So leaving the importance of VO2max aside, the study demonstrated that ET training was less effective in improving it than IT training backed by very little ET training (10% by volume of the ET group) – BOTH during the first and second three weeks.

Some sports, like wrestling, MMA, Brasilian Jiu Jitsu, other sports i’m sure as well, are fairly short duration, but 100%-you’re-gonna-die-kind of intensity. In the above cases, usually one to three 3-5 minute rounds for the competition.

Question: In training for this type of sport, do you think Tabata training takes on a greater significance?

Thanks.

My eyes probably have those black and white spriails in them from reading he crossfit boards discussion on the subject, not to mention every other subject.

It is great that Crossfit motivates a lot of people, but it’s a reach to say it’s effective because it is true. There’s a lot of salesmenship going on there that blurs disintctions.

In particular, I agree that the fact that a 70% VO2max workout was also performed on day 5 is key. Why would Tabata insert unless he believed it would make a difference. The object of the study was perhaps to show that *less* aerobic conditioning is still effective, when supplemented with his intervals. He wasn’t trying to show that it wasn’t needed at all. That would be another test (which others have done). By why a 20:10 interval has become such a dogma? He could have tested 15:15 or 20:20 just as easily. Perhaps others should.

Personally I like intervals because they reduce the monotony. I get a bigger charge from them.
They work for me. But I also like an occasional long run, swim or bike. I never like a long row however. Too grueling! Still, I find that I’m injured more at longer distances than at higher speeds.

So great article, great site. Looking forward to reading more. Thank you !

There are some people who don’t benefit from steady-state aerobic training – for example, (C. Bouchard et al. 1999) put a large sample of sedentary people through a similar 70%VO2max/40min regime and found that around 10% improved their VO2max and endurance not at all even after months of full compliance. Such “low responders” have a genetically limited training adaptation.

Do you think that a Tabata regime might be more or less useful for such individuals? Is there a possibility that interval training might improve fitness where continuous aerobic does not?

I ask because I’m sort of running a personal trial with a sample size of one on this. My VO2max effort on a stationary cycle is around 140 watts (yes, confirmed by labs). Four years of 75%VO2max*40min*5day/wk hasn’t improved this by so much as a single watt, so after learning about the Tabata protocol recently I’ve been trying to replicate it as exactly as possible: ie, a work interval of 240 watts at 100rpm, which works out to failure in the seventh set. Three weeks into this I perceive a modest benefit — I’ve increased workload once to 251 watts to keep failure in set 7 — but now your article makes me wonder if there’s further improvement to be had, or if that three weeks’ gain was the limit.

In general, folks who are anaerobic dominant can start hard and fast but tend to die quickly b/c they rely too heavily on anaerobic metabolism. You might want to read the long series I’m doing on endurance training methods for more on the topic of actual training.