What is wrong with interval training?
Nothing—if you know what you are doing.
Prof. Verkhoshansky explains interval training: “The rest period between sets is not of sufficient duration for the restoration of the body back to the optimal condition.” Clearly, IT is a huge umbrella covering a motley crew of goals and training protocols, brilliant and awful.
The brilliant ones—those by Reindell, Volkov, and Massaroni, to name a few—have clearly defined adaptation targets and load parameters to achieve them, while minimizing the odds of overtraining and health problems.
Reducing the contribution of the lactic system is a theme that runs through many classic interval training protocols. Prof. Edward Fox explains that in properly executed interval training, “…the energy supplied via anaerobic glycolysis will be less…there will be less lactic acid accumulated and thus less fatigue….”
He adds that, “...the savings in fatigue…can be converted to an increase in the intensity.... This is the single most important feature of intermittent work and as such is the key to the interval training system.”
Pop HIIT totally misses the point and simply trashes the body.
What exactly is “High Intensity Interval Training”?
It is one of those “I cannot define it, but I know it when I see it” things. Here is a non-definition from a scientific paper: “relatively short bursts of vigorous activity, interspersed by periods of rest or low-intensity exercise for recovery.”
How “short” are the sets? What is “vigorous”? How long are the rests?
Prof. Brent Rushall, who has not bought into the fitness-industrial complex’s propaganda, calls HIIT a “meaningless label.” It is too bad that some excellent training protocols got snagged by that pseudo-term…
I explained why and how glycolytic exercise that spews acid, acetone, ammonia, and free radicals may damage your health in The Quick and the Dead. In my new book, Kettlebell Axe, I list the ten ways “metcons” destroy your athletic performance—and offer a high speed low drag alternative to HIIT.
