Can 7 Minutes of Exercise Keep You Fit?

By Dr. Mercola

Short, intense workouts are all the rage in the fitness world. While it was once believed that the longer you stayed on the treadmill or elliptical machine, the better, it’s now known that you can seriously maximize your fitness results while working out for a fraction of the time, as long as you sufficiently ramp up the intensity (interspersed with periods of rest).

Very short workouts, as in seven minutes or even less, are also becoming regulars in the fitness scene, although I would stop short of calling them a trend. The fact is, humans have been exercising in very short, intense bursts since the beginning, although they didn’t call it exercise; they called it survival.

As such, your body is biologically programmed to respond to similarly intense bursts of activity. But because this is something many modern humans no longer do in the course of their daily grind, many are seeking it out via high-intensity interval training (HIIT).

In the video above, you can see one example of a full-body, seven-minute exercise routine by Hannah Bronfman, founder of the wellness site HBFit.

This workout is particularly useful because you can do the movements (a combination of jumping jacks, side kicks, abdominal work and more) virtually anywhere with no equipment required.

Short HIIT workouts can be deceptive, appearing simple on paper then surprising you with how challenging they are to complete. Still, a full workout in only seven minutes? Is it really too good to be true?

You may now be wondering what, exactly, Kilka and Jordan’s sample HICT program entails. The exercises were designed to:

You can watch a demonstration of the exercise sequence in the video above, and they’re also described below. Each exercise is performed for about 30 seconds with 10-seconds allowed for transitions. This adds up to an approximately seven-minute workout, which may be repeated in its entirety two or three times. The exercises should be done in the order given, as they’re selected to allow opposing muscle groups to alternate between resting and working.

As Intensity Increases, Duration Decreases

How many times you should repeat the seven-minute workout (one to three times, max) depends on a variety of factors, including intensity. The harder you work, the shorter your workout should be.

Research has shown proven benefits, including improvements in VO2 max and insulin sensitivity in just four minutes of HIIT exercise. However, to achieve these benefits, you likely need to be working at an intensity that’s equal to or greater than 100 percent of your VO2 max.⁸

This is a level of intensity that many people may not be able to achieve or maintain, especially if you’re just starting out. During a typical HIIT workout, the American Council on Exercise (ACE) notes, “Training is done at a submaximal level; around 80 to 95 percent of maximal aerobic capacity.”⁹

In other words, on an exertion scale of 1 to 10, a typical moderate-intensity workout (such as running or stair climbing) would be an exertion level of 5 to 6. A typical HIIT workout is done at an exertion level of 7 or higher. Very short HIIT workouts, such as Tabata Training, are an exertion level of 10.

The good thing about HIIT is that you can tweak it to your needs. You can still get benefits from working out at a slightly lower intensity; you simply increase the time you work out to make up for it. You’ll still be working out very intensely, remember, so your total workout will still be short, relatively speaking.

I typically recommend an HIIT session of 20 minutes. If you were using the protocol above, you could therefore repeat it three times. According to the featured study:¹⁰

“More moderate protocols (90 [percent] to 100 [percent] of VO2 max) have been examined for various total exercise durations. Although these protocols seem to require slightly more total exercise time to be effective, they still are well below the steady state exercise time requirements.

Because most individuals may not be able to execute the program at an intensity significantly greater than 100 [percent] of their VO2 max following the established ACSM guidelines for high-intensity exercise of at least 20 minutes is recommended. This may require multiple repetitions (or circuits) of a multistation exercise circuit.”

If You Think You’re Too Busy to Exercise, HIIT Is for You

Lack of time is one of the most common excuses used for not exercising. HIIT removes this hurdle, because virtually everyone can squeeze in seven minutes. If you have a bit more time, and you’re performing the workout at less than 100 percent, try repeating it two or three times.

With this minimum time investment, you’ll likely enjoy decreased body fat, improved insulin sensitivity and muscle strength and increased VO2 max. As Kilka and Jordan noted, “Individuals who previously believed that they did not have the time for exercise can now trade total exercise time for total exercise effort and get similar or better health and fitness benefits.”¹¹

Sources and References

• ^{1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 10, 11} ACSM’S Health & Fitness Journal May/June 2013 – Volume 17 – Issue 3 – p 8–13
• ⁵ Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, Oct 2011
• ⁶ Diabetes, Obesity, and Metabolism, 2012 Jan 23 [Epub ahead of print]
• ⁹ American Council on Exercise, High-Intensity Interval Training

The post Can 7 Minutes of Exercise Keep You Fit? appeared first on LewRockwell.