New Method: High-Intensity Interval Strength Training

Exercise is the most incredible medicine that I know of. It not only helps us get rid of unhealthy body weight and build more shapely muscles, it significantly decreases our risk of most all preventable diseases including: diabetes, depression, heart disease, and even some forms of cancer.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of people in America don’t do any ‘voluntary’ exercise at all (by voluntary, I mean they don’t do any extra physical activity outside of what they have to do for work or what’s required in just completing everyday activities). And of course, this is one of the big reasons why nearly 7 out of 10 people in our country are suffering from overweight/obesity and the preventable ailments which come along with it.

What I’ve discovered is that many people who have considered adding exercise to their lifestyle haven’t primarily because they believe the myth that to get good results, you have to exercise for hours a day. This is a big barrier for millions of people and it shouldn’t be, because the fact is we can all experience incredible benefits from working out for just 25 minutes a day; that is, if we follow the scientifically proven Intense Interval methods which dictate that QUALITY matters more than QUANTITY when it comes to exercise.

Show Me Don’t Tell Me (I will, I will! =)

Today I did the exact workout shown in this video below. It works, big time! Your muscles get stronger, you burn fat faster because your metabolism goes up (for as much as 30 to 40 hours after your workout), your cardio-pulmonary health improves, your heart gets healthier, your brain gets more energy, and your natural growth hormone (GH) levels go up 10 fold (for hours after your intense workout).

The keys to tapping into all these benefits and more is to do weight lifting in intense intervals where we work hard for a couple minutes then rest two minutes, then work, rest, work, rest, and work, rest again. We want to get our heart rate up to 90% to 95% of our estimated cardiac maximum (220 minus our age: for me that means I am aiming for about 160 heart beats per minutes at the end of my work sets–then I rest for a couple minutes until my pulse comes down to about 120).

You’ll notice in this exercise demonstration video that I do one set right after the other, with only maybe 10-15 seconds between each. After I complete 10 repetitions of all 5 exercises, I wait a couple minutes as I mentioned above (this is just enough time for a training partner to go through their 5 sets if you’re working out with somebody) and then I repeat all 5 exercises for a total of 5 times. I finished this workout in less than a half hour today and I was toast!

With this ‘5-25 Intense Interval Strength Training’ workout I can stick with the same weight for all 5 sets (as opposed to ‘pyramiding’ or increasing weight for each set as we did with Body-for-LIFE). The way 5-25 is designed we reach ‘progressive resistance overload’ (needed for positive muscle adaptations) through fatiguing the muscles more with each set. By your 5th set of 10 reps for each muscle group you will be toast too and that is good. =)  Give it a try and let me know how you like it! In my next blog I’ll show you how I work lower body and then I’ll discuss what’s new with High Intensity Interval Aerobic Training.

Upper Body Workout (as shown in video)

1. Incline Chest Press — 10 Reps
2. Iron-Cross Shoulder Raises — 10 Reps
3. Dumbbell Lat Rows — 10 Reps
4. Biceps Curls — 10 Reps
5. Triceps Extension — 10 Reps
   * Rest two minutes then repeat all 5 exercises, a total of 5 times