Body Transformation: Sunday's

The Best Body Transformation workout was shared with Fitness Rx in their April 2015 issue by Dianna Dahlgren. She is an IFBB Bikini Pro and 5 times Miss Supercross winner. Needless to say she must have her physical fitness life together. Her 8 weeks plan includes 6 visits to the gym or at home if you have all of the equipment. This post will only cover Sunday's workout. 

Post-Workout Summary from a past HIIT Cardio
session on a treadmill.

While the entire plan includes a variety of exercises that include cardio and weightlifting, Sundays are strictly cardio in the form of HIIT Cardio or High Intensity Interval Training. I had no idea what this was until I picked up this magazine and read. At first glance, you may think cardio is just cardio. Just run at the same pace for an extended period of time and voila! I'm good...oh but no. HIIT requires you to vary your speed for given intervals of time. For example, you may jog for 1 minute and then walk for 2 and repeat versus walking for a straight 20 minutes or jogging steadily for 20 minutes. According to research, HIIT requires you to work harder, requiring and in effect burning more calories when you have to constantly switch from walking to jogging or running. Think of it like your car. You use up more gasoline in starting the car repeatedly versus leaving the car running. The more you start and re-start the more gas you burn. The same goes for cardio, the more you have to rev up your engine or up your cardio speed the more calories you burn. This is the method to the madness which is HIIT cardio. 

I love and hate this. I love it because I'm not required to run or jog for an hour to burn calories but hate how much I have to push myself in the short amount of time (roughly 20 minutes on Dianna's plan). For the BBT (Best Body Transformation) plan, you are required to complete the following:

First
     5- minute Warm-Up or Light Jogging

Followed By
     During Weeks 1-4: 16 minutes of Interval Cardio (Sprint and Recover      
     Intervals)

     During Weeks 5-8: 20 minutes of Interval Cardio (Sprint and Recover      
     Intervals)

Concluded with
     5-minutes Cool-Down or Light Jogging 
     Stretching


Your cardio can be done on any cardio equipment or no equipment at all. The only requirement for any equipment you use is that it "allows you to perform an all-out effort safely" (taken directly from April 2015 issue of Fitness Rx). 

I start my fitness journey today with HIIT. Check back later to see how it went. 

Do you use workout plans from magazines like Fitness Rx or Women's Health to help you reach your fitness goals? Or a personal trainer? I'd love to hear from you ;-)