Benefits of an intense workout

Yesterday I talked about bumping up your workout program and finding a way to get past your plateau. Well I wanted to talk today a little bit about the benefit of an intense exercise program. Our bodies are highly adaptive to the demands placed on it. One way to combat this is by maximizing the caloric expenditure of a training program. This is made easier by maximizing the O2 consumption needed for your workout. The recovery oxygen consumption needed is known as EPOC, excess postexercise oxygen consumption. The benefit of EPOC is it’s a state after exercise where the body’s metabolism is elevated. This means that the body is burning more calories after the exercise than before the exercise was started. After exercise the body must use increased amounts of oxygen to replenish energy supplies and return body to a state of rest. Long story short, the higher the intensity of the training session, the more calories you will continue to burn post exercise!