Hi all!

I've been lurking on this site for some time now and thought it was about time for my very first post!

I currently do weight training 3 days a week with cardio days in between.
I also do 20min cardio (LISS) before every weight training session.

I am cutting at the moment and on my cardio days I do 20min (LISS) and then 20min (HIIT).

I'm looking for opinions on whether doing LISS and HIIT on the same day is a good plan or not.

Regards,

AngeliX

20 minutes LISS isnt really enough
so i say either do around 40-45 LISS on your cardio days or the 20minutes HIIT.

I also do 20min cardio (LISS) before every weight training session.

I am cutting at the moment and on my cardio days I do 20min (LISS) and then 20min (HIIT).

Its OK, but the 20 minutes of LISS is really just a warm-up. It probably helps you hit the weights harder because you've got the metabolism fired up but haven't burnt much glygogen.

You might consider going to 40 minutes HIIT and no LISS on the cardio days.

And it's probably better to put 10 minutes LISS in front of the lifting, and 10 minutes LISS after, than 20 minutes before. This gets you a cool down effect - circulating blood cleans up your muscles after the lifting.

You might consider going to 40 minutes HIIT and no LISS on the cardio days.

"Strike that, reverse it."

You might consider going to 40 minutes HIIT and no LISS on the cardio days.


40 minutes HIIT, that's alot dude, i understard 40 minutes LISS but HIIT, thats not right

40 minutes HIIT, that's alot dude, i understard 40 minutes LISS but HIIT, thats not right

It's not a lot. What do you guys mean when you say HIIT?

40 minutes of HIIT could be as simple as 6 intervals of 2 minutes hard / 5 minutes walking recovery. In that, you would expect to run a total of a mile and a half, maybe two miles, and walk some fraction of a mile. The total time in hard effort would be 10-12 minutes.

You don't mean 40 minutes of just counting the hard intervals do you?

I think most people (myself included) think of it more as a short cycles, like an all out sprint for 20-30 seconds, and 90 seconds jog. Then repeat. This is how I do mine, usually on a 2 minute cycle. Turns out that if I sprint TOO long, my recovery is limited. That's the motivation for going damn hard and fast.

I think most people (myself included) think of it more as a short cycles, like an all out sprint for 20-30 seconds, and 90 seconds jog.

The studies I've seen which show benefits of HIIT show that 30 seconds of hard is not enough time, but 90 seconds of hard is enough One minute is supposed to be about the minimum hard interval - and maybe one minute is too short.

The recovery can be longer than your 90 seconds, it's really up to what sort of training state you're up to.

I am quite sure that this is all training state dependent. But remember - you're not supposed to even try HIIT unless you are ready. And so if you can get your heart rate up over 90% of max - you're aiming for 95% or more - in 20 seconds, then you are not in good enough shape to do HIIT. Just be patient in that case and work your way up.

For example this paper

(http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=16540838&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_docsum)

used 20 one minute hard (90% VO2max which is more than 90% MHR) intervals followed by one minute rests. That's a pretty short rest. And you know what? They found that this was "similarly effective" to the 30 minutes of constant intensity exercise alternative for improving oxygen kinetics. Well that is not really that effective as one would hope from intervals. And notice: it is 40 minutes of interval workout.

What would be the point of the one minute hard with only one minute rest if after 40 minutes you are doing "similar" to 30 minutes of moderate constant exertion?

So I think you are not actually getting much intensity from your intervals. I've always heard that 90-seconds to two minutes is the short end of where the hard interval should be.

It depends on what "hard" means. My sprint interval is such that over 1 minute is pretty much impossible. :)

The sprints that I was doing today had my heart rate hitting over 200 bpm. I think that the intensity is what matters most, as if I ran even 5 seconds more I would definitely have thrown up. :D

Although I understand what you're saying, for me, it works best if I bust my ass for about 30 seconds (to the point where I physically MUST stop), then rest for about 90 seconds. Sometimes I change the intervals, but these seem best for me.

The sprints that I was doing today had my heart rate hitting over 200 bpm. I think that the intensity is what matters most, as if I ran even 5 seconds more I would definitely have thrown up. :D

Intensity matters more than volume, but the trick is more along the lines of get it to the point where that same sprint will not get your heart at 200 bpm.

I got monitor max readings over 200 bpm the first few times I did 74 second quarter miles (which is as fast as the treadmill runs) and was certainly around 190 for a good deal of it. But the second to the last time, it was only 184, and the last time, it was 172. So next time I'll have to incline the treadmill or something.

But this is the sort of training effect you want to see - that your heart rate during the exercise doesn't spike up as much for the same effort. And then, you can go for harder/longer.

You should feel the effect of your hard interval - it shouldn't be comfortable. But you should also get the effect of being able to do that pace for longer and longer.

FastGTX I think you are fully dumping your anerobic capacity and then shutting down. You have a lot of muscle mass and if you develop a lot of power this can happen. Do you see no improvement in endurance over the weeks of interval training? You might have enough disparity between the power you can generate anerobically and aerobically that you need to work a little less pace for longer.

It's true that 20 or 30 seconds is how long people can sprint - or put it this way, Michael Johnson claims that nobody can go all out for 400 meters, which takes him about 43 seconds. So that's about what the anerobic capacity is - 20 or 30 seconds. If you try and run on the strength of your Type IIb muscles, that's where you will be unable to stay really fast - you get little contribution from your aerobic ability.

I don't really know about what interval workouts do to your anerobic capacity. I have always thought of them as a way to work on the aerobic capacity. And for that, you really need to push the aerobic energy system. If you are letting your anerobic energy do all the work, then there isn't much adaptation that your aerobic system needs to do, and I would think that it doesn't bother doing much.

Having said this, I suppose the really short intervals would do something for your anerobic system - it would be under stress, so it would adapt. But there is almost no way to get more than a short burst of power from that.

So even if you are running on a treadmill, I think if you are busting it for 20 seconds and then shutting down, you are really doing a sort of anerobic exercise. I am not sure what I think of this as an exercise. I think I might go for the biggest 20 second set of power cleans I could do with jump rope rest intervals or something like that instead. I could see sprinters being interested in that sort of interval - it's not unlike some workouts they do.

But the point is sort of what you raised - it's really hard to keep the top pace past 20 or 30 seconds when almost all of that pace comes from anerobic metabolism. Can you hold your breath for the first interval? Then you aren't pushing the aerobic system really hard - you are building up an oxygen deficit, but the aerobic system can pay it back while you are no longer pushing on it.

If you want the cardio benefits of HIIT then you probably need to have intervals that can't be done almost all by your anerobic energy.

I actually think this is sort of the reasoning behind intervals that are exhausting for you, but which last well over a minute. Nobody has that much anerobic energy, and so you can be sure that you can putting a big dent in the aerobic system.

I was using HIIT last year as well, although on an elliptical. I had to go about 45-50 seconds to reach my exhaustion point. At first my heart rate was about 200 bpm. Fast forward three weeks later, and I had trouble breaking 180. It's a great style.

Nice insight. I always thought that it was meant to be purely anerobic.

I was using HIIT last year as well, although on an elliptical. I had to go about 45-50 seconds to reach my exhaustion point. At first my heart rate was about 200 bpm. Fast forward three weeks later, and I had trouble breaking 180. It's a great style.

Nice insight. I always thought that it was meant to be purely anerobic.

Oddly enough, it's not MEANT to be purely anerobic. But the way you guys are doing it, it seems like it would be. Which doesn't mean that you're getting no benefit - it means your getting something different - probably it's building your anerobic capacity.

But the classic idea of intervals is about building aerobic capacity. And the modern idea is that you can use that to burn a ton of fat calories.

Now I honestly don't know if the anerobic version you guys do burns calories better or worse than the more classic style. Time to get out a heart monitor and see. They would still be a whole lot of fat calories because they would get burned after you finish and while you were recovering.

So from a calorie point of view, you might be getting the fat burn you want. It would only happen if you were particularly powerful, but both of you guys are pretty powerful.

Regardless of the science behind it, I think the HIIT phenomenon should mimmick what these sprinters do for typical workouts (since that is the body style most people here are looking for).



Oddly enough, it's not MEANT to be purely anerobic. But the way you guys are doing it, it seems like it would be. Which doesn't mean that you're getting no benefit - it means your getting something different - probably it's building your anerobic capacity.

But the classic idea of intervals is about building aerobic capacity. And the modern idea is that you can use that to burn a ton of fat calories.

Now I honestly don't know if the anerobic version you guys do burns calories better or worse than the more classic style. Time to get out a heart monitor and see. They would still be a whole lot of fat calories because they would get burned after you finish and while you were recovering.

So from a calorie point of view, you might be getting the fat burn you want. It would only happen if you were particularly powerful, but both of you guys are pretty powerful.

Regardless of the science behind it, I think the HIIT phenomenon should mimmick what these sprinters do for typical workouts (since that is the body style most people here are looking for).
I agree.

In this regard, 20 minutes of LISS and 20 minutes of HIIT as the original poster is going to look very similiar to format used by a sprinter.

10-15 minutes slow jog (warm up)
20-30 minutes sprint intervals
10-15 minutes slow jog (cool down)

In the summer, I'd just go out to the track and do sprint workouts in this fashion. You can even take it out to the hills.

No need to stick to boring treadmills and stationary bikes.

OK so I have found some discussion of really short intervals - 20 and 30 seconds. You have to do them at nearly double the work rate of your VO2max. (Yikes!). For sure you will not be able to do much more than 20 or 30 seconds of that.

(http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/0145.htm)

What seems to be the key is a very short rest, so that you can't replenish oxygen and PCr (phosphocreatine) in the muscle. They did this with one interval pattern that had enough rest to replenish muscle oxygen and PCr and one that had too short a rest for that even though it had a less intense hard interval. The point of this is that by not allowing muscle replenishment, you are going to really exhaust the anerobic capacity. And by keeping it up, you will push the aerobic capacity by forcing the recovery to be deeper and deeper.

So it turns out that the anerobic stress can be big for 20 second intervals but to prevent recovery, you only get 10 seconds rest.

Yikes.

10 seconds rest.

No wonder that it loads your aerobic system trying to refuel in 10 seconds.

But there are more conventional ways to load the aerobic system with longer intervals.

What seems to be going on with these guys is that they are looking at these two interval schedules in terms of which one hits the PCr system harder (the one with the long rest) and which one hits the anerobic-glycolitic energy harder (the one with the short rest). So if you want explosive short burst power, do the one with the long rest, and if you want a little more muscle endurance you do the one with the short rest.

The thing that always seems to be the deal with interval training for athletic improvement, (as opposed to simple calorie burning) is what the guy says at the end:

"I recommend that for anaerobic training, both types of interval sessions are used, one with very short rests, another with long recoveries. However, the athlete's sport will determine which type of session is most important. Incidentally, if you want to use interval training, remember that to get the kind of benefits described you must perform the workouts to exhaustion. Interval training is about setting a demanding intensity level and working at that level for the prescribed work/rest ratios until you cannot continue. If you do that, you have reached overload and the training will be effective. Without overload, there is no adaptation."

Bottom line? If you want intervals to improve your energy, you have to knock yourself out with them.

Tabata is extremely effective. Good luck not puking the first time. :tu: It's been around for a while, though you won't see that many people doing it because it's so hard.

Here's a t-nation take on it with weights: http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=04-046-training

I'd advise starting with sprints, however, as a first experience.

Tabata is extremely effective. Good luck not puking the first time. :tu: It's been around for a while, though you won't see that many people doing it because it's so hard.

Here's a t-nation take on it with weights: http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=04-046-training

I'd advise starting with sprints, however, as a first experience.

As far as we can tell, 60 reps of 225 squat will take longer than 30 seconds. Once we've got the first 42 reps, we're figuring the difference is all aerobic capacity and mental/nerves. Aerobically, I think the 60 rep squats will be more similar to a run in the 400m-800m range.

So I think these anerobic intervals are not the right thing to try at the moment. But I'm really just saying that because they sound freaky horrid and I don't want to do that. I'm already guilty of not taking my running intervals to true exhaustion, but I've only been doing them seriously for a few weeks.

i do 30 sec sprint / 30 sec jog intervals for 20 minutes max for hiit

40 minutes hiit? i think id die :D

Regardless of the science behind it, I think the HIIT phenomenon should mimmick what these sprinters do for typical workouts (since that is the body style most people here are looking for).

I don't see how the aerobic training state is related to body style. These guys had excellent aerobic endurance:

Ali / Patterson (http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/10/25/specials/ali.5.jpg)

This guy too:

Daley Thompson (http://www.times-olympics.co.uk/historyheroes/images/STthompson118x243.jpg)

And these guys are famous sprinters (possible the three greatest ever?):

Carl Lewis (http://www.anni80.info/sport/images/lewis_gal_l_02.jpg)
Edwin Moses (http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/moses_gal_l_01.jpg)
Michael Johnson (http://www.collectr.com/ol/images/opjohnsonm.jpg)

I would be somewhat surprised if given the choice, most people here would prefer to look like Michael Johnson or Edwin Moses, or even Carl Lewis, as opposed to looking like Muhammed Ali or Daley Thompson.

I think there is a tendency to hear the word "endurance" and imagine a guy that looks like Frank Shorter (http://www.wtv-zone.com/whales/images/running/shorter.jpg). There's a bunch of different flavors of aerobic endurance. People tend to forget about endurance for heavyweight boxers until they see a fight where one guy gets tired before the other.

It's not a lot. What do you guys mean when you say HIIT?

40 minutes of HIIT could be as simple as 6 intervals of 2 minutes hard / 5 minutes walking recovery. In that, you would expect to run a total of a mile and a half, maybe two miles, and walk some fraction of a mile. The total time in hard effort would be 10-12 minutes.

You don't mean 40 minutes of just counting the hard intervals do you?


there is a big chance that you will lose muscles, but if u do not care about losing it, so 40 minute HIIT is fine as long as you can do it