Hope everyone’s training program well from last week, today we are going to focus on cardio training and in particular interval cardio training. Cardio training refers to running/jogging, swimming, cycling etc that gets your heart rate above resting levels.
Typically when we talk about cardio training we talk about either steady state or interval training.
What is steady state cardio?
steady state cardio training refers to exercise that is done at the same pace throughout the session. For example going out for a run for 30 minutes, keeping the same intensity, your heart rate would stay fairly constant throughout the run.
What is interval training?
interval training refers to exercise that is done at varied intensities, for example instead of keeping a run at a steady pace, causing your heart beat to go up and down throughout the training session. For interval training this would mean perhaps sprinting for 30 seconds then walking for 30 seconds and repeating this for 20 minutes.
Which is better interval training or steady state training?
For fat loss interval training is better as it puts more stress on the body, because interval training causes the heart to work at varying intensities, it means that the body has to work harder and for longer to recover and repair itself.
When we train it causes our metabolism to increase, meaning that we are burning more calories, when we do steady state training, studies have shown that we may continue to burn calories for up to an hour after we’ve finished training. However when we do an interval training session for the same amount of time we can continue to burn calories for up to 6 hours after the session, so our metabolism stays raised for longer.
An example of an interval session would be 5 minute warm up of a fast walk or light jog followed by sprinting for 30 seconds and a 30 seconds jog or walk depending on your fitness level, repeat this cycle for 20 minutes and finish with a 5 min cool down as you did to warm up. This can also be done as a row, cycle or swim.
Now that we have this weeks training organised we need to focus on our food, this week we will be looking at good carbs versus bad carbs.
For decades we have been told that a well-balanced healthy diet should consist of lots of carbohydrates and grains, a little protein and even less fat. If we look at the food pyramid that most of us learned in school, it shows that 60-70% of our diet should be made up of carbs including pasta, rice, and bread etc. However if most of us were to eat this way daily we would gain weight, instead our food intake should be closer to 40% carbs. With the majority of our carbs coming from fruit and veg with some grains and limiting the amount of simple carbs such as white flour, table sugar, honey etc . This is vitally important if we want to lose weight or stay lean, ideally we want to think of our bodies as a furnace and turn our bodies into a fat burning machine. When we are constantly eating carbs our bodies will use these sugars as a source of energy and won’t use its fats stores.
In order to allow our bodies to utilize more fat we need to ensure that our insulin levels remain steady, when we eat a lot of simple carbs our insulin levels spike, which tends to make us eat more once these levels drop, we feel a slump and need a quick pick me up. Instead we need to keep our insulin levels steady so that our bodies are forced to use up fat as an energy source. To do this we need to avoid simple carbs, like our white flour and refined sugars eating more “good carbs” like oats, sweet potato, fruit and veg.
If we eat this way the majority of the time we can allow ourselves a cheat meal once a week, as long as it is limited and in moderation.We don’t need to have a cheat day but rather a cheat meal, don’t use a cheat as a way too over indulge and binge, undoing all the hard work you’ve done during the week. When having a cheat, set a limit and decide what exactly you’re going to have beforehand, therefore you are less likely to go over eat. You can still make better choices when having a treat for example, choosing dark instead of white chocolate or choosing red wine over white.
Don’t worry having a cheat meal may not be necessarily detrimental to your weight loss goals. If we go on calorie controlled or low carbohydrate diet the hormone leptin which helps to control our appetite and energy balance is negatively affected. When this happens we have cravings and will more than likely then binge, by having a reasonable cheat meal this can return our leptin levels back to normal, therefore stabilising our energy levels and bringing our appetites back to normal again. With just some small alterations in your diet and controlling your sugar intake can make huge differences in achieving your goal.