Tabata interval training

Bella

New User
Hello all,

Has anyone out there tried tabata intervals as part of cardio training? I was reading about this recently and it sounds very promising. I would like to increase my cardio fitness and stamina for my increasingly long and difficult tennis matches, but I want to keep the running to a minimum to save my knees. I was thinking about trying this method by jumping rope. For anyone unfamiliar, the basic premise is to do intervals of 20 seconds of 100% effort followed by 10 seconds of complete rest. If anyone has any insight to this interval method I would love to hear some feedback. :)

PS- I just joined this forum and have really been enjoying reading through everything. Thanks in advance to anyone with advice!
 

plasma

Banned
Ciao Bella,
a player who I beat last year started doing something like this right before matches and recently beat me in a match. It seemed to help his conditioning and late match movement although I don't know the specifics of his routine. I can ask if you'd like.
Make sure you get a speed rope. Regular jump ropes are very slow.

-Bambino Plasma
 

Gmedlo

Professional
One of the basic premise of Tabata training is that the activity must be at maximal effort, something that a jump rope won't really allow. You're limited by your technique, and if you really wanted maximal effort while jump roping, you would have to jump as high as you can on every jump and spin the rope as many times as you can after every single jump, making it very impractical for Tabata. I would instead try it on a stationary bike with adjustable resistance.

An old user named Ano had some great posts on HIIT and Tabata that you should search for.
 

plasma

Banned
Hi Gmedlo, thanks for the education on this school of exercise thought. Could the same theory or principle be applied to a more controlled precision exercise, or is that not true tabata waza?
domo arigato g'zai masthta

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBEeHSdlIYU
although her explaination of the history is amazing the demonstration looks like some scary dangerous fly by night crossfit crap; they probably get half a million people doing it at least with that cool name though...

I couldn't watch the whole thing but she said something at the end which I took umbrage to. She said at the end of this you should be breathing so hard you cant talk. In boxing we train ridiculous co ordination by making sure the athlete tries to breath normally and have the ability to talk while straining intensely.
It humors/saddens me that the bored insecure fools at the gym seem to be looking for new and more ballistic ways to waste their bodies minds and precious time, and share their harmful fly by night conditioning theories, passing them off as fact.
 

Bella

New User
Thanks for the information everyone. That last link looks very interesting.

I do think the jump rope will be sufficient for me. I tried it and my heart rate was maxed by the second interval. Maybe if it gets easier I will move to another type of activity, but I think the jump rope should last me a while. :)
 
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