Super-short workouts are very effective

 Burst into a sprint. Run up the stairs. Pump some weights. Do a few reps of squats and lunges. Get your heart rate pumping fast at intervals and the sweat glands bursting. High-intensity, short-duration interval workouts are the latest cutting edge in fitness and effective weight loss. And they only take a few minutes at a time out of your day.

Even more remarkable, it's just as effective - maybe even better - as the hour-long cardio session.

In new research published in the journal The Science of Lifestyle Change, researchers looked at data from the 2003-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, for which the Centers for Disease Control collected the weights, heights, and activity levels of a nationally representative sample of people.

Researchers took 4,511 overweight and obese adults from the survey and split them into four categories: those who did more than 10 minutes of higher-intensity physical activity (defined as anything at least as rigorous as brisk walking) at a time; those who did less than 10 minutes of higher-intensity physical activity at a time; those who did more than 10 minutes of lower-intensity physical activity at a time, and those who did less than 10 minutes of lower-intensity physical activity at a time.

The findings revealed that the shorter bouts of higher-intensity activity were about as effective at lowering participants' body mass index (BMI) - minute for minute - as the longer bouts of higher-intensity activity were.

SMALLER RISK

Both higher-intensity activity groups also showed a smaller risk of being overweight or obese. Lower-intensity activity, however, wasn't associated with the same health perks.

"If you can do a minute here, a minute there - as long as it's higher-intensity and it adds up to about 30 minutes, five times a week - it would still have as much of a benefit as doing at least 10 minutes at a time," noted study author Jessie X. Fan, PhD, a professor in the department of family and consumer studies at the University of Utah, United States.

Higher-intensity exercises have been proven to rev up your metabolism more, so you keep burning calories and fat even after you stop moving, he added.

Quick sprints, running up stairs, weight and resistance training, lapping the pool, rope skipping, and a few reps of squats, lunges, planks, pull ups, push ups are some of the ways to get quick bursts of high-intensity, short-duration interval exercises during the day.

So, take a break from your routine for a few minutes a few times per day and burst into action.

yourhealth@gleanerjm.com