High Intensity Interval Training - Charles Staley

Bigger Stronger Leaner Competitive Bodybuilding
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I missed John’s previous post; just read through it. However, I can’t agree.

When you compare weight training to HIIT, you are comparing apples and oranges, not apples and apples...they are two completely different modes of training with two completely different objectives. When the goal is fat loss, I don't see a need to perform each subsequent sprint with an intensity that mirrors that of the first. As long as you are putting forth maximal effort with each sprint, you will get the metabolic benefit from the session.

Some of the best HIIT research done to date was conducted by Izumi Tabata, Ph.D. at the Institute of Health & Nutrition in Japan. Tabata performed two seperate studies (both of which have been peer reviewed and printed in Med. Sci. Sports Exerc.)

The first is entitled "Effects of Moderate-Intensity Endurance and HIIT on Anaerobic Capacity and VO2max." This study showed that HIIT intervals of 20 second sprint/10 second rest (1:1/2) yielded a 14% increase in aerobic capacity (VO2max) and a 28% increase in anaerobic capacity in a 6 week time period. These phenomenal increases were some of the highest ever recorded for the respective time frame. As you can see, that's a substantial increase in both aerobic and anaerobic capacity. That's "optimal" if you ask me.

The second study, entitled "Metabolic Profile of HIIT" clearly presents the metabolic benefits of HIIT (increase in metabolism for up to 48 hours, 2.5 times the amount of calories burned after exercise and upwards of 50% more fat burned than with long duration, low intensity activity, etc.) The same 1:1/2 ratio of max effort to rest was used in this study. Those are some pretty satisfying numbers; and to be honest, they look very "successful" and "effective."

Oh, and I'd be amiss if I did not mention that the workout lasted only 4 minutes aside from warm up and cool down (8 total sprints).

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John(or anyone), how do you feel this workout will work on a heavy bag or focus mitts? My reason for doing any type of cardio work is for fighting (mma) and if possible I’d like to use an exercise that translates well over into my chosen activity. Thanks!

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I’d like to thank the last few guys for chiming in and clarifying just how freakin hard the interval training is if done as it was intended to be done!

Let me tell you guys…even the 30 minute, 15rep bout is insane. You certainly cant do it year round as it’s physically and mentally draining. During certain conditioning/training phases (strength or power phases) I do 3 interval workouts per week (1 running, 1 biking, 1 rowing). As competitive seasons come around I begin to focus on the sport coming up by doing intervals such that I get 2 of that activity and 1 other activity (I dont compete any longer but do train with some high level athletes - rowers, rugby players, football players). During hypertrophy phases I might do only 1-2 sessions of 15 total minutes in duration (7-8 sprints).

With this said, 2-3 workouts per week is optimal. There was a study where subjects either trained (repeated wingates - even more intense than what we're talking about here) every day or every 3rd day. And while the every day group got better adaptations, they didnt improve in performance. The every 3rd day group got adequate adaptations AND improvements in performance.

As far as sprinting outside, yes, it’s a great way to do it. Just be sure that you’re monitoring your intensity and work. If you’re not you may not be going hard enough to get better. It’s like in the gym - if you were blind to how much weight you were lifting, you might “feel” like you’re getting a good workout but may be actually doing worse. One way to monitor intensity outdoors is via a set distance and a stop watch. A good outdoor protocol is 200m sprint (25-30s) followed by 200m slow walk (90s) followed by 100m sprint (12-13s) followed by 100m slow walk (30-45s). Repeat this 5 times.

As you can see, I like the 1:3 ratio as long as it's performed in the 20-60s range (for your sprint) followed by 60-180s recovery.

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It really depends on the intensity and duration of your training, but in general, you can eat the carbs immediately after training. This will not shut down fat metabolism as most of the carbs will be going to replenish glycogen stores. You metabolism will still be elevated while you are working to replenish PCr stores, glycogen stores and clear out any H+ ions.

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I have a couple of questions about this subject? First,frequency, is 3 times per week the max amount of times you want to do this if your goal is purely fat loss and not performance? Or would more be better? Secondly,could you get as good of an effect using a jumprope for your high intensity phase for one minute followed by 3 minutes of moderate sparring on a heavybag? If so, how many intervals would you suggest?

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Jason, or whoever has an answer, do youthink the carbs could be taken immediatly doing cardio both the way John says (30 min., 15 30 sec. sprints) and the way Joel says (15 min., 8 20 sec. sprints)? Or do you think it would be better to have the carbs immediatly following John’s and waiting about 50 minutes after Joels, since you’re expending less energy on that one? Thanks all.

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Rod- No, more is not better; three times a week for fat loss is sufficient. Jumping rope is definitely an option; although not as intense as sprinting you can still get a good workout via this mode.

John- I'm a little confused as to how you can "prescribe" workloads for HIIT. By doing this you assume that all individuals have the same maximal capacity, and that's a pretty big assumption. One individual may not even be able to go the full 30 seconds at 12mph @ 0% grade while for another this workload would be considered substantially below maximal effort. Granted, it will be challenging, but who's to say it's maximal? You'll get a good workout, but who's to say it's maximal? Maximal effort is relative to the individual. You previously stated how vitally important it is for individuals to use maximal or near-maximal effort throughout the course of the workout...if individuals were to go out and do the workout you prescribed (and I'm sure many people would have without even questioning it simply because you said so) very few of them would actually reach that point of maximal effort. Sure, they'd get a good workout and they'd be pretty fatigued, but would they have used maximal effort with every sprint? The majority of them would not have.

It would be much more efficacious to just go outside and sprint as hard as possible for the designated maximal effort portion of the interval. That is true max-effort. Yes, individuals can lie to themselves and say they put forth maximal effort when they actually did not, but you can do this on any piece of equipment (treadmill, bike, stepper, rowing machine, etc.) If one chooses to do this, their only robbing themselves...so that's not the issue here.

Peter- I see your point that you cannot choose sprinting as your mode of exercise with 20/10 intervals; after all, sprinting is about 20-30% more intense than cycling (the mode that was used in the Tabata study). However, this can be easily circumvented by increasing the rest portion of the interval by a similar percentage. Just to be safe, we'll go with the 20/20 or 1:1 ratio. That's a 100% increase in the amount of rest with only a 20-30% increase in demand...that should indeed be sufficient rest to get similar benefits as those presented in the Tabata study.

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I would really like to see some reasearch that could vouch for immediate supplemenation after a HIIT session without adversely effecting lipolysis. Would be great news, but I’m a little hesitant to believe it. It seems to me that ingesting anything post-workout would cause your body to feed on that as opposed to stored fat. Also, if Kelly Bagget is reading this thread, would your recommended BCAA/glutamine complex have any adverse effects on lipolysis (same reason that I stated above)? This is one area that I really want to learn more about. I have always, always waited 45-50 minutes post HIIT before consuming some high GI carbs and protein…but i’m willing to accept other ideas if they make sense. Jason, I understood your previous post, but I can’t help to think that it might detract from fat-burning, even if it doesn’t completly halt it.

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Another reason as to why sprinting is the mode of choice is that you consume more oxygen while sprinting as opposed to other modes of exercise. The closer that you get to your actual VO2max during the exercise session, the more fat you will burn once that exercise session is complete. In other words, you burn more fat by sprinting.

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JB and Joel thanks for the responses…

I am very familiar with Dr.Tabata’s protocol. I ahve found that the sprinting is too intense for it, by sprints 4-8 you are dead and definitely not achieving that much power output. Having said that, I think sprinting is tremendous for fat loss and JB’s reccomendations do make more sense in this case(related to Sprinting)

Joel- I think the Bcaa’s would not hinder at all, they would more likely be anti catabolic . The body would recognize aminos present and not feel threatened to burn aminos and with lower glycogen levels, would then burn fat as the preferred fuel source.

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Joel-to some extent I think that the precise presription that you adopt depends upon your goals. I (and possibly John Berardi)am adopting an “athletes” perspective and looking at optimising the interval workout for its anaerobic effects. With that in mind, and as I previously stated with a view to achieving peak lactate levels, John’s recommendation of 5x200/100 with a 1:3 work rest ratio perfectly achieves that goal. Much more than that would seriously compromise the quality of the session. Your modification of Tabata to a 20/20 would still lead to a serious drop off in the quality of the intervals. Running 150m plus flat out with only a 20 sec break for 8 reps is a tall order.

You are probably looking at a combination of maximising fat loss and perhaps maximising aerobic/anaerobic conditioning. I accept that your strategies may well do that.

One final point. John reiterated my view that high intensity intervals are too mentally and physically taxing to continue indefinitely. I think that everyone here should appreciate that few people can tolerate 2/3 weekly high lactate sessions without burning out and plan accordingly.

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Hey Joel, Thanks for the Tabata post. Those are certainly interesting studies. I cant seem to find the second one though. I find a similarly titled abstract on medline (havent gotten to the full paper yet) but the abstract doesnt make the comparisons you mention (elevated EPOC for 48hrs, 2.5x caloric expenditure, etc).

Anyway, check out some of J. Parra’s work with intermittent exercise. In the Eur J Appl Physiology paper, those are some pretty impressive numbers for the 1:3 ratio as well.

Now, two clarifications that have to be made are these.

First, I certainly need to evaluate a client/athlete’s goals before prescribing anything. With that said, I agree with you, Joel, that intensity is not the main goal when fat loss only is the objective. In fact, as I’ve said about a billion times on the site, if muscle fullness and low body fat is the goal (i.e. the bodybuilding look), no (or at least very little) high intensity anaerobic or aerobic work should be done. However if athletic objectives are the focus, then I believe some of my protocols are optimal (the breadth of what I can prescribe has not been represented here on the site).

The second clarification is this. Although I gave some examples in my earlier post of "prescriptions", I gave mostly ranges for work output. These ranges are just examples of what the average client needs. As you said, Joel, different fitness levels demand different protocols. But I didnt feel the need to painfully describe how to arrive at Vmax (via incremental exercise test), Tmax (max time at max work) and the other variables that factor into interval prescriptions.

With these distinctions made, it appears to me that, as usual, there are many ways to accomplish our goals, whatever they may be. The Tabata method seems a good one based on the limited literature. However, I have a few concerns about the protocol. First, it just seems too short a program. 4 minutes of work just doesnt “feel” like enough work based on what I’ve seen in the past. While this isnt a very scientific criterion (Ill admit my biases), sometimes we just have to go with our instincts (and yes, mine have been wrong before). Second, regular aerobic work (this 20s:10s protocol is considered aerobic by the strictest definition) may cause fiber shifts away from fast twitch and toward slow twitch (either in metabolic properties or structure). If the 20s:10s protocol is as effective as some of the data suggests, and does promote fiber shifts, this is the opposite
of what weight lifters want (however, a similar arguement can be made for my recommendations too - except for the fact that my suggestions have less of an aerobic component).

Another concern is that while there are 2 studies to back up some of the metabolic changes, Im curious as to why there hasnt been much follow up work in the last 5 years. Usually when a highly effective protocol is published, it's followed up with repeated studies. Are you aware of any other work on this, Joel?

Finally, the real world observations I’ve made, while scattered, tend to be as follows:

I see lots of fat guys doing short duration, HIIT programs like the Tabata protocol.

I see NO fat guys doing the longer duration higher intensity work that I’ve recommended.

If the proof of the pudding is in the eating, this is some pretty good “proof” for the body comp benefits of some of my protocols.

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Brent - Joel’s protocols (see his website for exact clarifications) are much shorter than Berardi’s prescription and involve much less total work. You could clearly supplement with a post-workout drink after either protocol, but I’m almost sure that 25g would not make a dent in the fat-burning effects of a 30 min (15sprint) program like Berardi’s. Joel’s shorter programs are much like the Tabata protocol and while they might be very effective, there might not be enough total energy expenditure during exercise to warrant immediate post workout consumption.

This argument would be akin to thinking that a leg workout consisting of 5 sets of 5 reps of squats would need the same post-workout recommendations of a GVT leg workout consisting of 10x10 squats and 10x10 SLDLs. Both exercise prescriptions absolutely have their place, but have very different energy needs. Hence the reason you don't do GVT during a cutting cycle.

Post-workout consumption is a very individualized need and while Berardi has done a phenomenal job describing needs based on the person's size, we could all benefit from some further instruction on how much the size of our post-workout drink should be based on total work done during a lifting session.

JMB - if you are still reading this thread, I think this would be a great question to tackle in an Appetite for Construction column.

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I wanted to address a couple of things…

Joel wrote - “It would be much more efficacious to just go outside and sprint as hard as possible for the designated maximal effort portion of the interval. That is true max-effort.”

My response - You are correct, Joel. However, I must clarify what I meant by "maximal or near maximal effort". Basically most anaerobic intervals (many aerobic protocols as well) are SUPRAmaximal effort by definition (greater than 100% of VO2 max). So what I meant by "max or near max" was that the trainee should be able to maintain a high quality of effort throughout and in doing so, I like them to maintain the same workload throughout. To choose this workload, I typically pick 125+/-10% of workload achieved during a graded exercise test. Most people can achieve 30min (15 reps) at this workload.

Going out and sprinting as fast as you can for each rep is way too subjective, in my opinion. In addition, some sprinters can work at power outputs for 15-30s of about 300-400% of VO2 max for 1 rep. But there is NO way they can duplicate that at the 1:3 ratio.

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To address some of the things that John has stated:

JB: Although I gave some examples in my earlier post of "prescriptions", I gave mostly ranges for work output.

You made no indication that these "prescriptions" were examples and/or ranges. Should I have not mentioned it, you can bet your bottom dollar that plenty of people reading this post would be heading to the gym and setting their treadmills to 12mph at 0% grade. The reason: This was "John Berardi's" suggestion. The problem is that most people don't think; they accept everything at face value and rarely use the debunking process. As long as the information comes from a reputable source, they take it and run...no questions asked. This is a major problem, but it's reality nonetheless.

You have to realize that individuals are going to do what you say, simply because of who you are. Because of this, you have to be even more careful of what you say and how you say it.

JB: I didnt feel the need to painfully describe how to arrive at Vmax (via incremental exercise test), Tmax (max time at max work) and the other variables that factor into interval prescriptions...Going out and sprinting as fast as you can for each rep is way too subjective, in my opinion...there is NO way they can duplicate that at the 1:3 ratio.

You don't need your VO2max or Tmax to design an highly effective fat burning HIIT workout. That's alot of testing, and most individuals don't have those resources anyway. If you are working with top-quality athletes that's one thing, but for the people on this site (who's main goals are to burn fat and improve their overall level of fitness); it's completely uneccesary.

That's why I recommended to just sprint as fast as you can. I don't understand how you can call this approach "subjective." Where's the ambiguity? Either your run as fast as you can (I just think of a rabid animal chasing me during the max-effort portion of the interval...but you might want to go with another thought if that doesn't work for you) or you don't. Either you push yourself as hard as you can or you don't. Ambiguity and subjectivity aren't even issues. If individuals want to cheat themselves, that's their perogative...but that's not the issue at hand.

I already stated in a previous post that when burning fat is the main issue, I don't see a need to perform each subsequent sprint with an intensity that mirrors that of the first (and you agreed). And obviously those individuals who participated in the Tabata study weren't maintaining the same level of intensity with each subsequent interval; however, they still improved their aerobic capacity by 14% and their anaerboic capacity by 28% over a six week period. You will still get great aerobic and anerobic benefits with the 1:1/2 or 1:1 protocol.

JB: First, it just seems too short a program. 4 minutes of work just doesnt "feel" like enough work based on what I've seen in the past.

John, have you ever done the 4-minute workout? IT SOUNDS SOOOO EASY! However, most individuals will fall flat on their face or puke within 2 minutes...it's tuff stuff...very, very demanding.

I encourage you to do this: forget the fancy equipment, put on some jogging shoes and walk right outside your front door. Jog for 3-4 minutes to warm up...brace yourself for the extreme torture you are about to put your body through...sprint as fast as you can for 20 seconds...just stand there and attempt to catch your breath for 10...do another full-blown sprint...rest 10 seconds...repeat the cycle 8 times and finally cool down with another 3-4 minute jog. If you don't "feel" like you did enough work, I'll give you the 20 something thousand dollars I still have left from winning BFL.

JB: I see lots of fat guys doing short duration, HIIT programs like the Tabata protocol. I see NO fat guys doing the longer duration higher intensity work that I've recommended.

To be honest, After I read that line, I almost fell out of my chair because I was laughing so hard. I don't know what "fat" guys you see doing the Tabata protocol, but let me tell you this; they are some top-notch "fat" guys in incredible shape. Most individuals won't make it through the 4 minutes and would need to start out with a much lighter workout (i.e. 1:1 ratio of max-effort to rest, performing 4-5 total intervals, etc.) and work their way up before they could even think about going outside and performing the workout that I described above.

Another thing, if you don't have all those "painful" numbers that Berardi spoke of (VO2max, Tmax, etc.) to highly individualize your HIIT session, then I'm going to make this statement: Treadmill work sucks. It just takes too damn long for the belt to slow down and/or speed up between intervals and you have no idea whether you are truly putting forth max effort. It may be challenging, but who knows if it's maximal? You don't know, and you can't know without the numbers. You'd be much better off just running as fast as you can...it takes less than 1 second for you to go from walking to near max effort and there is no subjectivity or ambiguity. With a treadmill, it could take the belt well over 15 seconds to go from 4mph to 12mph...and at that point, are you really running as fast as you would if you just "took off" and gave it all you got? Probably not.

Another drawback with treadmill work is this: Even if you did have your VO2 and T numbers you would be improving, but your workload wouldn't be changing. You would have to constantly re-evaluate your VO2max and the like in order to continue to increase the workload in a proper manner. If you just go outside and sprint as fast as you can, once you start to improve you automatically will start sprinting faster, thus your workload will be increased as your fitness level increases. Like I said, there is absolutly no ambiguity. "Full blown" is "full blown"...period.

Even though bike-work is not as demanding as sprinting, I still think its more effective than a treadmill. You can apply the same "fast as you can" principle with this mode as you can with sprinting. I still choose sprinting for two reasons:

1) Greater O2 consumption during exercise

2) I don't have a bike at my house and I find it much more convenient to just walk outside than to get in my car and drive to the gym.

Some other studies that vouch for the metabolic effects of HIIT are:

R. Bahr and O.M. Sejersted, "Effect of Intensity on Excess Post exercise O2 Consumption," Metabolism 40.8 (1991) : 836-841.

J. Smith and L. McnNaughton, "The Effects of Intensity of Exercise and Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption and Energy Expenditure in Moderately Trained Men and Women," European Journal of Applied Physiology 67 (1993) : 420-425.

Granted, they aren't the most recent articles, but they provide some more insight nonetheless. I'm with John that I would like to see more reseach done on HIIT...I honestly don't know why physiologists aren't doing more.

There are a few other studies, but I can't find the references right now...I'll work on it.

John, I love you man...don't misunderstand the nature of my post. I highly respect you and your views, but I'm just trying to bring some other ones to the table (on this subject anyway)...your methods and writings have greatly and positively affected my diet, training, and results. Having said that, I hope I'm gaining some respect from you through this very healthy debate.

I need to go get something to eat now...I skipped a P + F meal writing this post :)

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Re. Post workout nutrition and fat burning…

If you check out my Biology Bash In Barrie article I covered a study (I know, it’s in VITRO data) that showed that exercised muscle incubated in a carb and fat medium preferentially stores carbs and burns fat (even in the presence of insulin). While not definitive, it gives some indication of what to expect.

There’s not too much good data to prove one point or the other but here’s another…

The effects of various intensities and durations of exercise with and without glucose in milk ingestion on postexercise oxygen consumption. Lee YS, Ha MS, Lee YJ. This study shows that during high intensity exercise with supplement nutrient intake (glucose+milk) actually INCREASES EPOC without changing RER. This means increase total calorie expenditure at the same relative proportion of fat oxidized (i.e. more total fat burned with the drink provision) (The RER was measured 2 hours post exercise).

My one curiosity (for Joel) is why you wait 50 min after training. Regardless of what substrate is being oxidized, 50 minutes (in my opinion) will not dash through that much substrate (in terms of grams) that waiting is justified. In the Lee study the EPOC was 211ml/kg. For a 70kg guy, that's about 14.7L of O2. At 3.5kcal/L (the caloric cost of oxygen consumption), that's 51 kcal. So, even assuming a drink shifted from 100% fat to 100% carb (which we know it doesnt do), at 100% oxidation of fat, that's only 5g of fat. And that's over 2 hours. Half that (for 50 min) and we're talking 2.5g. So, assuming you take a pw drink and shift from total fat burning to total carb burning you might only burn 2.5g less fat!

But the point is moot since you dont shut off fat burning at all!

On the other hand, studies have shown that the closer to the workout post exercise nutrition is provided, the better the “recovery” (as measured by protein metabolism) as well as the gains in mass.

So, protein and carb recovery is better and fat burning is not inhibited. Take your post workout nutrition!

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Thanks John for the info on post HIIT nutrition. Like I said, this is a subject that I wanted to learn more about…the views in which you have presented provide a great deal of insight. Thanks again.

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You know what; in light of this thread and the obvious interest for more research to be done on HIIT, I’m going to talk to my Exercise Physiology and Kinesiology profs, Dr. Jie Kang and Dr. Jay Hoffman, respectively (who have had over a dozen studies published in peer-reviewed journals) and see if we can’t design an HIIT study to be conducted at the college. I will definitely want to include post-workout nutrition and different protocols for HIIT to be examined extensively within the study…I’m going to see what I can do.

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HIIT is an incredibly effective way to burn calories, lose body fat and increase aerobic and anaerobic capacity. Both the shorter Tabata protocol (1:1/2 work to rest) and Berardi’s longer (3:1) are effective methods.

Joel and I had a good talk about this issue and while we did not come to a solid conclusion (I don't think you can), we (let me know if I'm wrong buddy) agreed that there could be room for both types of programs depending on needs.

Just to be clear, the following are my (Jason Norcross) thoughts.

1)The more body fat you have to lose, the more you will benefit with a longer program. You need to burn more calories both during and after exercise and the shorter Tabata protocol may not be enough.

2) Intensity is key. If you are not using an effort significantly above VO2max, then you are wasting your time and effort. Sure you can't measure VO2max, but you can use the treadmill protocol that Berardi mentioned in his article to get an estimate of what your max workload would be. Once you know this workload, you have to use a workload that is at least 25% higher than this to get the benefit. Use the calories burned screen on cardio equipment as your best indicator of workload.

For example, if you can't maintain a minute at a calorie cost of 1000 cal/hour, you need to use a workload that generates a calorie cost of 1250 or more to really use HIIT effectively.

Wow, I'm out of time, I'll post the rest of my thoughts when I get back from church.

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Just for future reference, the caloric cost of oxygen consumption is 5kcal/L or 21kJ/L, not 3.5kcal/L.