Fitness: How often do you have to train for a beach body?

JEvery summer, the battle against the love handles begins again for many people – a decent beach body is needed, and as quickly as possible. It should now be clear that this cannot be achieved with a starvation diet alone. Only a healthy diet and a strict exercise plan can actually help.

But how often should you actually train per week? Every day, is that perhaps more effective, or are the weekends enough – and if so, how long and intense should the training be so that results are visible as quickly as possible? The best thing to do is ask a personal trainer directly: Arlow Pieniak, as an exercise therapist and trainer in Hamburg, gets weak people fit in his studio Work it, which is popular (even among fashion bloggers!).

Intense training sessions are more effective

Recent studies say that intensive training sessions in short intervals (i.e. High Intensity Interval Training, or HIIT for short) are most effective when it comes to burning fat. Pieniak agrees with this, because the body actually only uses its “valuable” fat reserves, which thousands of years ago were actually vital in the event of a food shortage, when absolutely necessary.

And it’s exactly this emergency situation that you trick your body into believing with high-intensity interval training, says Pienak: “Maybe it’s a matter of life, the effort is so high that the body can only do it if it’s in addition to the freely available carbohydrates in the blood and also taps into the energy from the fat reserves in the muscles.”

The long-term advantage of this, the fitness expert explains, is that the body becomes more and more effective at burning fat. Someone who does HIIT every day will eventually expend more energy than they put into their body – also known as negative energy balance. Nevertheless, “the idea is that quiet endurance training proportionally Burns more fat, true, but not in absolute terms. A misunderstanding that persists quite persistently.”

So in terms of fat burning and everything to do with circulation, exercising at a high heart rate (like HIIT) is more effective than moderate exercise. “However, moderate exercise can do one very important thing better: reduce stress. This may not necessarily be a focus for many, but high levels of stress are not only unhealthy, but also bad for burning fat,” says Pieniak. In this respect, continuous stress should definitely have a permanent place in the training plan.

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This is how often you should train per week

Does a lot actually help a lot? Yes, says the Hamburg fitness expert, because “our body is designed for movement, only a lack of exercise will harm it.” However, you shouldn’t overdo it straight away. If you haven’t exercised that often before, you shouldn’t train six days a week, but rather steadily increase the number of training units. And true people who don’t like sports or people with very little time who still don’t want to look completely untrained can also get by with three sessions per week, says Arlow Pieniak.

This should include a sporty week

HIIT, yoga, Pilates, jogging, swimming, strength training – the range is almost inexhaustible and more extensive than there are days in a week. But which sports are really beneficial when it comes to the perfect figure? “Here I would divide it into: If you are only looking for health or visual benefits, you should look into strength training and HIIT.” Because these two sports belong in the “training” category – so they have no other goal than to positively change the body. “Not just in terms of losing weight, but also to eliminate pain or poor posture.”

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“In contrast, sports like yoga, Pilates, jogging or swimming are about the goals of the sport itself.” While in yoga, for example, you try to master certain figures, in jogging and swimming you try to be particularly fast or stamina, and in climbing and bouldering to overcome new levels of difficulty. Such sports are less about changing the body – that is a positive side effect, but never the primary goal. You should always choose this type of sport based on your personal preferences and fun factor.

These exercises should not be missing from any training plan

When it comes to strength training, the personal trainer recommends the following basic exercises: squats, presses, deadlifts and bench presses or push-ups – because they represent the basic patterns of human movement. “Only once you have mastered these exercises should you try more complex things such as lunges, jumps or kettlebell swings,” advises Pieniak.

With high-intensity interval training, however, the exercises should be chosen based on personal preferences and ability. “Whether you do HIIT on the stationary bike, the track or with the kettlebell depends on how fit you are and what you like to do.”

Time for work-out and rest

Of course, we cannot generalize here either: the duration of the workout depends on your own fitness and the training goal to be achieved. Arlow Pieniak recommends a duration of 30 to 40 minutes for strength training for beginners; HIIT or any comparable interval training should last between five and 25 minutes.

Powering through seven days a week does nothing for the body; it also needs rest days. Beginners in particular should coordinate exercise and rest phases depending on their own training level and not train for more than three days with four rest days per week. Professional athletes, on the other hand, train for several hours up to three times a day, depending on the sport.

And what does the expert recommend for nasty sore muscles? Opinions differ as to whether it is better to train or take a break: “If you have sore muscles, you should not repeat the same strain that caused the sore muscles. Because the muscle has not yet regenerated and the risk of injury is therefore higher.” If the sore muscles arise from strength training, HIIT or moderate endurance training is recommended – both help the muscle regenerate, explains Pieniak.

Sports units in everyday life as a replacement for training?

If you have little time or are skeptical about the sport itself, you can simply incorporate certain training sessions into your everyday life, for example by climbing stairs instead of taking the elevator. According to Arlow Pieniak, the most important thing is to integrate the right movements into your everyday life. In other words, standing correctly, walking or even moving at all.

However, a conceptual distinction must be made at this point, says Pieniak. “Training provides training-effective stimuli that cause the body to change something. Lose fat, build muscle or something similar. Physical exertion in itself may, as the name suggests, be very strenuous, but it is not a training stimulus.”

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In order to systematically change your body, precisely controlled stimuli have to build on each other – and that is practically impossible in everyday life. Working in the garden or lugging shopping bags is strenuous, but it doesn’t give the body any training-effective stimuli to improve performance. “It’s very good and healthy to take the stairs, ride your bike, etc., but that’s not training.”

The right nutrition

No dream figure can get by with exercise alone – nutrition is also crucial. Therefore, during exercise you should eat more vegetables, proteins (from fish and meat) and high-quality fats from nuts and oils and avoid sugar, white flour, “bad” fats and alcohol.

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“However, most people who start exercising and changing their diet at the same time make the mistake of consuming far too little energy. And after a short time they stop both the sport and the change in diet.” Therefore, you should eat both high-quality and sufficient nutrition, advises the personal trainer. And that is often more difficult than you would think.

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Visible successes come quickly

With proper training and the right diet, the first visible results can be seen after just four weeks. However, the Hamburg movement therapist warns against relying too much on the scales. “So much happens in the body during such a change that you can easily get rid of two kilograms of fat without losing a gram on the scales.” He recommends buying a pair of fat tongs or, even easier, taking a before and after photo. However, that should be judged by someone else, because as always, you can judge yourself the worst – at least visually.

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Further information about Arlow Pieniak and his training programs can be found at workittraining.de.

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This article was first published in July 2017.