A new study might turn the age old theory that you have to work hard and long to burn fat. Web MD is reporting that a new Japanese study found that taking a rest in the middle of a workout can rev up your metabolism and burn more fat! The findings suggest that exercising for 30 minutes, resting for 20, and then finishing your hour workout by putting in another 30 minutes of cardio increased participants metabolism more than exercising an hour straight.
Before you start taking your 20 minute break in the middle of your cardio time, let me caution you that this study was small. It involved only young, fit men. They road stationary bikes and other forms of cardio were not used. More research is planned on more "normal populations" and I hope by normal they plan to include some women in the next study.
What would you do for 20 minutes at the gym in between cardio sets? The folks at that's fit suggest paying some bills during your down time. Me? I have enough trouble carving out exercise time, so taking an extra 20 minutes to chill out would be a scheduling challenge for me.
Miss Cerise
Michael Stars
1881 Cerruti Blue
what about doing strengh training for 20 min then do anohter cardio session ..
1that's what I was thinking. So long as you kept your heart rate down it would still work, I would imagine.
2I have seen this study's results posted on other fitness blogs on the web this past week. It really bothers me when the media takes a single studies results and runs with it and makes some grand conclusion. It was one isolated study and the results could easly be spurious. I am glad that the author of this blog was smart enough to recognize this
We need to be skeptical about the information out there until more studies replicate.
3Wowz!
4I totally never knew that.
That's awesomeeee. =]
i'm trying to picture myself hanging out in my gym for 20 minutes... i don't think that would happen. but maybe i could do this when working out at home -- like take a run, rest, then do a workout video.
5I think too much attention is being paid to the 20 minute rest period here. As has been shown time and time again with studies on circuit and interval training, bursts of high activity broken up by even short breaks results in more fat burning than lengthy periods of activity at a constant level. Therefore, breaks just long enough to get your heart rate down should be sufficient--a minute rest between vigorous sets of lifting weights or a minute walking at a normal pace on the treadmill in between two minutes of fast-paced running, etc. I don't think bringing your bills to the gym is necessary!
6I always do 20 minutes of cardio followed by half an hour of strength training followed by 10 more minutes of cardio to finish off.
Seems to work alright for me.
7=)
yeah cause we all have that kind of time to waste. Get real.
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