Don't Waste Your Time On The Treadmill!

I enjoy the treadmill. Its not that I don't enjoy running outside, but I find I get a good workout off of a machine as well. The key is to make the machine work for you, not just get on it.

I've heard people talk about getting on a treadmill for a workout. When I ask them about the details I sometimes find out the person just walked or jogged lightly and didn't even work up a decent heart rate. Basically, they wasted their time.

Others will champion the advantages of using different machines: air bikes or elliptical machines. But the same mistake can be made on those machines: if you expect to be any different just because you got on an exercise machine for a half hour, but you don't push yourself, you wasted your time.

Generally speaking, it is not the machine, but the intensity and effort you bring to it that will make the difference. If you are not challenging your body to do something harder, you are not changing your body to be harder.

My choice is the treadmill. I enjoy the run and I enjoy using the machine to push me forward. Other machines may be preferable to you. It doesn't matter which one you like to use and switching up from time to time is a definite advantage. But given a choice, I'm climbing on the treadmill.

Here's what I do. I start out with a 5-minute walk. On the treadmill that I use (Life Fitness), for me that starts at a speed setting of  2.8 and I gradually work it up to 4.2 or 4.3. After five minutes I go to 5.2, a slow jog. After 30 seconds I speed up to 6.2 or higher. Then every 30 seconds I speed up by an increment of .2. When I reach exhaustion (somewhere between 8.0 and 9.0 depending on the day) I  drop down to 5.3. Then I begin speeding up every 30 seconds by an increment of .3 until I reach exhaustion. When I need to slow down to rest, I drop the speed down to 5.4. I incrementally increase the speed every 30 seconds by .4 until exhaustion. Then I drop down to 5.5. Incremental increases at 30 second intervals are .5. At exhaustion I drop to 5.6 and repeat the same kind of cycle. When exhausted and I finish that round, I start the process in reverse: 5.5, 5.4, 5.3, and 5.2. With that final round done, I walk for 5 minutes again to cool down.

The entire exercise takes a little over 30 minutes, usually about 35. If I don't have that much time I can adjust to make it shorter. If I feel a bit of overachiever in me, I can make it go longer.

The advantage is that I get an effective workout, instead of  just putting in time on the treadmill. Another is that this is effectively an interval exercise, or HIIT (shown to reduce belly fat). With every round I am challenging my body to either work harder or longer or both.  I can evaluate each session I'm on the treadmill by recording the length of time that I run and the point at which I reach 1 km, 2 km, and 3 km.

Similar approaches can be used on the exercise bike, the elliptical machine and even a stair master. If you are not sweating and needing to get your heart rate down at the end of the exercise, you need to reevaluate what you're doing. It's not the machine. It's how hard you're willing to work while you're on the machine that makes the difference.


Check out other great health and exercise resources at my Coach site. With the use of BeachBody products I have lost over 100 lbs and I'm keeping them off. At 55, I'm in the best shape of my life. I look forward to helping you reach your health and weight goals.