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Nathan DeMetz Personal Training

A Simple But Effective Cardio Routine


Woman pushing stroller with kid running


I'm about to offer you the simplest cardio routine that you have ever heard. Are you ready for it? Here it goes.


Perform any cardio method for 10 minutes. The next time you do it add one minute. Repeat this process as long as you can.


Now that seems simple and it's meant to be. Your approach to doing cardio really could be that easy. But since I know it seems like it couldn't be let me drill it down a bit more.


Starting somewhere simple

Beginning to work out can be mentally difficult for just about anybody. Starting with a very simple approach can make the process easier to handle. If you are currently not engaging cardio activity especially if you're extremely out of shape then simple and easy is the best route.


We're going into a gym or buying a piece of cardio equipment for home you have a variety of options. Some of these are:


·         treadmill

·         Stair climber

·         Elliptical

·         Stationary cycle


any of these is a good option. Get on the treadmill and walk jog run for 10. Get on the stair climber and stair climb at different paces for 10 minutes. Get on the elliptical and test out different paces for 10 minutes. Get on the stationary cycle and paddle your feet as fast or as slow as you would like.


Then stop and be happy that you did something.


Now imagine you come in the next day to do it again. Add one minute.


Now again that seems simple and it's meant to be your approach to doing cardio really could be that easy because I know it seems like it couldn't be let me drill it down still a bit more.


Use progressive overload

Imagine today is your first day, and you plan to do cardio at least three times per week for the next year. That means that you will complete 156 cardio sessions.

That means if you add one minute per session and that last 156 cardio session you will do 165 minutes of cardio for almost 3 hours.


Now it seems like a lot doesn't it?


That's why the approach can be that simple. Think about if you start today and just add 3 minutes per week over a year. Now seriously I don't think that you need to do 165 minutes of cardio in a single session.


But by following a really simple approach you can start someplace simple and easily see progression over time. That one minute added every session is a form of progressive overload. In real simple terms progressive overload simply means increasing the difficulty of the activity over time.


By adding one minute each session you are doing that. Now there are other ways you can do this even more with or without adding the minute every single session.

Ways to progressively increase difficulty


Other ways to increase difficulty are going faster, using incline or decline, or putting up the resistance level.


For example:


·         the treadmill can go faster slower or you can use an incline or decline.

·         On the cycle you can go faster or slower or increase the resistance level.

·         On the stair stepper you can increase the speed or do things like take double

steps instead of single steps which is effectively increasing the resistance level.


The Simplest Cardio Routine


Again this may seem real simple and it's meant to. Anything can be made convoluted and hard. But why make something harder than it needs to be.


On a very base level if you go in and start with that 10 minutes and then one minute per sessions three times per week, you think you're going to be doing a whole lot of cardio at the end of the 156 sessions.


But again I'm not suggesting that she needed need to do almost three hours of cardio. Instead just go in you got 10 minutes that first session, make the work moderate to hard effort, and planned to add 1 minute per session and or use some other approach to increase the intensity that is the difficulty such as the items listed above.


If you do this consistently over time you will see progress.

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