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The Benefits of Sprinting

The Benefits of Sprinting

Adding sprinting sessions to your workout regime is a great way of improving your conditioning and increasing your metabolic expenditure quickly. To anyone serious about losing weight/fat and improving their fitness, sprinting is a must.

The benefits of sprinting are just too great to be ignored!

This article will briefly outline the benefits of sprinting and show you how to incorporate sprints into your workout.

I don’t like jogging as a fitness or weight loss tool. Biomechanically, lots of us aren’t suited or prepared for running long distances and we end up injured quickly. From a ‘fitness’ point of view, it is of little benefit. Long, slow cardio will improve your ability to do…..long, slow cardio.

It won’t improve your athleticism, it won’t improve your general health particularly and it is likely to cost you some of your hard-earned strength and muscle tissue.

The hormonal changes as a result of jogging aren’t beneficial to health and fitness improvement. Increased cortisol, reduced growth hormone and reduced testosterone are merely the start of the problems associated with long duration cardio.

Look at the picture below comparing the physique of international athletes – who looks healthier and in better condition? These are at the peak of their respective sports, competing internationally. Look at the effect of long term distance running on the physique – no obvious benefits, other than being able to fit in children’s clothes as an adult male!

Jogging Vs Sprinting, the benefits of sprinting, sprinting

So how can sprinting give me the supposed benefits of running without dragging myself out on the roads for 3 or more hours per week?

The Benefits of Sprinting

Sprinting is the most time efficient way to improve your cardiovascular conditioning. Working at flat out pace for 20-50 metres, followed by a rest of 10-30 seconds will have your heart rate up in no time, and the reduced distance and time will almost eradicate the overuse and impact injuries associated with jogging. There is even the benefit of muscle gain – even moreso if you add resistance to your sprint workouts with sleds or prowlers.

the benefits of sprinting

Athletically, sprinting is far more suited to conditioning for most sports. Other than distance running, very few sports require the athlete to run continuously at a medium/slow pace for a long stretch of time. Most sports require the explosive dynamic movements improved by sprinting. The power, speed and even endurance created through a well structured sprint training regimen will transfer far better to both sport and life than a cardio based approach.

So why does sprinting work so well?

This boils down to intensity of the work. A sprint requires all-out effort, which improves cardiovascular function as the heart is forced to work harder (check your pulse rate during a sprint session to see for yourself). This translates as an improvement in cardiac capability. I always wear a Polar FT4 Men’s Heart Rate Monitor and Sports Watch when I do my sprinting and conditioning workouts – it lets me keep an eye on my heart rate.

Remember… Heart rate = intensity = results.

The power is developed by moving your bodyweight quickly and explosively. This ability to move a load at speed is fantastic for power development – moving weight as speed is fundamental to Olympic lifting, which is the ultimate power development training protocol.

The acceleration developed by sprinting is a benefit to most sports, and the fact that you can gain these benefits in less than half the time of a typical 10km run shows the efficiency of the workout.

I started to incorporate sprinting into my training this year and have noticed a huge difference in my speed and conditioning. I fit in two sprint sessions per week, usually early morning before I see clients. Being outside wakes me up quickly and I can have the workout finished in 20 minutes.

For a beginner, I would typically recommend a short sprint workout. Try to do the sprinting while you are still fresh as you don’t want to run the risk of injury due to working at intensity whilst fatigued.

To start, try 10 sprints of 20-30 metres with 20 seconds of rest in between. Add 5 metres per week until you reach 50 metres, then increase the intensity by including more sprints. You don’t want to add too much distance as the focus is on speed and intensity, not distance.

Doing this twice per week, ensuring you adequately rest and refuel in between sessions will bring you benefits very quickly. Try not to sprint two consecutive days, and don’t let it dominate your training (unless you are a sprinter!) Remember this is another element of your workout – not the main basis of it.

My workout this morning was 12 x 50m sprints with 20 seconds rest in between. This session took 15 minutes with a warm up and mobility work included. I will do another one on Friday and that will be it until next week – as I said before, rest is vital.

Tips for incorporating sprints into your workout…

  • Start short and increase in distance first, then number of sprints.
  • Don’t sprint over 75m – the focus is on speed, not distance.
  • For increased intensity, perform the sprints up a hill.
  • Try to sprint on a track or grass – avoid roads or hard surfaces if you can to prevent injury.
  • Make sure your rest is sufficiently long enough to recover, but not so long that you lose the intensity of the session. as your conditioning increases, reduce the rest period.

A sensible sprinting programme will have enormous benefits on your conditioning, fat loss and overall health. Sprinting provides all of the benefits of traditional cardio and almost none of the negatives associated with it.

Sprinting improves athleticism, gym performance and is amazing time-effective approach to working out. You can perform a whole session in less than 20 minutes and still benefit enormously.

As I mentioned earlier, I always wear a heart rate monitor during my conditioning sessions so I can keep a close eye on my workout intensity. Knowing what my heart rate is accurately removes the guessing game approach, meaning I can get more of the benefits of sprinting from my workout.

I have always used polar heart rate monitors, but get whichever on you like. My suggestion is the Polar FT4…

P.S. I’m giving away a FREE eBook ‘101 Health and Fitness Tips’ to everyone who subscribes to my VIP email list. By joining the list you’ll have access to exclusive content, discounts, offers and products from both me and selected partners. Click here to download!

free health and fitness ebook

Published by

HoylesFitness

Owner of www.hoylesfitness.com. Personal Trainer, Father and fitness copy writer. Working hard making the world fitter and healthier!

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