Rest Periods between Intervals
To become stronger and faster, athletes use a technique
called interval training, in which they exercise very intensely, rest
and then alternate intense bursts of exercise and rest until their
muscles start to feel heavy. You can apply this principle to
your own exercise program, but the rest period between intervals is
not the same for every sport.
Rest periods are different for runners and weightlifters.
Runners run intervals as fast as they can and recover enough to
run the same fast pace several times. Research shows that
runners need very short recoveries between intervals, usually
only about 30 seconds. So a runner may run a quarter mile 12
times, averaging one minute, with a 110-yard slow jog between
each. However, weight lifters need much longer recoveries
between hard sets, at least two and a half minutes.
Runners become short of breath and feel a burning in
their muscles when lactic acid starts to accumulate in muscles. It
takes only a few seconds for a trained athlete to recover from
hard running and clear lactic acid, so runners usually need short
30 second recoveries between each hard run. On the other hand,
weight lifters feel a burning caused by a tearing of the muscle
fibers and it can take a much longer time for their pain to
disappear so they can lift very heavy weights again.
Checked 8/31/11