HIIT Workout

I think this is what I will start doing for cardio instead of getting on the damn treadmill.  HIIT Stands for High Intensity Interval Training, and involves performing 30 - 60 seconds of extremely high intensity work with the equivalent amount of time as a break.  Basically, if you run for 30 seconds, walk for 30 seconds, then start over.  You can also take longer breaks if you need to, but no more than 4 minutes at a time.  This should go on for 8-10 minutes.  if you can't do that much, cut back on the duration of the high intensity portion just a bit until you get used to it, then start periodically moving up the amount of high intensity and cutting back the amount of low intensity, continuing to stick to the 8-10 minute time.

The opposite of HIIT is LIT ("Cause I'm all lit up again, on my couch, in my be..." Sorry, Got carried away).  LIT stand for Low Intensity Training, and it is what you generally see at the gym when people walk 2 miles per hour on the treadmill.  The problem with LIT is that you only burn calories right now.  If you burn off 200 calories, you only burn 200 calories.  You can eat 200 less calories that day and have the exact same effect.

When you perform a HIIT workout, you not only burn calories now, but you continue to burn them for up to 24 hours.  See, HIIT boosts your metabolism, while LIT does not.  High intensity training is anaerobic, which means that it does not use oxygen.  This helps to increase your VO2 levels, among other things, and raises your metabolism to help you get the power needed to perform these types of activities.  Low intensity exercises burn much more fat, but do not increase your metabolism.  So when the two are combined, you are burning fat, boosting your metabolism, increasing stamina, increasing lung capacity (VO2), and basically kicking ass.

I think I will start including this in my workouts.  I plan to start slowly, of course, to make sure that I don't hurt myself.  I have already received permission from both of my doctors to workout, and both know that I used to workout and play soccer, so I understand what my body is trying to tell me.  I know when to slow down, and I know when I can speed up.  Its the reason that I got better much, much quicker than the doctors thought I would, so they give me a little leeway.  As long as I'm not stupid about it, anyway.  I'll never be healed as Crohn's has no cure, but I can get better than where I am currently.

I usually work lower body on Monday and Thursday, upper body on Tuesday and Friday, and intense cardio on Wednesday.  I think I will switch around upper and lower body days so that I can start including HIIT training 3 days a week.  I will do this on upper body days so that I'm not overworking my legs, which means that I need to start doing upper body on Monday and Friday, and legs on Tuesday and Thursday.  HIIT, of course, will be done Monday, Wednesday, and Friday on the treadmill and anywhere else that I can think of.  I might also see about including some circuit training some days, as well.  But that's another post.

I'm the sick one, so I take working out much, much more seriously than does my wife.  Man, is Jessi gonna hate me.