Science says: if you exercise for so many minutes a day, you are being healthy

I am a lazy athlete. If I feel like it, I go. And if I don't feel like it, then I don't go. This comes in waves. One month I'm there five mornings a week and the next month I take a big detour around the gym. Right now, I'm in that second phase. I blame my vacation (which was already a month ago) for this. It's always a bit difficult to ‘restart’.

Or better said: I simply lack sports discipline. And I don't think that's a disaster, you know. I compensate the twenty minutes on the cross trainer by walking enough every day. A little movement is something every person simply needs. But how much is that little bit? Moreover, how many minutes of exercise is enough in a day to stay fit as a person?

Well, then the people who, like me, derive little pleasure from exercising are lucky. With HIIT exercises, better known as High Intensity Interval Training, four minutes of your day is already quite sufficient according to sports scientist Chris Easton. Yes, you read that right: FOUR. I wish I had said this a bit earlier.

But then you have to really put in the effort for those few minutes. Not consecutively, no one can keep that up — at least, I certainly can't. The idea is to go all out for twenty seconds. That could be sprinting, for example, or cycling on a spin bike. Then you take a ten-second break and start the cycle again. You keep going until the timer hits four minutes. Sounds easy, but it's not. And you keep this up four days a week.

According to our sports scientist, it genuinely works. He says this is due to the high intensity that forces your body to go outside its own comfort zone. Your body has to adapt and does so by improving the functioning of your heart and lungs. Now you know that too.

So who’s coming to a spinning class? It only costs you four minutes of your day. I don't want to hear excuses.

Source: trouw.nl