Any sort of exercise that doesn’t require oxygen to break down glucose for energy is referred to as anaerobic exercise. It offers a number of important health advantages! The anaerobic category includes weightlifting, HIIT exercise, pilates, and yoga.
There is a vast array of physical activities available, including salsa dance, ice skating, and handball (just watch the Olympics late at night if you need any proof). You can also believe that all forms of exercise employ the same energetic pathways despite the fact that the specifics of how you move your body can vary. Yet that’s not exactly accurate.
For instance, the way anaerobic activity consumes energy is different from how other sorts of activities do.
Anaerobic activity, as opposed to aerobic exercise (often known as cardio among gym visitors), burns glucose without the need of oxygen. Sprinting, HIIT training, squats, and vinyasa yoga are a few examples of anaerobic exercise. Anaerobic exercise can improve your mood, strengthen your bones, and burn fat.
Want to take advantage of the numerous advantages of this movement? Here is your comprehensive reference on anything anaerobic.
- What is anaerobic exercise?
Let’s spend a few moment obsessing over word origins. The Greek words a (“without”), ar (“air”), and bios (“life”) combine to form the word anaerobic, which meaning “able to live without oxygen.”
Also, Read- Five Quick Methods for Boosting Walking Stamina and Endurance.
Anaerobic exercise is appropriately described by this etymological root. Anaerobic exercise causes your muscles to contract more quickly than your body can deliver oxygen, unlike aerobic exercise, which uses oxygen to break down glucose molecules in the blood.
So, just how does this operate? Join us for the second geek-out phase, which will focus on science.
In the form of glycogen, your body stores glucose, which comes from the carbs in the food you eat, in your muscles. Muscle cells access glycogen during anaerobic activity and separate it into individual glucose molecules. Next, through a procedure known as lactic acid fermentation, these are converted into energy.
The amount of energy produced by this approach of utilising glucose for energy is not as high as that of aerobic exercise, while being effective. Due to this, most anaerobic training is performed in short bursts, such as the force required to raise a heavy barbell above your head or squat deeply.
- Exercise types: aerobic vs. anaerobic
Anaerobic exercise is distinct from aerobic exercise in that it attempts to provide energy for movement without using oxygen. It uses a different method, as previously mentioned, to access that crucial glucose.
Contrarily, aerobic exercise fuels workouts by using the oxygen in your breath. Your breath becomes deeper and your heart rate rises during aerobic exercises like jogging, swimming, or cycling. Your blood arteries even enlarge to let more oxygen-rich blood reach your chest, arms, and legs’ major muscle groups.
Aerobic exercise can be done for extended lengths of time because it involves a continuous cycle of breath and newly oxygenated blood. (Consider running a marathon, swimming the English Channel, or, for those of us who are more reasonable, taking a 30-minute bike ride around the neighbourhood.)
- Benefits of aerobic exercise
Anaerobic exercise has significant advantages despite taking place in brief spurts. These are a few amazing results of feeding your workout without oxygen.
- May help with weight loss
It would be difficult to discover an activity that doesn’t help you lose weight because exercising your muscles in any way requires energy, which burns calories that you’ve consumed from meals.
But historically, aerobic exercises have been preferred for weight loss than anaerobic ones. However more recent research indicates that anaerobic exercises like high-intensity interval training (HIIT) can be just as successful in burning fat as cardio sweat sessions.
For instance, a 2021 analysis that looked at 12 reviews and 149 studies discovered that, as long as energy expenditure was the same, there was no difference between aerobic and HIIT training in terms of weight reduction or fat loss.
Another study from 2015 found that obese persons who only did anaerobic exercises still lost a considerable amount of weight, even if their weight loss was larger when they also engaged in aerobic exercise.
- Improves bone health
What do yoga, jumping rope, and weightlifting have in common? Any of these anaerobic resistance exercises can increase your bone strength and density.
By such exercises, you place stress on your bones, which causes the body to stimulate bone-forming cells and thereby strengthen your skeleton.
- Could make you feel better
Anaerobic exercises may help to dispel some of your negative feelings.
Anxiety symptoms were markedly reduced in a small 2020 research of young individuals who regularly lifted weights. Resistance training exercise was linked to significantly lower levels of depressive symptoms, according to a 2021 analysis that included 33 randomised clinical trials.
- May protect your heart
Yes, cardiovascular exercise is important for your heart, but (surprise!) anaerobic exercise is also beneficial for your cardiovascular system. According to research, this kind of activity can lower lipid levels, which are linked to an increased risk of heart disease.
- Improves your balance and posture.
Maintaining eagle pose or performing your maximum bench press requires concentration and focus. These kind of anaerobic exercises put your balance to the test and can aid in the development of good posture. To improve your physical balance, use anaerobic exercises like yoga, pilates, and weightlifting.
- Various forms of aerobic exercise
Your body uses more energy during anaerobic exercise than your aerobic system can provide. Short bursts of high power can be used to carry out this kind of activity. Anaerobic activity includes, for instance:
- HIIT workout
- Using weights
- Pilates and vinyasa yoga
- Sprinting
- Pushups, lunges, squats, and pull-ups are examples of bodyweight exercises.
Safety guidelines for aerobic activity
If an injury keeps you from participating, you won’t be improving your fitness. It’s crucial to workout anaerobically while remaining safe. Following are some general principles:
- Wear fitting clothes that won’t catch or grab on the gym’s equipment.
- Choose running shoes with strong traction (and replace them as they wear out)
- Work under a trainer’s direction until you are comfortable with your skills and knowledge.
- Never lift heavy weights without a spotter.
- Keep hydrated, especially if you’re exercising outside in the heat.
- Stretching should be done before beginning any vigorous exercises to warm up.
- Stop doing what you’re doing if you’re not feeling well.
Conclusion:
Anaerobic exercises completely deserve a spot alongside your regular cardio (also known as aerobic) exercises because of their numerous advantages.
Your body will become more accustomed to this kind of workout the more you do it, which will ultimately make it feel less taxing. And you might be shocked to learn that exercises like strength training or a regular yoga practise have a significant impact on problems like weight management, heart health, and posture.
Now start putting some bite-sized bursts of energy into action by grabbing some free weights or a pull-up bar! Although they do not consume oxygen, they can certainly be a breath of fresh air.
