06 Nov The Benefits of Explosive Training
HIIT, Met-Con, P90X, and Circuit training are all methods of exercising that are intended to promote maximal metabolic response and cardiovascular conditioning through explosive and high-intensity workouts. This form of training is awesome for really igniting your fat cells and promoting muscular toning, even growth. Many people don’t know the explosive movements usually found in these styles of conditioning are also very beneficial in more ways than just incinerating your fat.
Halo Neuroscience explains, explosiveness is the neuromuscular system’s ability to generate high action velocities. By training our fast twitch muscles and engaging in explosive activities, we are making our brain have to quickly signal the muscular contraction that creates the velocity, better establishing the mind to muscle connection. When we have a strong mind to muscle connection we can achieve better muscle activation and recruitment in our lifts. This is important for many reasons including avoidance of muscular imbalance and injury as well as maximal muscular gain.
Targeting our fast twitch muscles can also help sharpen our reaction time. When we are working with quick movements, our brain is working quickly and our body is reacting rapidly to the surrounding stimulus. This is actively sharpening our proprioception, our bodies awareness in space and time, and can be implemented in our daily lives. For instance, you are out walking and an attacker jumps out of the bushes! You are most likely going to have a much faster reaction time as well as a faster break away from having trained your fast twitch muscles and that may have just saved your life!
Check out these moves you can cycle into your fitness program to work on your fast twitch muscle fibers and burn maximal calories. Use these in a HIIT circuit or couples with a low impact exercise like squats or deadlifts on your next leg day to add some cardio and dimension to your lift. It’s always good to step outside the box and try something new!