Interval Training article by John Berardi

**isol8d** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 8:52am

Interval Training - Are You Doing It? by John Berardi

John Berardi had the chance to sit in on one of George St. Pierre's workouts before the last UFC fight. He sums it up with:

And while some might say I was lucky enough to sit in on a sparring session and a conditioning session, my lungs might beg to differ.

The article has the circuit they used for HIIT, and a follow up by strength coach Mike Boyle, in which he gives you the tools to create your own HIIT program, including which equipment is most effective and/or safest.

**BaronVonDingDong** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 12:48pm

Thanks for the article, it was a clarifying read.

I've been doing HIIT on a stationary bike once a week for a month now. In fact today, I just upped my routine from 8 intervals of 30 secs. work with 1 minute rest, to 10 intervals of 30 secs. work with 30 secs. rest.

My cardio has improved greatly even in this short time. I noticed it most when my coach got me running the stairs for three three minute rounds. He cheerfully predicted that I was going to die, when in actual fact I was surprised at how good I felt.

(As a side note, I find that if I stretch and roll my legs out on a foam roller straight afterward the bike work, I can avoid the hamstring/lower back soreness that I was getting when I first started.)

I think it might be time to invest in a HR monitor, though, as what I'm doing doesn't seem to be very scientific.

Thanks again.

**TheRuss** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 1:15pm

Subscribed. Very good article.

Originally Posted by BaronVonDingDong

I think it might be time to invest in a HR monitor, though, as what I'm doing doesn't seem to be very scientific.

Yeah, once I resume interval training, I should probably get one of these as well. The Airdyne looks neat too - if I had the room and the money, I'd get one for my place so I could crank out some intervals first thing in the morning.

**BaronVonDingDong** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 1:41pm

Originally Posted by TheRuss

The Airdyne looks neat too - if I had the room and the money, I'd get one for my place so I could crank out some intervals first thing in the morning.

Definitely - much nicer than the budget clunker I have right now. I just checked on my local Craigslist and you can get the older model for around $250 used. I bet the vast majority of them have hardly been touched.

**Lily** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 3:06pm

Nice simple article.

I do HIIT but that Circuit would kill me at the END of a strength training session, especially the fact that my legs would be wobbly by the end of the 20 air squats and 20 lunges. I'd probably put in a set of 20 pushups to give my legs a break for 20-30 seconds before continuing with the jump squats/split jumps/burpees...repeat.

Also I'm not a fan of the jumping off a treadmill for recovery and then getting back on while its at an incline and a good pace. Do any of you'll do that? I just keep the incline steady and walk my recovery 1min and then put the pace on again for the 1 min interval.

**CoffeeFan** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 3:09pm

I actually have been currently been doing some HIIT and Tabata training 3x a week in an attempt to increase both my cardio respiratory fitness and my anaerobic capacity. It's grueling stuff but so far it's seemed to have much greater results (and less time consuming) then my previous running routine. Here's what I've been doing:

(after warming up, stretching, and weight training)

-Burpee Intervals: 1 interval of 3 minutes, 30 seconds of burpees, 30 seconds of running in place, then repeat . Rest one minute after the 3 minute mark

-Tabata Intervals: 1 interval consisting of 4 minutes, 20 seconds of burpees, 10 seconds of rest, then repeat 8 times. Rest one minute then cooldown and stretch

For the second week I added an additional set of intervals and am going to progressively increase it till I can do 3 sets of 5 minutes of burpees and 4 sets of tabatas.

**CoffeeFan** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 3:10pm

Originally Posted by Lily

Also I'm not a fan of the jumping off a treadmill for recovery and then getting back on while its at an incline and a good pace. Do any of you'll do that? I just keep the incline steady and walk my recovery 1min and then put the pace on again for the 1 min interval.

I've done it before, your supposed to jump onto the sides rather then off the treadmill and make sure to hold onto the handles when jumping back on. Otherwise bad things may happen

**TheRuss** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 3:21pm

Originally Posted by Lily

Also I'm not a fan of the jumping off a treadmill for recovery and then getting back on while its at an incline and a good pace. Do any of you'll do that? I just keep the incline steady and walk my recovery 1min and then put the pace on again for the 1 min interval.

Nope. I don't use a treadmill for intervals, mostly because they've got an unfavourable coordination to metabolic disturbance ratio - meaning that to get to my target HR, I'd be at pretty acute risk of tripping, falling and hurting myself.

**Lily** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 3:29pm

[quote=CoffeeFan]I've done it before, your supposed to jump onto the sides rather then off the treadmill and make sure to hold onto the handles when jumping back on. Otherwise bad things may happen[/quote]

Personally I find that there is no space to the side (about half a foot) between the treadmills at the gym so I don't jump on and off. I also don't trust that my legs will do what I want at a certain point into a HIIT cycle. Plus my legs are way too precious to risk if I screwed up either the dismount or mount back onto the treadmill.

Coffeefan - That's quite a lot of burpees and I'd like to know how you progress towards that goal. I can't keep good form after a while so its generally 1x4min Tabata of burpees and then various other plyo style Tabata or HIIT sets.

**CoffeeFan** · Posted On: 2/06/2009 4:00pm

Originally Posted by Lily

Personally I find that there is no space to the side (about half a foot) between the treadmills at the gym so I don't jump on and off. I also don't trust that my legs will do what I want at a certain point into a HIIT cycle. Plus my legs are way too precious to risk if I screwed up either the dismount or mount back onto the treadmill.

Coffeefan - That's quite a lot of burpees and I'd like to know how you progress towards that goal. I can't keep good form after a while so its generally 1x4min Tabata of burpees and then various other plyo style Tabata or HIIT sets.

Yea, I could see the reasoning for not wanting to jump on and off a fast moving treadmill.

Generally I will start off doing advanced burpees but then once my form (and lungs) give out I move to regular ones where you don't do a push up or a jump.

Basic Burpee
Advanced Burpee

The basic ones are still grueling, but are much easier to keep good form. I try to keep good form at all times which usually means my speed decreases as I get more into it.

The progression should hopefully look like this:

Phase 1: 3x a week perform 1 set of burpee intervals (3 min rounds) plus 1 set of Tabata intervals (4 min rounds)

Phase 2: 3x a week perform 2 sets of of burpee intervals (3 min rounds) plus 2 sets of Tabata intervals (4 min rounds)

Phase 3: 3x a week perform 3 sets of burpee intervals (3 min rounds) plus 3 sets of tabata intervals (4 min rounds)

Phase 4: 2 - 3x a week perform 3 sets of burpee intervals (4 min rounds) plus 4 sets of tabata intervals (4 min rounds)

Phase 5: 2 - 3x a week perform 3 sets of bupree intervals (5 min rounds) plus 4 sets of tabata Intervals (4 min rounds)

I'm hoping to be able to progress on a weekly to bi weekly basis, but am definitely going to keep an eye out for overtraining and make sure to cut back on the number of weekly training sessions if it becomes too much. Also, I will probably include other exercises in the tabata intervals for variety.