Fit Tip Thursday: What is HIIT?

One of the hottest trends in fitness in the past few years has been High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). A form of cardiovascular exercise, HIIT has been around for decades but has recently exploded in popularity.

It makes sense. One of the top reasons people have for not exercising is lack of time. But HIIT provides big results in much shorter, more intense workouts. This desire to maximize workout time was one of the driving forces behind the BowFlex Max Trainer® and its built-in 14-minute HIIT workout.

Additionally, exciting is the research that indicates you not only burn a significant amount of calories while engaging in HIIT workouts, but there is also an "after-burn" effect which may allow for additional energy expenditure even after the workout has ended.

The formula is pretty straightforward: short, hard cardiovascular intervals followed by periods of recovery, repeated in a series format. Understand, however, that to reap the rewards of HIIT Training you have to push the intensity.

More calories burned in shorter workouts and additional calories burned afterwards… Sounds pretty great, right? Here is a quick video explanation of how you can get started doing HIIT training:

Like what you see? Watch more Fit Tip Thursdays for great tips to help enhance your workouts.