if you love your stationary bike or elliptical, here's how to make it work for you to have a MUCH improved effect not only while you're on the thing but once you get off it - yup, it will keep burning calories after you stop pedaling or stepping or running IF you follow a simple protocol.
The protocol is called "intervals"
Intervals are designed so that you balance hard effort with recovery for repetitions. For instance, 60secs of hard effort balanced with 30 seconds of lighter "recovery" effort.
My favorite interval set is called the tabata protocol: it's 20secs of hard effort with 10secs of absolute dead stop, for 8 intervals on a bike going 90rpm (revolutions per minute).
But, you may be asking, what's "hard effort."
There are several ways to calculate this:
if your bike shows power output in watts you can go for cranking out 200 watts pedaling like mad at say 155rpm for a minute, and then go down to 50 watts at about 60rpm.
Looks something like this on a stationary bike or this, with an elliptical
These show the lighter start, upping intensity and going harder.
Another, possibly saner, way to calculate hard effort is based on a percentage of your maximum heart rate. The standard rough estimate calculation is, for men, 220-age, and for women 226-age.
Hard effort is in the 85% zone of your max heart rate. So if your max heart rate is calculated at 190, 85% would be 190*.85=161-162ish
The idea would be to warm up for 5-10 mins, then do 30sec at 75%; slow down A LOT to recover for 90secs, then go up again, and do this 3-7 times, getting your heart rate (HR) up further each time. Then cool down. That'a about 20 mins.
Studies have shown that this kind of High Intensity Interval Training can be 9x's more effective at fat burning than steady state (just going the same pace) for that time on the treadmill. NINE TIMES!!
Now, your question may be how do you measure your heart rate throughout your workout? well, a heart rate monitor is a great tool for anyone doing cardio/aerobic activity. The equipment in the gym may have them built in which you access by grabbing the machine's handles. Otherwise, there are a number of folks that sell decent Polar Heart Rate Monitors quite cheaply, including Amazon. My fave UK supplier is http://www.heartratemonitor.co.uk/
You may ask yourself, do you really need to measure your heart rate: if you feel like you're working hard, isn't that enough? Actually, you could be working TOO hard too frequently and not know it:
Working too hard can be just as useless as not working hard enough. So having a clear measure of effort is one good way to make sure you're getting the optimal benefit. Working too hard too soon can mean you burn out, get discouraged, feel like crap and don't want to go near the bike again (been there; done that. no fun. depressing, in fact).
As with all programs if this kind of intensity is new to you, check with your doctor first.
Once you have the go ahead, you can make those 20 min sessions on the treadmill or bike or whatever pay dividends on the fat burning scale - or bathroom scale.
Blend intervals 3 times a week with lifting heavy two or three times a week and you have an incredible combination for burning fat, and building muscle to keep it burning.
As always, seeing the results of all this effort means eating right. A reminder that the most sensible program i've found is precision nutrition. with freebie 10 Habits to good nutrition.
