Jessica Desmond, an instructor at the Mile High Run Club (MHRC), leads a class in a Manhattan borough of New York November 14, 2014.

Jessica Desmond, an instructor at the Mile High Run Club (MHRC), leads a class in a Manhattan borough of New York November 14, 2014.
Photo Credit: Brendan McDermid / Reuters

How to get fit in 60 seconds: Canadian study

It’s called high-intensity interval training and it’s the latest fitness craze splashed all over fitness magazines, Youtube videos and trendy exercise apps.

And now a new Canadian study confirms that short bursts of high-intensity exercise can be as effective as longer gym sessions.

The study by a group of researchers from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, shows doing just 60 seconds of intense sprint intervals offers the same health benefits as 50 minutes of moderate continuous exercise, said Professor Martin Gibala, chair of McMaster’s department of kinesiology and the lead author of the 12-week study.

(click to listen the full interview with Prof Martin Gibala)

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The study looked at two groups of sedentary men in mid to late 20s, with one group doing interval training and the other doing the more traditional moderate effort but longer exercises, Gibala said.

10 minutes, 3 times a week

Both groups trained on bicycles three times a week.

But the entire training of the interval-based group lasted only 10 minutes each session, broken into a two-minute warm-up, a 20-second burst, a two-minute recovery, another 20-second burst, another two-minute recovery, a final 20-second burst, followed by a cool-down, Gibala said.

While the second group had a 50-minute continuous moderate exercise regimen for each session.

Improved fitness

By the end of the study both groups improved their cardiovascular fitness and aerobic power by about 20 per cent “even though one group did fivefold less exercise with a fivefold lower time commitment,” said Gibala.

“What we’re finding with interval training is that it can stimulate many of the same pathways or mechanisms that we associate with the more traditional approach but in a somewhat different manner,” Gibala said. “What appears is the same signalling pathways that lead to physiological remodelling, they can be simulated by the traditional approach of relatively prolonged endurance type exercise, but these short vigorous bursts of activity can activate the same pathways and lead to very similar remodeling.”

The study proves that even short but intensive exercise can have dramatic effects on people’s fitness.

“We know that the number one sited barrier for why people don’t exercise is lack of time,” Gibala said. “Clearly that’s an excuse for some people, but many people lead very busy, time-pressed lives and so there is an interest for interval training to serve as a time-efficient alternative to the traditional approach.”

But just like with any physical exercise, check with your doctor before you decide to take up interval training, Gibala said.

“This most recent study involved a relatively extreme model and it shows that there is a trade-off between intensity and duration,” Gibala said. “If you’re willing and able to exercise at a very vigorous pace, you can get away with a surprisingly small dose of exercise.”

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