3 Reasons Intense Workouts Tone Your Body Faster

If you have no time to waste working out....make your workouts more fat-burn effective by ramping up the intensity! This will shape and tone your body faster. That's what you want right? You want to look and feel your best--sooner rather than later!


Get more progress with your fat loss and weight loss by working out smarter, not longer. Make it a goal to be finished with your workout in 45 minutes or less. Talk to your friends after your workout.

Let's get right to it...here are 3 Reasons Intense Workouts Shape and Tone Your Body Faster:

1. Doing these types of short burst workouts will change your hormones allowing your body to naturally regulate fat burning, appetite and moods.

Short burst workouts, such as interval cardio and circuit weight training had these advantages over the low-to-moderate intensity workouts: a) more release of fat from cells, b) more fat used as fuel during exercise and c) increased metabolic rate after exercise. All it takes is 20-30 minutes of workout time.

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For instance, do your interval cardio "on land" such as bodyweight cardio (examples: mountain climbers, burpees, leg circuits, etc.), jump rope and running in place. The key here is to speed up and shorten your cardio work to about 20 minutes. Research and my experience has proven that this type of cardio work is one of the best ways to tone up your body.

2. Doing this type of intense exercise will burn more calories and fat during and after your workout. Exercise Post-Oxygen Consumption (EPOC) causes your body to burn more calories and fat after a tough workout.

Your body has to work harder to get back to its pre-exercise state. Fat burning and metabolism can increase for up to 48 hours after your workout!

Research at Duke University, directed by Dr. Cris Slentz, supports high-intensity exercise for better fat loss. The eight-month study showed that people could lose weight with exercise and no dieting. Those who exercised intensely (especially using interval training) lost much more fat than those who exercised moderately.

3. Long, traditional 1-2 hour workouts can have a negative impact on hunger and stress hormones which can cause increased appetite and cravings for sugary and other fatty foods.

Forget about weight loss and concentrate on fat loss. Build muscle mass, burn fat, change your body's composition and permanently speed up your metabolism so that you burn more calories during workouts, during the day and at rest.

As time moves on, make frequent changes to your exercise routine or your body will adapt. That's when your progress begins to stall. There are many things you can do to change up your routine such as choosing different exercises, rest periods, supersets, speeds, etc. You can change up exercises every workout if you want (but not necessary).

Here are 3 high intensity workout methods to burn more fat and calories:

Trainer's Note: Strength train your movements and not just your muscles. Bodyweight strength exercises are good for this purpose. You will burn more fat because you will be training all muscle groups. Some call this functional strength training.

1. Add more one-legged strength exercises such as step ups, single leg squats, Bulgarian split squats, lunges, single leg good mornings and single leg medicine ball exercises to your workout routine.


These types of exercises are more intense than two-legged exercises. Doing these exercises with circuit weight training using supersets (with lighter weights) adds even more intensity to your workout.

Rotate heavy and light lifting days. According to the research, doing heavy weight lifting will give you exercise-induced testosterone increases. Of course, this will help you build muscle mass. Women can lift heavy weights without fear of getting too bulky. Your repetition range for exercises should be between 3-5 (you would have a difficult time lifting these repetitions). You would typically do 4-5 sets of each exercise.

Doing some of these exercises with your eyes closed will improve limb position sense (proprioception), balance and will help you burn more fat and calories. Balance training also improves your core strength.

One last strength training tip would be to do combinations of one-arm and one-leg exercises such as single leg squat-to-single arm shoulder press.

2. Add more intensity to your workouts by exercising your body in all 3 planes of motion. This also improves your multi-planar balance.

An example would be a grouping of walking lunges, side lunges and transverse lunges.

Want more intensity? Exercise on different surfaces such as grass, sand, astro-play and soft surfaces.

3. Do cardio blasts. This is a very intense form of exercising. You will get great fat burning results.

Cardio blasts could work this way: between each weight training exercise set, do 30-45 seconds of a high speed cardio exercise like jump rope, mountain climbers, sprints or squat jumps.

Devote more time to strength training and less time to cardio. That way, you will build more muscle mass, burn more fat and lean out your body faster.

Ready to get started?

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Mark Dilworth, BA, PES
My Fitness Hut


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About Mark

Hi, I'm Mark Dilworth, Nutritionist, Dietary Strategies Specialist, Nutrition for Metabolic Health Specialist and Lifestyle Weight Management Specialist. Since 2006, I have helped thousands of clients and readers make lifestyle habit changes which includes body transformation and ideal body weight.