Rob Riches' cardio workout tips

Hi guys welcome to the workout show here on Prozis TV with me Rob Riches. Where today’s theme is all about cardio. Cardio to help you burn the body fat, boost your metabolism and keep all of that muscle that I know you have worked so hard to build. Two main types of cardio we will be looking at today. The first being steady paced cardio. Steady paced cardio allows you to burn the most amount of calories within that time frame. And as the name suggests is a steady pace throughout much of that duration go the cardio. The second type of cardio we will be taking a look at is HIIT or High Intensity Interval Training. Which is much shorter, requires more kind of sudden bursts of output of energy and can boost your metabolism, which is really the amount of calories your body burns at rest. Primarily from fat, by up to 8 hours throughout the day. So lets start off with steady pace and how this can help with your fat loss gains. As the name suggests, steady paced really requires the same level of intensity throughout much of the duration. Now people often get fearful of doing this because they think their body is going to adapt and they are not going to burn enough of the fat as energy. Even fearful that their muscles may be used as fuel, but that is not really the case. What steady paced cardio does is increases our metabolic rate so while we are actually exercising our body needs to search for energy somewhere. Now if we have just eaten a big meal, this is exactly where it is going to take the energy from, so my first tip is not to eat before doing cardio. I actually prefer doing cardio early in the morning, just before breakfast so my body has fasted throughout the night. Therefore I have no food in my stomach and the only energy my body can really get to is you have guessed it stored as body fat. So that is the first tip. The second tip is maintain the right heart rate zone. Now if you don’t have a heart rate watch, or the machine and you can't hold onto the sensors the best way to do that is to build up to a level where you can pretty much maintain conversation. Like I am now. If you find you are having to catch your breath and pant like this and you can't really talk for longer than a few seconds… then the chances are you may need to lower that resistance down. So… That is the second tip. The third one is duration. I find anywhere from 30-40 minutes up to about an hour is all you really need to do for steady paced cardio. Now you can start off at a moderate level for a warm up for about 3 minutes and then increase the resistance… Until you find that point where you are having to, you know, put some work into it but you can still maintain that level of conversation. Now after about 5 minutes you may want to increase that just by one or two intervals So again… Slowly turning up that resistance allowing you to work harder, but if you find you start to lose that level where you can no longer hold a conversation, drop it back down. And then the final point of steady paced cardio is that you don’t have to keep it at that same level throughout the entire duration. You can take it up and down… Do shorter bursts where you increase a little bit faster, maybe drop the elbows down. But we still want to keep it within a time frame of 3-5 minutes. Then maybe increase it up and take it up into more of a hill climb. Working more the glutes, the calves and the hamstrings. What about High Intensity Interval Training how can this really help with your fat loss and preserve all of that lean muscle mass that you have gained over the last few months or even years? Well as the name suggests it's High Intensity and its interval based. Meaning stop and start. This is one of my favorite forms of cardio and for this the upright bike is one of the best exercise machines to do it on. Basically start off with a 3 minute warm up and then after that so from the 4th minute onwards crank up the resistance, and for 30 seconds up to a minute take the elbows down and give it everything you have got, all out effort… Like this. Now I will do a shorter version so that I don’t bore you throughout the duration. But let's say that was 30 seconds. All out effort and then I am going to come up for what is called a recovery phase. Take the resistance down… now my legs are still moving round, I am not stopping altogether. This is really to allow me to get my breath back and to allow my heart rate zone to drop down. Once I get back to a level which again is really that point of conversation, where my breathing becomes more relaxed and controlled I feel I can talk and hold conversation and at that point, Resistance goes back up, the elbows drop back down… And build up that resistance and speed Now I always say allow as much time as you need to recover, there is no point in only restricting yourself to 30 seconds or a minute during that recovery phase, because after that 4/5th interval you are going to be that much more taxed on your energy and the effort at which you can go all out. So to really give it your best shot during those all out moments, you want to bring your heart rate zone back down to about 70-65% again that point of conversation. 8-10 intervals doing this, the final 8th and 10th interval will really push you for everything you have got. And for this one I really crank it all the way up as high as the bike will go. Hands on the outer and imagine I am climbing up a big hill. Count it down whether I have a watch in front of me or in my mind I am just going until I can no longer keep that effort up. But always drop it back down, lower the resistance and come back down to that point of conversation allowing your heart rate to drop down All in all HIIT shouldn’t take longer than 20 minutes and to get the best results I like to alternate between Steady paced for about an hour and HIIT. In fact HIIT in the morning will boost your metabolism for up to 6-8 hours, meaning you are burning more calories at rest long after you have finished the cardio. But on a final note if you really want to burn more calories during that time… Steady paced cardio, Turning up the resistance a bit and you will probably find you start to build up a sweat after the first 15-20 minutes which is a key sign that your body has converted over to fat, for energy. So, 2 different types of cardio there. 2 different outcomes, but as long as you keep that resistance up and give it everything you have got, the fat will surely come off. Just be sure to eat and get a good source of protein after so you can keep those muscles refueled and ready for your next resistance workout. Join me next time for more tips, tricks and techniques here on the workout show for Prozis TV. I will see you then.