October 14,2021

A recent study at McMaster University had good news for people that don’t have a lot of time to exercise.  The study compared 3 groups of participants, 2 of which were training on stationary bikes and 1 group which was sedentary.  The study involved 27 men who trained 3 times per week for a total of 12 weeks.   One of the groups did 45 minutes of moderate intensity exercise with a 2-minute warm-up and a 3-minute cool down for a total time of 50 minutes.  The second group did a 2-minute warm-up followed by a 20-second-high intensity all out cycle sprint.  There were 3, 20 second cycle sprints followed each time by 2 minutes of easy cycle recovery.  The last 20 second sprint was followed by 3 minutes of recovery for a total of 10 minutes of training.

The continuum would look like:

2-minute warm-up-20 second sprint-2-minute recovery-20 second sprint-2-minute recovery-20 second sprint-3-minute cool down > Total Time =10 minutes.

The study found that the group that worked out for 10 minutes had the same fitness gains as the group that worked out for 50 minutes.  Both groups surpassed the sedentary group.  The study author, Martin Gibala, Professor of Kinesiology at McMaster, said that they examined key health indicators including cardio-respiratory fitness and insulin sensitivity which measures how the body regulates blood sugars to determine the training effects on the body.  He went on to state that, “Our study shows that an interval-based approach can be more efficient — you can get health and fitness benefits comparable to the traditional approach, in less time.”

We can apply this philosophy to our everyday life by using the stairs at work, parking a distance away from our destinations and walking quickly.  As well, we can apply this model to many forms of exercise such as jumping rope, rowing, running, and weight training just to name a few.

John Russell RMT