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Tabata et al.[1] found in the mid-1990s that just 2-4 minutes of "high-intensity intermittent training may improve both anaerobic and aerobic energy supplying s

• pawelduda 2y ago
  system > goals
  • el_benhameen 2y ago
    Yep. I hated running when I made it an option. The mental struggle around whether to run today took up many brain cycles. Now, I run weekday mornings. Tired? Go run. Don’t feel great? Go run. Busy day ahead? Go run. Read an article about the optimal workout routine in mice aged 25-35? Go run. Routine sucks until it works, and then it’s great.
    • iamthemonster 2y ago
      I don't know if it works for everyone, but for me I tell myself "you HAVE to go for a 1 minute run, then just see how you feel" and every time I just end up doing a decent run anyway.
      • aed 2y ago
        Yes! I do something similar. I tell people I don’t have a running habit. I have a getting out the door in the morning with my running shoes on habit. Whatever happens after that is a bonus. The goal is to just step outside in the morning ready for a run.
    • Fire-Dragon-DoL 2y ago
      I do something similar, I gave my body "no option" to skip a workout session. If I skip, I did 2 workout sessions the next day. I hated it, still hate it, but my body now sees it as work and it's committed to doing it. I still hate it though, but it doesn't take as much effort
    • watwut 2y ago
      For me, this would lead to growing to hate running and stopping to do it entirely. Especially when life is stressful and overall sux, strong "irrational" rules are first I end up resented. Irrational as in "this adds one more time consuming chore to already sucky life". I got myself injuries from overtraining for not listening to body already twice. And I was not fit or competitive, anything like that. Just physically average person being more ambitious then is reasonable.
  • rurp 2y ago
    Yeah I would say in general habits are the most powerful force in health. Finding an activity you enjoy is 1000x easier to stick with than anything that feels like a grind. Same thing for food. Trying to switch to a healthier but difficult diet wholesale fails essentially always. But what's relatively easy is finding a healthier alternative to one single thing you eat regularly, that you like just as well. This takes some experimenting, but is usually doable. Then once you've gotten used to the healthier option it becomes automatic. Then you can replace a single other food, and so on. I think that gradual and sustainable are the most important things to focus on for most people looking for general health improvement.
    • newaccount74 2y ago
      I'd love a replacement for Salami and Bacon. I don't think there is a healthy alternative that comes close.
• m3kw9 2y ago
  Add travelling and dress/undress time and you got an extra 15-30 minutes tacked on
  • Fire-Dragon-DoL 2y ago
    This is what everybody seems to overlook. Gym is usually 15 minutes, add shower and dressing/undressing, the total can easily add 1 hour. I'm so glad I have a gym under my building, because with 30 minutes workout I usually waste an additional 15 minutes (shower, change)
  • ozim 2y ago
    That is why I got more equipment to home. I don’t have space for much but pull up bar and stationary bike is enough - for many that’s already a lot. Bike is getting dusty but pull up bar is great for “well I am passing by, let’s do 3 reps”.
• blargey 2y ago
  Nitpick: In Tabata's research, "high intensity" meant 170% of VO2max - definitely not easier to do consistently, even if you can voluntarily sustain 170% VO2max. Popular "HIIT" methodology is only loosely inspired by it, and the mechanisms for their merits would be largely unrelated to that of the original Tabata protocol's benefits (which was about demonstrating a way for elite athletes to push anaerobic capacity at the same time as aerobic, not shaving 50 minutes off their cardio routine). The growing research into how even a small amount of activity can confer significant benefits to the sedentary may be yet another mechanism entirely. I agree shorter workouts are much easier to stick to though, especially since I'm easily bored.
  • warner25 2y ago
    Right. I once experimented with organizing my running workouts according to the original Tabata protocol, as closely as possible, for about six weeks[1]. I wasn't an elite athlete by any means, but I was a 21 year-old Army cadet in the top quartile of cadets in terms of fitness. I found that it's indeed difficult to strike a legitimate 100% effort, even when it's only for 20 seconds and only 5-10 times. My point is not that people should adopt the protocol as a sustainable, long-term routine; it's just that there's been evidence for a long time that short workouts can have disproportionate benefits in addition to being easier to program into day-to-day life. [1] The results on my running performance, specifically over two miles, weren't clear, by the way. I wasn't running my best times when I started the experiment, nor at the end of it. But at least I didn't get worse despite averaging only six miles per week. I've done much better on 15-25 miles per week with a wider variety of speed work.
    • seadan83 2y ago
      HIIT or Tabata must not be done day-to-day, everyday. With no recovery days, there will be no gains. A 21 year old is able to recover like crazy, a good 9 hours of sleep might be enough to mostly recover. For others it would not work well and would lead to over-training. In overtraining, the 100% efforts will be 90% efforts, impact the immune system, generally just not good all round. For disproportionate benefits, one needs to define which benefits exactly. A max effort will burn a lot of calories quite quickly and potentially increase V02 max (which is highly correlated to overall longevity). Zone 2 training has become popular and has other benefits, notably increases 'fat max' threshold - which gives different benefits (specifically the ability to work harder for longer while still using fat as an energy source for the exercise). > I found that it's indeed difficult to strike a legitimate 100% effort, even when it's only for 20 seconds and only 5-10 times. This is essentially the point. At the end of Tabata, the last interval should be the last bit of energy you have in the tank. It should be entirely draining. Doing this routine daily will not allow recovery to then properly do the training well. FWIW, I heard it paraphrased as this: the body has essentially too modes, hard & easy. When going hard, it only matters how hard you go, not how long. When going easy, it only matters how long you go for, not how hard. At the same time, zone 2 training and HIIT/Tabata are not mutually exclusive in their benefits, but it's more which systems receive the most benefit while other systems in the body receive benefits but to a lesser degree.
• drowsspa 2y ago
  HIIT is and feels awesome, but no way a sedentary person can start straight with that.
  • Fire-Dragon-DoL 2y ago
    Why not? HIIT is based on that person's body. They will hit their bpm much faster than a trained person. I started with HIIT last year in august (2023),reaching 181 bpm max and averaging 176 (I'm 35). Now, 1.5 years later, I do the same exercise (with a lot more strength) and hit 156 bpm average, 176 max. If I halt for 10 seconds (phone ringing), my bpm plummets (150 or even 148) and it's hard to bring back. On top of that, I have to be more careful not injuring myself: my muscles are a lot stronger, so if I use all my strength in an attempt of pushing my bpm, I can hurt my body. I feel terrible with HIIT either way, which means it does work
    • drowsspa 2y ago
      Were you completely sedentary before starting? And I mean, psychologically, the feeling of nearly dying would have been enough to scare me off any exercising had I started with that. Being able to push yourself physically, and enjoying it, is a skill that needs to be learned gradually for most people.
      • Fire-Dragon-DoL 2y ago
        I was completely sedentary for 2-3 years. I did practice intense sports over the year and I already had experience with sedentary/active lifestyle changes, so I'm familiar with the "throw up" feeling. That goes away in a couple of weeks. My mother did always describe to me the feeling of being exhausted after sport as a pleasant one, so I do perceive it as pleasant. The reason why I hate it is because I could be doing something enjoyable. I tried looking for sports that I actually enjoy but I found only windsurf, which is highly impractical, expensive and very time consuming. I'd rather spend that time with my kids, my wife, playing board games and playing videogames.
• mancerayder 2y ago
  Tabata makes you want to vomit if you don't have at least a moderate level of fitness. Even if it's great conditioning. So here's the problem. We go on about what's optimal from a raw time perspective, but time slows subjectively when you suffer. So people who don't conceptualize themselves as athletic, they may have insecurities if not outright skepticism, aren't going to last. You can make a culty cultural glue to get habits to stick (because fitness is all about habits). You can do CrossFit, the social and positive aspects. That encouragement can bring habit and a change of self perception. But if you're just a self-driven type, and you're dipping your toes in the water, my observations are that whatever is fun (an individual experience) is what you'll be creating a habit with, and time foes quickly. So explore a brunch of things until you encounter fun. Tennis, running club, weightlifting club. Etc. So my point is that fitness is a problem around how people experience exercise and training, instead of what's optimal in a paper or in terms what's efficient in terms of time. Was this prematurely dismissive? Maybe, I'm going by the comments.
  • acosmism 2y ago
    this is true. at some point i was so unfit that i probably was going to die if i continued eating and being as sedentary as i was. a single game of soccer changed my life. it was fun to chase a ball around and i got addicted to this "after glow" effect.
  • prirun 2y ago
    > So people who don't conceptualize themselves as athletic, they may have insecurities if not outright skepticism, aren't going to last I have always been thin and tried to start workouts on my own several times over many years, and never could do it, mostly because I didn't know what I was doing. Hiring a personal trainer, if you can afford it, is a great way to get over this hump. I quit after a couple of years and workout on my own now, but couldn't have done it without the trainer.
• hilux 2y ago
  According to the link you shared, the Tabata research involved a TINY number of athletic, male, Japanese undergrads. I remember being stunned when I first looked it up years ago. It's not at all obvious that their findings - which became part of Crossfit "religion" - generalize to both sexes, all fitness levels, and all ages.
• safety1st 2y ago
  I think for the average person, looking too carefully at individual studies is failing to see the forest for the trees. Basically any time we do a study which asks "Is doing a bit more exercise better for you?" the answer is yes. Like doing a single walk around the block every week is better than doing none. Even five minutes of exercise is better than zero. But obviously these have much less positive impact than several hours of moderate to intense exercise weekly. There are diminishing returns but they don't really kick in until you're already pretty fit, they are only really a concern that athletes need to think about. So in terms of individual decision making things are really simple. Are you not fit? Do you feel bad? Are your basic markers for this looking bad (blood pressure, weight etc.)? Do more exercise. Do what you enjoy, do it safely, and do as much of it as you can as intensely as is reasonable, and the numbers will go in the right direction. This will put you way ahead of the average American in terms of fitness, it's not until a higher level that things really start to get technical.
  • ratmeadow 2y ago
    While it's true that doing any amount more exercise is beneficial to the average person, they may not necessarily know/feel it. As we so often see super fit people in the media, it's easy to think we need to do hours of exercise daily for any benefit. Easy to then think "what's the point? I'll never be super fit" and do nothing. Recinforcing the narrative (including publication of studies) that no, even a small amount of execise is quite beneficial, is encouraging for the average person.
    • f1shy 2y ago
      I think is exactly what the comment addresses (at least how I understood it). Just do whatever makes you happy, but move! Is not about being a model, it is about being heathier than moving less.
    • ijidak 2y ago
      Shannon Sharpe works out at my gym. Huge guy. Former NFL tight-end. Still very fit. I notice he only does 1 hour at the gym and then he leaves. Granted, this is very low quality anecdata. But seeing how brief his workout is opened my eyes to the benefit of consistency over volume.
• PUSH_AX 2y ago
  I remember reading something about Tabata/HIIT being something you don't want to do every day, due to the high intensity and strain on your CNS. Is this not the thinking anymore?
  • warner25 2y ago
    The original experimental protocol was "only" four days per week, so it was never suggested to be an everyday thing. The extreme thinking among runners is probably three days per week of short intervals or repeats. The more conventional thinking is more like one day per week with a much higher volume of easy zone 2 running on the other days.
• RoxaneFischer1 2y ago
  tabata is the worst, i've tried and i was not feeling well for hours
• acchow 2y ago
  60-90 minutes is far too long at the gym. If you space your sets correctly, you can have a very effective workout in 25 minutes. Change your muscle groups every day. Do people want to spend 60 minutes as some kind of gym time standard? Where does this number come from?
• vladgur 2y ago
  wow, never knew what Tabata meant back in my crossfit days :) Now i do -- its a persons name