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chair workout feature image
While you might try to work out as often as you can, it's often tough to find the hour or so you need to get in a solid sweat session. But your fitness doesn’t have to suffer if you’re short on time. According to new research, all you need is seven minutes.
That’s the key takeaway from a new study published in The Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness. For the study, researchers had 29 people between the ages of 18 and 30 do a daily seven-minute workout that combined aerobic and resistance exercises, every day for six weeks. After the six weeks, the researchers found that people who did the workout had a lower BMI, decreased waist and hip circumference, and lower fat mass than before they started.
The research also found that for those who didn't need to lose weight, this exercise formula increased cardio gains.
Here's the best bit. The workout actually isn’t anything you haven’t done before. According to lead study author Lama Mattar, Ph.D., an assistant professor of nutrition at Lebanese American University, it’s very simple.
7-Minute Workout
The Workout:
You do a high-intensity short-duration workout of 12 exercises performed over 30 seconds, with a 10-second rest period between.
The Exercises:
• jumping jacks
• wall sits
• push ups
• crunches
• step ups onto chair
• squats
• triceps dips
• planks
• high knees running in place
• lunges
• pushups
That’s it. "It can be done in a small space and requires just a chair as material," says Mattar.
The workout is so effective because it’s just like any other high-intensity interval training, which pushes your body to maximum capacity, he says. 'It is very short and can be done at home or in the garden which gives flexibility to busy individuals that have time constrains,' Mattar adds.
Unfortunately, you can’t work out for seven minutes a day for the rest of your life and expect to be super-fit. "The seven-minute workout will not replace a full and complete workout program but it is a good entry point to improved fitness and body weight control," Mattar says. Still, when you’re pressed for time, it’s not a bad option at all.
Ready, set, sweat.
Want more chair workouts? Here are 3 by top trainers that are currently online.
ALICE LIVEING'S CHAIR WORKOUT
KAYLA ITSINES' LADDER WORKOUT
SAMANTHA MCGOWAN'S FULL-BODY CHAIR WORKOUT
This article originally appeared on Harper’s BAZAAR UK.
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