Make this summer great with exercise, short or long

Summer is here, and so are beach days. And hiking, and kayaking or canoeing too, and the list could go on. In other words, it is a great time to head outside and increase your fitness levels and general well-being by taking part in some physical activities, solo or with a group.

If rainy, chilly days have kept you inside and shredded your motivation to bits, summer offers no excuses but rather a big incentive: all you need to do is put on light clothing, shoes and head out the door.

Early mornings are great for runs and workouts, and so are early evenings if morning routines do not agree with you. Avoid midday training in full sun if possible; exposure to heat and sun might increase the risk of heat stroke.

How about length of training? If long-drawn out training sessions make you reach for a list of excuses as to why not to exercise just yet, here’s some interesting news. You may have heard of the latest trend about short, intense workouts being very efficient and yes, they would solve the long-drawn out resistance issue. It turns out the trend has scientific backup.

Researchers are Scripps Institute have looked into what short intense workouts do and they discovered that during intense bouts of physical activity a protein is activated and that leads to certain biochemical processes that help the involved muscles grow. In other words, the hard intense work pays off.

While long training sessions have their place (if you’re training for any races, or marathons for example) it may be beneficial to add variety and combine the long and the short intense ones. Short bouts of intense exercise promote lean muscle growth and force your body to burn calories due to the intensity of the exercises.

A recent study published in Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Diseases in November of 2013 concluded that overweight people would benefit from long sessions of moderate intensity as high intensity workouts, though extremely efficient, could be hard to keep up with at least in the beginning.

Whether you choose short intense workouts or longer, moderate intensity levels ones, your heart is getting stronger and your body too.

A word of caution on overtraining: With both long and short sessions, you should always be careful to not overtrain. Adjust the time and frequency of your workouts depending on the levels of intensity and watch out for symptoms such as lower immune functions, loss of lean muscle mass, sleeplessness, muscle cramps and tiredness.

It is always a good idea to consult a professional for guidance on how to do it right. The most important thing is the old, still solid advice: just do it!