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I borrowed a friend’s Polar RS100 Running Computer because I was curious to know how many calories I burn and what my heart rate is during two types of my workouts. I don’t know why I never bothered to calculate it — I guess I was waiting for a “running computer” to be invented. In addition to playing soccer 1-2 times/week, I have two “flavors” of workouts that I like to do. I alternate between the two workouts throughout the week…Monday, lift, Tuesday, sprints, Wednesday, lift, etc.

Wind/Gorilla Sprints

The first is wind/gorilla sprints…these things really kick my ass. My Dad introduced this workout to me about 5 years ago and I’ve been doing them ever since, about 3 times/week. I jog at a reasonable pace for 5 minutes to warm up, then stretch. The distance of the track at the Student Rec Center on campus is 1/8 mile, so 8 laps = 1 mile. After the warm-up jog and stretching, I jog for another 5 minutes to get “the juice” going again. Then, I sprint the full length of the track (1/8 mile or 200m), walk a quarter of the track (1/32 mile or 50m) and repeat about 8 times or until I feel like I’m going to throw up. Lastly, I cool down by slowly jogging for a quarter mile (400m) and then walking for another quarter mile.

Don’t drink water during this exercise — you’ll get cramps or puke. So drink plenty of fluids throughout the day. The warm-up, stretching, sprinting and cool down takes me about 30 minutes. I recommend this sprint workout if you are serious about burning fat and getting into shape but, beware, it’s quite close to living Hell. First, take it slow — maybe do 3-4 sprints the first week or so at 50% speed, then gradually increase the number of sprints and speed. You will be sore [and possibly hurl] after doing this the first few times, if you’re not used to sprinting. When I really want to destroy myself, I do these uphill. Here’s the output from the RS100:

436 calories burned in 25 minutes — with the fat % of burnt calories being 25. The minutes above my “zone” is high because I entered my age (32), weight (180 lb), height (5′10″) and gender into the watch, er…”running computer” the night before. The watch calculated my training zone for me, based upon the information I entered. On to workout #2.

Weight-lifting

Firstly, I am not a serious weight-lifter. I lift to stay healthy and counteract my high metabolism. Oh yeah, and I like to eat ice cream. If I don’t lift weights, I lose weight just sitting in my office chair. This will slowly go away as I get older, so I need to enjoy it while I can. Half of my lifting workout is spent doing push-ups, crunches on a “Fitness Orb” and other various, abdominal stuff. The other half of the workout is spent using dumbbells and various Nautilus-like machines. I was really curious to see how the results from this workout compared to the sprints, so here’s the numbers:

The Scoop

It seems obvious that lifting weights does not stress the heart as much as running. I was below my “zone” for almost half of the workout with my maximum heart rate only reaching 167 bpm, as compared to the 196-bpm maximum during the sprints. What was interesting is that I burned roughly the same amount of calories during the two workouts, but the fat % of burnt calories while weight lifting was twice as high! I am also surprised to know that according to the numbers above and the general stats from the American Heart Association, I am 23 years old. WOOT! Do you smell that? Yep, it’s a rant.

Many people believe that in order to get a flat stomach, you have to do 1000 crunches and blow off the cardio or to lose weight quickly, you must severely limit your calorie intake and run 1000 miles a week. The key, in my opinion, is to make sure you lift weights [for muscle tone and fat burning], perform cardiovascular exercise [for a healthy heart and lungs] AND eat healthy and smaller portions. Just because a food product has no fat, doesn’t mean it’s low in calories. Many non/low-fat foods are loaded with sugar [i.e. high-fructose corn syrup], which your body easily converts to fat, and many people falsely believe that because the food product is non/low-fat, it justifies eating larger portions. OK, I’ll get off my soap box now.

Have any workout/exercise tips? Let’s hear them! Have an ass like two scoops of butter-pecan ice cream? Feel free to share your exercise secrets!