Short and Intense: A New Way to Get Fit

If you'd rather race for 30 seconds than trudge for an hour, seems you might have your wish and get something out of it, too.

Short, intense bouts of exercise may boost muscle fitness as effectively as longer sessions do. But you won't burn as many calories. And you should check with your doctor first: Intense exercise is not for the faint of heart -- or body.

30 Seconds Here and There
Men who worked out really hard on a stationary bike for just a few minutes each week (30-second intervals four to six times a day, every other day) experienced muscle fitness gains on a par with those experienced by the guys who cycled at a moderate pace for 90 to 120 minutes daily. The trade-off sounds almost too good to be true. But there's a strong caveat here.

Calorie Counsel
If you count weight control as one of your exercise goals -- and who doesn't -- you'll need to opt for the longer haul to burn more calories. And not everyone's body is built for short, intense bursts of speed (translation: you could really pull something).

So this preliminary research is no reason to kick your 30-minutes-a-day workout to the curb. But if your health allows it, a few 30-second dashes through the park -- or parking lot -- may help keep your muscles fit on days when you're a bit short on time.

Hate exercising? Try this no-workout workout.

Short-term sprint interval versus traditional endurance training: similar initial adaptations in human skeletal muscle and exercise performance. Gibala, M. J., Little, J. P., van Essen, M., Wilkin, G. P., Burgomaster, K. A., Safdar, A., Raha, S., Tarnopolsky, M. A., Journal of Physiology 2006 Sep 15;575(Pt 3):901-911.