main reasons people do HIIT over other forms of cardio is because they were told it’s better than other forms, even though that’s no necessarily true.
Many have gotten lean on HIIT training and many have gotten very lean on boring ass LISS cardio(look at old time pro BBers).
Agreed on all points. I’d much rather focus on a single goal and run with it, so no HIIT for me while trying to add some mass. My conditioning is pretty good from past activities and of course, there are other, less strenuous ways of improving conditioning. Great post.
This kind of reminds me of what Lyle said about HIIT in a podcast. It would probably be better to include and intense HIIT session on the same day as a lower body day, instead of an off day with the weights. Reason being that you have that day to recover. I hope I’m not butchering that.
you hit the nail on the head.
I’ve been doing HIIT 3 days a week! No wonder I have no energy past 7 p.m.!!! Thanks for the info.
heh, objectivity is the key!
I’ve seen this many times and I was someone who once did the same. Learn from this stuff!
Hey JC, I actually used to do HIIT 3x a week as well but this was when I was still a beginner and my sprinting speed was not nearly as fast as I am now. Nowadays, I only do them once a week also. I perform body weight intervals instead of running at least 2x a week after a workout. Works better for me!
word. Gotta find what works and I think most will agree that they eventually burn out when doing them more than 2x per week especially if they are doing them on “off” days.
I think for those who didn’t find the proper results, they really lacked the “Intensity” aspect that is so crucial to its success. Hardwork varies from person to person with different definitions but if you aren’t making things “short and sweet” but feeling like death afterwards, a re-evaluation might be needed.
I like your idea of reevaluation. I completely agree. If you want to do HIIT as prescribed, you better make sure you puke your guts out when you finish.
Personally, I love high intensity training, but have never really considered doing it more than once a week. I like to vary my training, and too much high intensity just kills the rest of your fitness. You’re too tired to do anything else.