Why Your Elliptical Training Routine isn't Cutting It - Pump up Intensity for Better Results : Life Fitness : Home



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Why Your Elliptical Training Routine isn't Cutting It - Pump up Intensity for Better Results

Admit it, you go to the gym, you step onto the nearest elliptical cross-trainer, you hit ‘Quick Start’ (like 80 percent of exercisers) and you begin your workout. As you start to feel more comfortable, you may decide to add a level. Then you get bored and decide enough is enough after 15 minutes.

There is more to gain out of your elliptical training experience. According to the experts at Life Fitness, time isn’t the issue, it’s all about intensity. A short, high intensity workout offers greater benefits than a long, steady routine. Short routines with minimal resting time give you a high power workout.

Here are a few suggestions to kick your elliptical routine into gear.

Building Blocks: Take a builder’s approach to your workout with the Hill workout. The program starts out small to get warmed up and adds periods of intense aerobic exercise alternating with regular periods of lower intensity exercise. Changing the level every couple of minutes keeps your body and mind adjusting for a more involved experience that fights boredom.
Keep Moving: Remaining in the same position and mindset throughout your elliptical cross-trainer workout is a sure way to destroy/ diminish intensity. When you use the Random workout it gives you an interval training workout of constantly changing intensity levels that occur in no regular pattern or progression. This workout also incorporates both forward and backward stride movements in your routine. Not only will you increase the intensity of the exercise, you’ll feel more targeted muscle burn.
Intensity Intervals: Rather than running at level seven for 30 minutes, switch it up a bit. The Cross-Train Aerobics workout simulates the experience of working with a personal trainer by displaying different prompts at different times on the display. It emphasizes pushing, pulling, total body, lower body, speed changes and forward/reverse motion. This versatile workout promotes maximum cross-training benefits and variety.
Embrace the Heart Monitors: Heart rate monitors don’t lie. They are accurate and sometimes one of the best tools for determining how hard you should work. If you don’t have your own heart rate monitor, all Life Fitness elliptical cross-trainers are equipped with heart rate sensors and provide a quick guide for ideal target heart rates based on age.

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