There’s a really interesting article in The New York Times today, about two studies exploring whether muscles react better to strength training and cardio if they are combined in one workout, or take place on separate days.
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| Combine short workouts and save time! |
You can read the article here. It seems from the results of muscles biopsies taken after each study, you can get the same benefit from combining strength and cardio in one workout, even if your workout duration is half of the time spent doing each type of training on different days. Great news for the time challenged! From the article:
‘Best of all, Dr. Phillips’s study suggests that you can potentially do less of each form of exercise when you combine them and still gain considerable benefits. “In our study, the men were doing only 50 percent as much” cycling and weight training in the combined session as during the specialized workouts, he points out. “But their muscles couldn’t tell the difference.” ‘
I love incorporating cardio into clients’ sessions, for extra calorie burn, especially if I know a client does little cardio on their own. Next time you’re at the gym, instead of only doing a quick cardio warm-up before your strength training, try doing a short cardio workout, and then the weights. You could even combine two of my quickie workouts, and still be done within an hour.
