HIIT Me Like a Hammer

HIIT - or High Intensity Interval Training - is a runaway hit in training regiments for many reasons. First off - it provides a monster cardio workout that you will not find in the gym. This is a throw back kind of training of man vs. beast where it is just you in the wild and you need to track down dinner. Sometimes you need to sprint, other times you need to trek for up to half a mile in search of prey. Second - this is speed training that can give you that edge in the 10K or half marathon course that you want to demolish. Third - it is something different and forces you to use your muscles differently and challenge them more. So what is it?

There are many variations of HIIT and I would recommend that you find the variations that work best for your body and goals. One HIIT program is to warm up with a light one to two mile jog to get the muscles loose and heart ready for the hellish workout to come. Once stretched and ready at the running track, sprint a 100 meter dash at full speed and then walk or lightly jog around the rump of the track before sprinting another 100 meter dash. Repeat until you have run 4 of the 100 meter dashes.

Run, Forrest, Run

Running, or jogging really, has been the biggest part of many folks achieving the fitness results that they want. You can burn about two or three times as calories while jogging then you can on most of the cardio machines at the gym. Not to say that those machines don't serve a purpose for warming up and burning some calories in a low-impact way. But if you want to see results, considering jogging at least twice a week.

It doesn't take much to start - just jog at a light pace around a park near your home or your neighborhood and see how far you can go your first time. Now you've established a baseline. After jogging for around ten minutes you probably feel great and are thinking, "hey this isn't so bad afterall". It only gets better from here.

The Secret to Fitness at Forty (or Any Age)

Six months ago I looked in the mirror and didn't recognize the person looking back at me. How had I aged so fast in just a few years? I had gone from bright-eyed and energetic to dull and lethargic. I knew that I needed to make a change and it had to start with my fitness. After gaining about 30 pounds over a two year period, it was time to make a change.

Fast forward six months, I've dropped three waist sizes, lost about 20 pounds of fat and gained 5 pounds of muscle, and look about five years younger than I did just six months ago. My appearance has changed so much that many friends and acquaintances think that I used steroids or some other "secret sauce" to achieve such strikingly awesome results. They seem to think that it is impossible to make such a huge change in such a short period of time this late in life.