Building a Better Cardio Workout: Aerobic Versus Anaerobic

The common mistake that a lot of people make when designing a cardiovascular exercise program is not considering whether what they’re doing is aerobic or anaerobic. Aerobic exercise is exercise that, by definition, works with oxygen.

Anaerobic exercise is exercise that works without oxygen. An example of aerobic exercise would be jogging several miles over the course of an hour: it will tire you out and tax your system, but it’s also time consuming. It will take much longer to get you breathing very heavily with an aerobic activity than it would take if you were to perform an anaerobic activity. An anaerobic activity would be doing something such as sprinting; it’s a fast, all-out endeavor, and at the end of it, you’re breathing heavily and feel somewhat tired, though the sprint itself may only have taken less than a minute in duration.

Aerobic exercise consumes a lot of time, and does not necessarily burn more calories or fat than anaerobic exercise. Anaerobic exercise has been shown to spike the metabolism for much longer than aerobic exercise, takes less time (so you can do more anaerobic exercise, or whatever else you want. Makes for much more efficient consumption of time.), and, generally, is less stressful on your joints. The thinking behind the joint-thing is this: which is harder on your body? Your feet hitting the ground a thousand times over an hour, or your feet hitting the ground considerably harder, but only fifteen or twenty times, over a minute or less?

Most agree that, unless you have some sort of bone problem, the latter is the best choice.

Now, what should be considered when designing an anaerobic routine? For one, you will want to gas-out (that is, run out of energy) in less than 10 or 15 minutes. Some of you may be thinking that anyone who gases out in 10 or 15 minutes is obviously not fit. If you are one of those people, I suggest you actually try a short, intense anaerobic workout.

A good variation of an anaerobic workout is the Tabata Protocol; that is, a short burst of intense effort followed by a short rest, and this pattern repeated several times. Exercises that work well with this protocol include burpees, high-rep pushups, bodyweight squats, jumping jacks, punch-outs (for the boxers, kickboxers, and bathroom-warriors among us.), sprints, and other movements that can be done quickly. For the hardcore among us, try doing Tabata Protocol situps (or v-ups.): 30 seconds all-out situps, 30 seconds rest, repeated 5 times. If you can do it, you’re likely not giving your all on the situps. Or you’re some sort of rare genetic freak. You could take that as a compliment.

Anaerobic activity has many more benefits than simple aerobic activity: shorter, more intense, spikes metabolism harder, and is easier, long-term, on the joints. In addition, anaerobic activity increases both anaerobic capacity as well as aerobic capacity, whereas aerobic activity only increase aerobic capacity.

Good luck, future anaerobic warriors!