Fake HIIT is not High Intensity Training

  SAN JOSE CA - 01/05/2018 (PRESS RELEASE JET)

One of the hottest trends in the fitness industry according to the American College of Sports Medicine is High Intensity Interval Training. It’s frequently called HIIT. 

If you’ve been to the gym lately, you’ve probably heard about HIIT. You may even have been in a HIIT class. 

HIIT is popular. And for good reason. It gets superior results. If it’s not fake HIIT. 

“What people are doing today and calling it HIIT is extremely misleading,” says Phil Campbell, 65, trainer / speed coach with 40-years’ experience, author of two books on the subject, and the creator of a cardio HIIT program, the Sprint 8, which has been featured by major fitness equipment manufacturer for 15 years. 

“I’ve had to change the nomenclature of my Sprint 8 Protocol to “sprint cardio” to distinguish it from these so called HIIT programs,” says Campbell. His Sprint 8 Protocol can be ground-based running, sprint swimming, or performed on any type of typical gym cardio unit; elliptical, treadmill, recumbent or the upright cycle. 

Campbell explains how programs claiming to be HIIT are actually moderate-intensity exercise followed by short active-recovery periods. “This is fake HIIT,” says Campbell.

How to know if your HIIT class is the real deal? 

Campbell explains how to recognize the real thing from the fake. Knowing a few facts about the science of muscle fiber recruitment is the key. 

“The body tries to do things with slow-muscle fiber in the endurance energy system so we can endure all day,” explains Campbell. “The brain thinks it’s doing you a favor not to recruit fast-muscle fiber in case you need to run away from a bad guy later.” 

The brain sends your slow-muscle fiber first to accomplish the exercise, but when the nervous system and brain sense slow isn’t adequate, the brain instructs the nervous system to recruit the fast-twitch IIa muscle fiber that moves five times faster than the slow. “To become true HIIT,” Campbell explains, “the cardio sprint must be hard and fast to recruit one more layer of muscle fiber, the super-fast IIX muscle fiber that moves ten times faster than the slow.” 

Hard and slow exercise doesn’t qualify as true HIIT because the heart muscle only has to work hard enough to oxygenate the slow fiber. You need the combination of hard and fast during the cardio sprint to recruit all three muscle-fiber types. Now the heart muscle has to work very hard attempting to oxygenate a lot more muscle fiber.

“There needs to be an explosive, high-velocity movement along with the hard to be true HIIT because all three muscle fiber types have to be recruited where the heart muscle works hard for 30 seconds or less, explains Campbell. “If you can go longer than 30 seconds, as a human you paced, and pacing is the enemy of intensity.” 

The second way to know if your HIIT is real or fake is in the amount of recovery in between the cardio sprints.

If the recovery is less than 90 seconds it’s probably moderate-intensity exercise, explains Campbell. “If you only need 30 seconds to recover and can still go all-out on the coming cardio sprint, this means you paced and didn’t recruit all three muscle-fiber types to propel the all-out cardio sprint. True HIIT is hard, there’s nothing harder.”

“We’ve tested 30, 60 and 90-second recoveries and by far 90 seconds is much more demanding because your fast fiber is recovered enough to truly go all-out during the coming cardio sprint,” explains Campbell. “This is where the benefits are hidden in true HIIT cardio.” 

There is more on Phil Campbell at www.sprint8book.com

www.readysetgofitness.com and www.40speed.com