Even 20-second exercises can improve fitness

According to a new pragmatic study of interval training, it may be enough to exercise to improve fitness, but 20 seconds of quick steps, done several times a day.

The study shows that people can perform a series of introductory sessions without leaving their office or even change into evening shoes, offering hope – and eliminating excuses – for those of us convinced that we have little time, expertise, revenue or resources. shoes for exercise.

At this point in January, many of us began to waver in New Year's fitness resolutions, often accusing our busy schedules of our neglected workouts.

Such perceived time constraints have aroused interest for a short but intense exercise, substituting intensity for duration. These types of training, structured as intervals, consist of brief pushes of high intensity exercises, such as 20 seconds of total pedaling on a stationary bike, interspersed with periods of rest.

I've written about the science behind high intensity interval training, or HIIT, which indicates that even a minute or a day of effort can increase endurance and improve many aspects. health, including control of blood pressure and blood sugar.

But typical high-intensity interval training sessions are, in practice, longer and less convenient than many of us would like. They usually need time to go to the gym or running trail, change, warm up and shower, in addition to formal exercise.

Recognizing these disadvantages, McMaster University of Hamilton, Ontario exercise scientists, who have been working for years in their laboratories with different types and durations of HIIT training, have begun to think about the best way to simplify and shorten the intense workouts most people but still effective.

Climbing has emerged as an option. Climbing the stairwell requires physical effort but little planning, travel or cost, as most office buildings contain stairs.

In 2017, scientists published their first relevant study. It turns out that sedentary women who managed three climbs in 20 seconds, performed in one session with several minutes of rest between climbs, improved their physical condition by about 12% after six weeks.

But this workout still required about 10 minutes of uninterrupted time, which, although truncated, might be difficult for some people.

So for the new study, which was published this month in Applied Physiology, Nutrition and Metabolism, the researchers decided to see if it was possible to divide the workout into a series of "exercise snacks" spread throughout the day.

They hoped that a simple quick climb of the staircase would be sufficiently tiring to allow an improvement of the physical condition if it was repeated several times, even at hours of the interval.

To find out, they recruited 24 healthy but inactive students, tested their stamina and leg power with the help of a specialized stationary bike, and randomly badigned them either to continue their normal lives as a control group, either to start exercise snacks.

The users went to the stairwell of the physiology building. There, the researchers asked them to warm up with a few jumps, squats and lunges, then 60 steps forward – three steps up – as quickly as possible, step by step, while using the guard -body for security. These climbs lasted about 20 seconds.

And it was the workout. Volunteers repeated these abbreviated exercise snacks twice more during the day, usually at lunch and again in the afternoon, for a total of about one minute of intense exercise.

After six weeks, users had improved their aerobic capacity by approximately 5%. They also showed improvements in leg power and could generate more power during cycling.

These results suggest that intermittent and fast stair climbing can be an effective workout, says Martin Gibala, professor and chairman of the kinesiology board at McMaster University and lead author of the study.

"We wanted to make interval training as simple and convenient as possible while providing enough physical stimulus" to actually improve physical fitness, he says.

Of course, this approach to snacks at intervals has not improved physical fitness as much as the repeated repeated climbing sessions that he and his colleagues had previously reviewed, he says.

This experience also does not know if and how spaced intervals can affect blood pressure and other health measures, such as appetite and weight, and whether older or already fit people will benefit. also.

"It was a small proof of concept study," says Gibala. He and his colleagues plan to carry out larger and longer-term studies on the effects of different amounts and approaches to climbing and other approaches.

"We do not suggest that this type of exercise can or should" replace any other physical activity, he continues. "But it's a possible way for people who think that they are too busy to train for exercise in their lives."