How to Get Rid of Belly Fat Quickly with Interval Training

Alright, we’ve crossed the biggest hurdle already, that of educating ourselves on the fundamental principles of how to get rid of belly fat. It’s time for me to give you a little more fuel for you to attack the problem. And that is how it should be seen. Always remember that body and belly fat is just stored energy. It isn’t you, some obstinate part of your character that identifies you. It is just stored energy that can leave as easily as it came. It just takes determination and a plan. So let’s plan.

To get rid of belly fat quickly, we need to step up our energy output. As we’ve discussed, my preferred method of doing so is through interval training. Long cardio sessions do indeed cause you to burn calories, but your body will adapt in time, and it takes a great deal of fortitude to train for an hour a session, several days a week. I believe this is excessive. Interval training sessions of 20 to 30 minutes are more time efficient, and better for your all around system.

To review briefly, interval training is the combination of moderate to high intensity training for a period of 30 minutes or less. It is much more difficult than maintaining moderate speeds or resistance for extended periods of time. The 30 minutes should include both a warm up and a cool down, so the interval aspect of it need not be longer than 10 to 20 minutes. This is the key to getting rid of belly fat quickly. So let’s get into a beginner to intermediate interval training session.

If using the treadmill, start at a moderate warm-up level, one that gets your heart rate up to around 140 for 5 minutes (I’m assuming you have no heart conditions and are in relatively good health with the exception of having a bit of belly fat to take care of). After 5 minutes raise the speed to a level your body can only sustain for 1 to 2 minutes, but you’ll only maintain that level for one minute. After that minute, return to your base speed, or one that is higher but still allows for moderate recover in breathing and heart rate reduction without slowing your heart rate all together. Continue this pattern 2 more times. Add a 5 minute walking cool down. So together it would look like this:

-5 minute warm-up jogging
-1 minute sprinting or high intensity jogging
-2 minutes jogging at base speed
-1 minute sprinting
-2 minutes jogging
-1 minute sprinting
-2 minutes jogging
-3 to 5 minutes cool down, walking at a good pace

Every person will start from a different place. For me, my base speed is between 10 and 12 kilometers an hour. And my 1 minute interval speed is between 15 and 17 km per hour. That peaks my heart rate to about 170, and then I drop it back to 140 or 150 during my moderate 2 minutes. If you are just starting out, it may only require a light jog at 8 km to raise your heart rate to 170, and a fast walking pace to maintain your heart rate at around 140 to 150. These are more important indicators than the speed at which you are moving. Your heart is doing just as much work as mine, and that’s what we’re looking for.

Once you’ve become conditioned to this workout, which may take 2 to 4 weeks if done 2 to 4 times per week, then simply add 1 more interval to the equation. An interval is a set of a 1 minute sprint followed by 2 minutes of jogging, or whatever your ideal pace is. Once you’ve worked up to 5 interval sets, your total training time will be between 25 and 30 minutes. It is then time to add speed or add elevation to your workout for greater intensity. So any of these three factors can be altered to increase intensity; speed, elevation, or total number of intervals. Perhaps you can experiment to find what works best for you. But make sure you record the details of each session, including:

-Beginning heart rate
-Number and duration of intervals
-Speed
-Elevation
-Heart rate at the beginning of the cool down
-Heart rate at the end of the cool down
-Total workout time
-Your own feelings of how tired or weak you feel afterwards, and how difficult you feel it was in general

Make sure that if you’re adding weight training to your overall fitness plan that you don’t lift after you interval train. After exhausting the body of energy stores, your body may be forced to break down muscle fiber for the energy to complete your lift. This is not what we want as muscle mass in conducive to fat loss. So if you intend to weight train and interval train on the same day, weight train first and interval train second. The body will adapt to interval training, so keeping a log of the factors mentioned above will allow you to constantly change your workouts for better results, which will indeed get rid of belly fat quickly.