UKH

Hi, I'm looking at starting HIIT to improve anaerobic fitness for running, swimming, and boxing. For the high intensity portion it's suggested to run at 80-95% of my MHR, except that I don't have a heart rate monitor. Is it possible/worthwhile to simply sprint for a certain time/distance rather than knowing exactly what percentage of my MHR I'm at? If not is there a decent way of doing HIIT which doesn't require a HR monitor or do I just have to suck it up and buy one?

Thank you very much for your help and advice.

In reply to O'Donopoo:personally If I was doing it I wouldn’t use a HR anyway. You only run for what, 20 secs, so how would you accurately measure it? Just run fast for the allotted time. 

Probably best to run up a slight incline so that you are not flat out sprinting which is a good way to get injured.

btw as I understand it it doesn’t work by improving anaerobic performance per se (‘anaerobic fitness’ is a meaningless term), rather it is supposed to raise your metabolic rate. 

 

In reply to O'Donopoo:

HR is no good for high intensity. Use pace. 

In reply to O'Donopoo:

I am trying to build pace by doing fast intervals; just running fast for a rough-and-readily measured distance. No HR monitor and really don't want to get too techy or anatomical! There was a very good thread here a few weeks back and someone said 8 x 400m or 4 x 800m or 3 x 1km once or twice a week with a rest day afterwards, and I am doing that fairly informally (distance measures using gb mapomoeter). I work in London and Regent's Park has some very convenient 400m paths ...

In reply to O'Donopoo:

Hi,

Not sure of exact plan or training you are doing, but HR is useless for anything less than (approximately) 3 minutes. 

Below that you can do it by power on a bike, or perceived effort running or in the pool. As you get more experienced you'll get better at evaluating perceived effort. Whilst running you can also use a watch that shows pace but acceleration will get lost in this. Then it is simply a matter of effort time and rest period.

Hope that helps. 

 

You don't need a HRM, the whole point of HIIT is you're doing maximal efforts. If you're doing 80% it ain't HIIT!