You have heard all of the miracle health benefit promises. Maybe you have even tried a few supplements or exercise programs which promised to deliver miracle results in a very short period of time, with little or no effort on your part. Generally, those products are nothing but hype in the best case scenario, and potentially dangerous at worst.
.
That having been said, the 21st century has seen multiple claims by physical trainers and other health professionals that you can get fit working out just 10 minutes a day. Is this possible? What form of exercise delivers significant health benefits in such a short period of time? More importantly, can a 10 minute workout help you reach your personal fitness goals? Let’s take a look.
.
Changing your body chemistry is simply a matter of changing your routine. If you are pretty healthy, and you start eating nothing but junk food and stop working out, you will become unhealthy in a hurry. The same is true if you adopt regular exercise if you are currently leading a sedentary lifestyle.
.
Any exercise that you perform, for even the shortest amount of time, is better than no exercise at all.
.
So if you are currently not physically active, then squeezing in several 10 minute workouts during your regular weekly schedule is going to produce some serious health benefits.
.
However, you only burn so many calories when you exercise. You have to destroy 3,500 more calories than you take in before you lose 1 pound of body weight. This means that burning fat, losing weight, building muscle and getting in shape is going to require at least a few extended exercise sessions every week.
.
Here’s why.
.
At best you can only expect to burn 100 to 150 calories in 10 minutes of exercise. (Most exercises will consume fewer calories than that.) Burning calories through physical activity is what makes your muscles, heart and respiratory system stronger, leading to physical fitness. So to have a 1 pound impact on your body weight (a measurable sign of health and fitness), you would need to enjoy at least 23 to 35 sessions of exercise of 10 minutes each!
.
This is not to say that short exercise sessions are pointless.
.
They aren’t. Sprinkling a few 10 minute aerobic or strength training sessions in your regular exercise routine can improve the speed at which you reach your desired goal. Just understand that short workouts are never going to replace the three to five 30 to 45 minute sessions of moderately intense exercise that you should be performing on a weekly basis.