Its not exercise for 1 minute. Its exercise for 10 minutes, with 1 minute of that being all out. The actual comparison is 10 minutes vs 45, not 1 minute vs 45 as headline says.
I think author could have said as effectively 10 minutes of interval exercise may have benefits of 45 minutes of moderate exercise
What the 10 minutes (with 1 minute all out) gets closer to HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training), something which I highly recommend.
Here is a great study which describes some of the benefits - you'll notice that the researchers ran into some trouble with the duration "rest period" versus "sprint period", but otherwise, there are some great results. [0]
This is the idea of progressive overload that has been a core tenant of many weight training programs for a long time. It may be that body composition changes are primarily adaptive responses to stressers, rather than the typical simplified model of 'x work burns x calories'. That is, x work may in some cases be associated, on average, with x calories being shed, but it does not directly cause that outcome in a straightforward fashion. Rather, it may well be the case that your body adapts in proportion to the level of stress that it experiences (that would be consistent with the conclusions here).
Another consideration is that when we assume that natural processes respond linearly, we seem to have a tremendous track record of being wrong. Even with that being the case, essentially every model that covers any aspect of fitness seems to assume linear response. So it's not surprising to see demonstrations that these models don't hold to reality at the extremes.
Since the Fitbit was released, I've maintained that counting steps is a useless activity unless you are very old or infirm. I think that practitioners (i.e. athletes) have long known that intensity is the primary determinant of changes in body composition and athletic performance. It's seemed to me for a while that one of many causes of the difficulty people have improving their bodies is that they 'exercise' rather than 'train'. That is, they think of their workout as putting in time or quantity of work, rather than just trying to improve their performance across various physical tests.
I lost 40 lbs after high school by working out 10 minutes / night. Pushups til I couldn't anymore. Crunches til I couldn't anymore. Hitting a punching bag til I couldn't anymore and when that was all done, wall sits til I couldn't anymore.
The first three I went as hard and fast as I could. Best shape I've ever been in.
Nice work. Please don't take this the wrong way, but it should be noted for anyone struggling to lose weight: Weight loss is 99% diet (calories in, calories out).
Work out all day long, but if you're at a caloric surplus, you're going to gain weight. Never work out, but eat less than you burn, and you'll lose weight.
That said, there are countless benefits to regular exercise, so don't overlook it.
Bodybuilders rotate body parts so that those can recover for a day or two. If they could work them out faster by working them out every day, they would.
So I wish some study did what you did, but had groups doing what you did (all-out for ten minutes every day), a group going all out for ten minutes but every 2 days, a group each doing the same but every 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 60, 70, 80 days respectively.
Obviously (or not so obviously!!) you'll get only a small percentage of the benefits as you go up in number of recovery days. But 10 minutes every 15 days for example is 4 hours a year. Is it possible that 4 hours a year of all-out exercise is the difference between fit and +30 lbs?
Attached is my prediction of the results, based on the reasoning in my first paragraph. Doing it every day has been a baseline of "100%" based on what you said "Best shape I've ever been in." The only thing I'm sure about is that it must go up with a couple of days of rest. My attached chart: http://imgur.com/WwbpDhq
It's a genuine experiment and I'd like to see someone do it. Also key is the "all-out" part.
By the way, having noticed that certain physical professions, where everyone eats similarly, and does similar labor, are associated with certain builds, I thought I might be able to answer the question for myself, if I found a profession like moving man but where people only are called to, say, load and unload something manually, twice a month or once a month. However, I couldn't think of any such professions. Hence the idea of a controlled experiment! (Control = daily exercise.)
I've been doing this every day for the last 4 or 5 days, after reading a article about the same study. Basically I sprint around my apartment as fast as possible, try to do clapping pushups as high as possible, do a few forward rolls, jump as high as possible and try to touch the ceiling, and then repeat for as long as I can. I'm having a lot of fun, and I think it's definitely better than nothing. I think it's might even be a good way to get back into shape, and could increase it to 2 minutes one day.
The volunteers warmed up for two minutes on stationary bicycles,
then pedaled as hard as possible for 20 seconds; rode at a very slow
pace for two minutes, sprinted all-out again for 20 seconds;
recovered with slow riding for another two minutes; pedaled all-out
for a final 20 seconds; then cooled down for three minutes. The
entire workout lasted 10 minutes, with only one minute of that time
being strenuous.
So it's:
120 seconds slow
20 seconds fast
120 seconds slow
20 seconds fast
120 seconds slow
20 seconds fast
180 seconds slow
================
600 seconds (10 minutes)
What you're doing is fine, and I'll encourage you to continue it or a
variation of it (EDIT: especially since you're having fun, that's a
key to keeping up a routine). However, that's not what the article
described. The article describes a variation of HIIT (high intensity
interval training).
"All out" is relative. "All out to an Olympian means the "brink of death" or (220+ heartbeats per minute) and none of these people went all out for a whole minute; it was 20-seconds, three times.
Reading what they did, The warmup seems too short and no real warm down to relax the muscles as needed.
"...volunteers warmed up for two minutes on stationary bicycles, then pedaled as hard as possible for 20 seconds; rode at a very slow pace for two minutes, sprinted all-out again for 20 seconds; recovered with slow riding for another two minutes; pedaled all-out for a final 20 seconds; then cooled down for three minutes. The entire workout lasted 10 minutes, with only one minute of that time being strenuous. ..."
I find that rather difficult to believe. e.g. If you consider the heart-rate. 1 minute of say 180bpm just isn't going to equal 45 minutes of 150bpm. I'm sure it does scale to some extent but not that dramatically...
Such experiments essentially make a point that the main results of training sessions occur not because of the direct action on muscles and calorie burn during the exercise but rather because of some changes in body self-regulation that are triggered by the training session but act throughout the rest of the day/week.
If that 1 minute of 180bpm causes an upregulation of +1bpm (or an increase of base metabolism for calorie burn) for the whole next week in a way that moderate exercise doesn't, then it can quite plausibly have significant effects..
150 bpm is usually considered a vigorous workout (modulo variance in age/ability/genetics) and depending on many factors could be very hard to maintain for 45 minutes.
To anyone trying this: make sure you warm up first and stretch afterwards. One minute of instant-on full-intensity exercise of any kind is just begging for an injury.
Especially if you're not eighteen any more like me.
The routine in the study included a 2 minute warm up and 3 minute cool down, with 2 minute rests between 20 second sprints. The reporting on this study is frustrating since they keep implying and/or stating that it's 1 minute of exercise. It's 1 minute of strenuous exercise.
This is nonsense. Like people saying oh you can lose weight by being cold or breathing harder/more. Sure there is science behind it but in the end it does not promote maintainable lifestyles.
One minute all out may help athletes already in shape push to the next level. Like at the end of my long distance runs, I do a wind-sprint all out.
But regular people doing regular exercise benefit much more mentally from learning HOW to exercise for 45 minutes every day and increasing their metabolism.
If intensity training for a minute was all you needed, you could do sprints in the parking lot to train for a 45 minute 10K. Good luck with that.
Intensity training is good for fast-twitch muscle. Endurance training is good for slow-twitch. The two are not interchangeable.
I don't understand your problem with the research/article. All they are claiming is that short intense intervals produce comparable improvement in aerobic fitness and metabolic variables as longer endurance exercise, in untrained young men. This is supported by many other studies.
It doesn't try to prove that they will be equally good at running 10K, or have the same 'mental' benefits. That's a separate issue.
Think about all the people that are unable or unwilling to exercise like you do. Is it nonsense that they could significantly improve their health with short intense exercise? Who cares about fast and slow twitch fibres.
One of the largest challenges for regular people is finding 45-90 minutes to exercise in the first place. Research on shortening the length of time required for effective exercises is a worthwhile pursuit.
And the other thing is to keep focused for 45-90min on a bicycle in a gym, with nothing else to watch than wrestling and Justin Bieber in loop. That's where the real effort is.
That's why it's better to play sports. Exercise is more enjoyable when it's competitive. Don't punish yourself with exercise, reward yourself with play.
Or find a sport and find exercises to improve it. That's what I did. Soccer is fun, we often lose, but I love my team. We're pretty much considered the best sportsmen in our league (everyone respects us and enjoys playing with us because we treat everyone well, whether we're winning or losing). I took up running so I could play better.
I took up BJJ (individual rather than team sport) as a way to fill my evenings, and to try to get back into martial arts. I've taken up a strength training (bodyweight) as a way to improve myself there.
The exercise isn't always fun, but it has a purpose beyond "run faster" or "lift more" (though those are fine goals as well, just insufficient motivators for me).
Yeah, I have been doing BJJ for 8 years and just got my black belt. Recently started kickboxing too. On the side I jog and lift weights and do a handful of other sports for fun. I think of it as "training" as opposed to "exercise".
I might accept that but it feels like a cheating shortcut somehow.
A major part of long distance running (10k+) is the mental aspect.
You are never, ever, going to get the mental endurance and discipline to run fast for distance by running for a short period of time, no matter how hard.
Training for long distance running is not a goal most people have. Discussions about endurance training and improving health of "normal" people are not the same discussion.
This kind of research allows people to think working out for only a couple minutes is okay if you do it hard.
I think many people could easily train to do 5k and then 10k and get many benefits. Our very evolution came about from persistence hunting which means many people should have the genetics for endurance and far fewer for intensity (speed).
I think you're confusing a trained person training to get better with a sedentary person training to not be sedentary.
In the weight training community there's a thing everyone calls "newb gains". It's basically this study in played out in a weightroom. In a nutshell, it's that you don't need interesting training programs or massive amounts of gym time to get started. Just a few basic lifts a few times a week. Once you get a baseline, your gains level out and you have to start being smarter with your training. I'll bet a solid handshake that the same general pattern will apply here.
This study took out of shape people that didn't exercise and asked them to exercise. The program isn't so much important as is the fact that getting people doing anything strenuous ends up being beneficial.
Eventually their "gains" will level out and if they want to run a 10k in under 45 minutes, they're going to have do a lot more interesting training.
Good points. I'm in the camp that sees the claimed benefits of SIT as a logical extension of cardio exercise to the set/rest/set approach of weightlifting, but this study doesn't really answer that question. I'd really like to see an "equal time" comparison group to account for newb gains (e.g. MICT for 10 min vs SIT for 10 min) as well as directly compare the effect of the different approaches.
>If intensity training for a minute was all you needed, you could do sprints in the parking lot to train for a 45 minute 10K. Good luck with that. //
That's not a logical conclusion. The intense workout is to achieve/maintain normal fitness not to enable someone to run a good 10k.
If you can achieve moderate fitness with an intense workout then it seems much more likely to me that a person with such fitness will choose sports or other activities instead of remaining sedentary for the rest of the day.
The [citation needed] was for your association between muscle types and training types. For example, it's also a common assertion that intensity training is good for both fast and slow twitch muscles.
Its not exercise for 1 minute. Its exercise for 10 minutes, with 1 minute of that being all out. The actual comparison is 10 minutes vs 45, not 1 minute vs 45 as headline says.
I think author could have said as effectively 10 minutes of interval exercise may have benefits of 45 minutes of moderate exercise