More on Intervals

Thanks Sheena. The beauty about intervals is that you can build up the intensity at your own pace to whatever level you like, depending on your fitness aspirations. Take walking for instance, nearly everyone can walk, although some really obese people can’t walk much so swimming might be a better exercise to start with for them.

Anyway, you might start out with the warm up then do just 5 seconds of high intensity work by sprinting flat out. After the 5 second sprint, walk at your normal medium to brisk pace.

Now if you’re not used to sprinting be ready for some soreness if you do too much. Build up slowly otherwise the soreness will stop and you might not keep going at all. Do it on alternate days or just 3 days a week. Maybe on the first day you might only do two sprints and walk the rest of the time. If you don’t experience any soreness after a workout, increase the number of sprints by one or two each successive workout.

Once you are up to a total exercise time of 15 to 30 minutes, then you can look at increasing the length of the actual sprint part itself.

You can increase the sprint time and keep the walk interval the same (say 90 seconds or 1 minute or even two) until the sprint is 30 seconds, then start reducing the walk interval. Or you could reduce the walk time as the sprint increases. E.g., 50 sec walk 10 sec sprint, 45 sec walk 15 sec sprint, 40 sec walk 20 sec sprint, etc. After a 30 second sprint you will be spent!

Go according to your level of fitness and take your time. In exercise, haste makes waste. Stay un-sore and stay enthusiastic. Now go for it.