NEW TOY: heart rate watch

 

 

a couple days ago i made an order on amazon for a watch that keeps track of your heart rate and the calories you burn during your workouts and it came in!! for only $25 i think it was a good investment. my sister has one like it, but she has to strap a heart rate monitor around her in order for it to work, and mine [they were both the same price] only requires you to hold the silver ring for a couple seconds to record your heart rate.

the screen where the time is is a touch screen where you can switch between the time, your user info [male/female, hight, weight, age, etc. to make sure its readings are accurate], as well as memory from previous workouts! i cant wait to take it to the gym later and test it out.

for those of you that are curious, it is a Gaiam Oregon Scientific watch called the G2 Fitness Trainer and you can find it on amazon as well as the Oregon Scientific website.

ill be sure to let everyone know how it works!

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HIIT

HIIT stands for high intensity interval training; something i intend to work into my exercise routines.

yesterday i posted an article stating that steady running or cardio is actually not good for you. Even though you’re burning calories, it actually leads to negative side effects on your body and could also lead to weight gain instead of the weight loss you’re looking for.

the solution to this problem is not to cut out cardio altogether [although weight training is important too and should be done more often]; but to do intervals while doing cardio to increase fat loss.

HIIT is an extreme form of intervals involving sprinting and jogging, but such intervals are not completely necessary. as i am a beginner, i plan on starting with less intense intervals to build up to the high intensity ones.

interval training makes your heart rate escalate and then decrease on multiple occasions, really giving your body the work out it needs, burning more calories and increasing your metabolism.

Though i have been working out a lot lately, i dont feel as though my weight loss or body has made any progress this week, which is really disappointing. however, i dont want to get too down on myself at my weigh in tomorrow, so im going to set up a schedule for interval training instead of running long distance or just going on the elliptical for 40 minutes.

for today [on the treadmill] i have:

warm up: 3 minutes on 3.5 mph

High intensity: 1 minute on 8 mph

Low intensity: 2 minutes on 5.5 mph [slow jog]

repeat 5 times

cool down: 3 minutes on 3.5 mph

hopefully these workouts will stimulate some fat loss and helps me reach my goal