Ahh, Tabata

Tabata (tah-BAH-tuh) is another type of high intensity interval training. If you've read my other blogs, you know what my typical workouts consist of. Baffled at my metabolic issues, I've been trying to think of things I can do to kick it into gear. When I did some research on HIIT training, Tabata came up. I hadn't heard of it before, so I clicked on a couple links and it intrigued me. I watched a video of someone doing it and was impressed.

The basic gist of Tabata is four minutes of intervals. 20 seconds hard core, 10 seconds rest, repeating 8 times. (It didn't mention it on the sites I read, but I strongly recommend 5 min warm-ups and cool-downs, too). It's very similiar to the HIIT I've been doing, but on a much small, much more intense scale. In this video you can see first-hand that it's not an easy workout. I figured it was worth a shot and might shake up my metabolism a little bit. If today's workout was any indication, I'm right.

I did my 5 min warm up on the treadmill, then switched to the elliptical. I set the resistance at about 15 and pounded it as hard as my legs would go for 20 seconds. I slowed to a walking pace for 10 seconds. By 3 minutes in, I couldn't breathe and my legs burned so bad I wanted to die. But with ONE minute left, I knew I could push through the pain and keep going. With a 15 minute HIIT workout, after 3 minutes, you've still got a lot of reps left and even those twelve minutes can seem like forever, even if it is done at 30 second intervals.

I finished the entire four minutes and stepped off the machine to get the sanitizer and I thought I was gonna collapse. My legs were (and still, two hours later) Jell-O. My heart rate topped out at 177 (not smart, btw. I shouldn't have let it get that high) and it took me 30 minutes to get back to my normal resting heart rate of 75-80.

I feel like I actually did something today rather than just pranced along on the treadmill. I'm hoping this is what my body needs. I'll keep you posted.

Today's weigh-in - 245
We'll see where I'm at this time next week. :)