Are you looking for a way to break your personal records? High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) workouts will do the trick. Combining short bursts of speed with slow recovery periods will help to improve your performance. Overtime, HIIT can help to improve your speed, strength, and endurance. In the running world you see interval training at it’s finest- Coach to 5k for example. The typical run/walk training, on a schedule that has you increasing your time running versus walking over time. By the end of the training, you are running a 5k. This can be applied to any distance or type of race, running, biking, hiking, or swimming.
Here are some of the benefits of HIIT workouts:
Get in shape more quickly
2 weeks of high-intensity intervals can improve your aerobic capacity as much as 6-8 weeks of endurance training.
Burn more calories
The intense effort you put in means that your body must work harder to recover, so you will burn more calories in the 24 hours after a HIIT workout than you would after a slow, steady run.
Boost your endurance
Interval training makes it easier to go farther and faster with more energy, and will also help with your other cardio activities.
HIIT can help lower blood pressure and blood sugar: A 2017 study published in Experimental Gerontology followed 39 men ages 56-67 who performed a HIIT workout five days a week for six weeks. At the end of the study, the group had “clinically relevant improvements in blood pressure”- an average of about 5.5 mm/HG. A 2015 study published in the journal of the Public Library of Science found that after 8 weeks of HIIT, people with type 2 diabetes had better control of their insulin levels and better pancreatic function.
Interval training will allow you to reap many health benefits as well as increasing your speed and endurance in your cardio training, which means breaking your personal record!