Can Tabata Training Be Used to Tone Your Muscles?
Well-formed, well-toned muscles are a dream for many of us and they may sometimes seem a dream that's out of our reach.
Who can afford a membership to the gym and three hours a day to work on muscle toning? Not me, that's for sure.
Most of us have schedules that are already far too full, and even if a gym membership was free, and it's anything but, is there much chance we'd be able to get in those doors more than once a week, and then for longer than an hour? Not really. Not when we have work, and family responsibilities.
But you don't need a gym to tone your muscles, and surprise! You don't even need time. All you need is gumption, dedication, and the ability to push yourself even when it hurts.
Tabata training is a wonderful way to sculpt those muscles into the form you want them to have. Because this exercise protocol maximizes the stimulation your muscular system gets during your workout, it offers extremely good results for muscle toning.
Choose a bodyweight exercise that targets the muscles you'd like to tone. Practice it till you can do it well, and then incorporate it into a nothing-held-back extreme Tabata routine.
Suppose you want to tone the muscles in your buttocks and legs. Jump squats would be a perfect choice for this. To do them, start in a standing position, and then let yourself down into a full squat. Jump up from this position to standing- and higher still, bounce back down and sit down again into your squat.
If you're doing jump squats for your Tabata routine you're going to need to do them really, really fast. Like, faster than you've probably ever jumped before. So start off now by practicing some jump squats at a more everyday pace. You won't be ready to do Tabata till you can do these smoothly.
Ready now?
Okay, put your stopwatch somewhere you can see it, or turn on the free Tabata app you've got installed on your smartphone. Then-go! For twenty seconds, you need to do as many of these jump squats as is physically possible.
No pausing to catch your breath, no slowing down to make it a little easy for yourself. As soon as you're down, jump up again as if you touched hot coals.
As soon as you're up, squat back down.
Twenty seconds in, you get a break for ten seconds, so rest and catch your breath. Then go at it again as if they turned the heat up. No slacking. Up and down, up and down, up and down, faster, faster, faster--no, no catching a breath-faster, faster-till the twenty second dong goes off again and you've got another ten minutes for you muscles to catch rest and for you to catch your breath.
For a Tabata muscle-toning workout you're going to have to do eight rounds of 20 seconds each-twenty seconds at your absolute maximum speed and intensity, ten seconds at rest.
When you're done you may throw up. You may collapse on the floor. That's okay. That's what happens when we push ourselves.
But it was only four minutes. You survived it. And if you do it tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that-four days a week-you will be well on your way to having those well-toned muscles you always dreamed about.
Versatility
Tabata is very versatile so you can literally choose to sculpt any muscle area of the body, including the abs, butt, legs, back and even chest.
One of the important things to remember about Tabata is that its purpose is to increase anaerobic capacity and overall cardiovascular conditioning, this, is why the 20 second intervals are so intense. And, one of the best ways to do this is to use moves that engage most or all major muscle groups, such as, the case with burpees, lunge jumps and medicine ball slams.
The use of all major muscle groups are intense in nature and so they easily facilitate the anaerobic state, and because the work is so intense it is one of the fastest ways to build lean muscle tone.
John Rivers, an Independent Team Beachbody Coach, and his wife Beth enjoy helping individuals reach their health and fitness goals. Their unique support style through social media is a very integral part of their accountability model. Find more info at HomeWorkoutsWork.com or sign up to Join their "private" Facebook group. "Friend" John today to start reaching "YOUR" goals.
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