Fitness: Metabolic Training

People are looking for more and more ways to get the most out of their training.  Metabolic training is becoming more popular in the fitness world.  The problem is this is more of an advanced training style so it may not be ideal for beginners.  It is mostly utilized by military, athletes, and fitness enthusiasts.  But it is growing in popularity for all fitness levels.  Since this is such an intense way of training it can require build up to be able to achieve the exercises to benefit the metabolism boost.  

The goal of metabolic training is to maximize muscle gain and shed excess fat even after your workout is complete.  Metabolic training will help increase efficiency of your body’s metabolism.  Since this is such an intense way of training it can require build up to be able to achieve the exercises.  Now some examples of metabolic training are HIIT (high intensity interval training) workouts and crossfit.  Not all metabolic conditioning exercises are HIIT exercises.  So if you are doing some HIIT workouts it may not necessarily mean you are doing a metabolic conditioning session already.  

These exercises that are done during a metabolic training session are structural and compound exercises that maximize calorie burn and increase metabolic rate during and after the exercise.  This helps boost weight loss up to 48 hours after you have completed the workout.  Your metabolism is what controls how many calories your body burns at rest.  So during a metabolic training session you want to do exercises that work multiple joints or muscles all at once, and you go super hard using your max energy to achieve the exercise.  You will want to push your body to the limit in these exercises.  Afterwards your muscles should be burning.  If you aren’t breathless and sweating afterwards you weren’t completing your workout to the max level. 

The benefits of this style of training is to improve your cardio.  As well as give you a serious calorie burn.  It can also increase your caloric burn at rest and build muscle faster.  Metabolic training can also help improve your hormone profile.  Because you push your body to the limit and burn out so many different muscles at the same time, this type of training kick starts the growth hormone to start working and repairing the muscles you burned out.  This is why many people have noticed weight loss, and muscle toning faster while training in this style.  

So the benefits of metabolic training sound great, we now know that we may have to work up to doing a full metabolic training session, but what does a metabolic training session look like?  Usually metabolic training is done in circuits.  An exercise circuit is when you do a certain amount of exercises, for a short period of time like thirty to forty-five seconds, with a short rest in between each exercise like ten seconds.  Once you complete all those exercises that consists of one round.  You can do your circuits multiple rounds.  Crossfit is a very well known way of metabolic training.  When you do exercises that work multiple areas of your body all at once, or lift heavy weights for a few rounds instead of light weight for longer.  Specific exercises are kettlebell swings, squat and press, burpees, jump squats, wood choppers, speed skaters, or jump lunges.  

Combining all of these into a circuit would then give you a metabolic workout.  Metabolic training sessions should only be around twenty minutes.  Instead of having a long exercise with lots of rest between exercises, metabolic training is pushing yourself super hard during a short amount of time of exercises with very little rest.  This keeps your heart rate up helping your cardio function, as well as help your metabolism to speed up.  

Metabolic training is not for everyone.  It is an intense way of training and may not be ideal for beginners.  Mostly used by athletes, and military it is an effective way to get a calorie burn and build muscle quickly.  It has shown that it can increase your metabolic rate up to 48 hours after training.  That means you could be burning calories while your body is at rest 48 hours after you do a workout.  Making sure you push your body, pick the right exercises to benefit the burn as best as you can, where you are breathless and sweaty after your session will give you the most benefits and results.  To avoid injury make sure you talk with your doctor to see if metabolic training is the right type of training for you.