CARDIO OPTIONS
Cardio Movements Defined
Anytime we are doing a “Cardio” movement in a PPF workout, the primary intention is to get the heart rate up, most likely for a relatively sustained amount of time. That sounds sort of silly if you’ve done any high intensity weightlifting or gymnastics, because as you may well know, ANY movement can keep your heart rate up if you do it for long enough with enough intensity!
So what makes our “Cardio” elements different? In general, the “Cardio” movements shouldn’t be as muscularly intense. One way to think about it, is that these should be movements that are quick and endlessly repeatable. Think of the running stride, pedaling a bike, or jumping rope. These are tiny movements that take a fraction of a second to complete and you could potentially do hundreds or thousands of times in a row without stopping. Rowing has a slightly longer cadence, but it is similar in its ability to be repeated hundreds of times in a row if necessary.
Now think of something like… a push up, a deadlift, a pull up… these are very muscularly demanding! If I offered you $1000 to do push ups continuously, without ever stopping your body, for 60min, would you be able to? Highly doubtful. What if I offered you the same $1000 to keep pedaling a bike without stopping for 60min? You’d be 1k richer! This is an easy way to think about “Cardio” movements in our programming.
Cardio Equivalents
The traditional cardio movements we use are: Running, Biking, Jumping Rope, and Rowing. Below is a handy chart that I found that gives some easy ball-park estimates for equating a one movement to another. As you can see, there is a lot of wiggle room here, so choose which option is best for you depending on the specific workout!
Alternative Cardio Options
Depending on your fitness level, here is a list of options that you can swap into any workout that calls for the traditional running, biking, or rowing. There are a few rules/guidelines though…
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Because these are alternative options, most of them carry with them a higher level of muscular demand than the traditional cardio options. That means that depending on your level and how long the cardio is, these have the potential to make you far more sore than usual! Be very careful not to overdo it and if you need help navigating this issue, please reach out for help!
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Because of the same muscular demand from #1, you also need to look ahead to your next workout of the week to make sure you aren’t causing too much interference. Meaning, the reason these PPF workouts are so effective in the long haul is that we vary the muscle groups in each workout. If you use the exact same muscles or movements with high intensity on back to back days, you could dig yourself a hole and potentially do damage. This could lead to at best, intense soreness and at worst, injury! Example, let’s say a workout calls for 3 rounds of 400m runs. That’s about a two minute endeavor, so you decide to do burpees instead of the run. You get 25 burpees in place of each run, so you total 75 burpees. Then the next day, the workout has 100 push ups in it… a burpee and a push up are very nearly the exact same mechanics for your upper body. This is what we’d call muscular interference and we want to avoid that!
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Feel free to mix and match! If the programming calls for 3 rounds of 800m run (ew!) that is about 12 minutes of “cardio.” I would not want to do burpees for 12 minutes! In that case I might do one minute of Move A, one minute of Move B, etc. and mix and match my way to the total amount of Cardio time.
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Jump Rope - Freestyle
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Jump Rope - Single Unders
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Jump Rope - Double Unders
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Jumping Jacks
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Shadowboxing (Tae Bo!)
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Battle Ropes
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Cardio Machine (Elliptical, Spin Bike, Stairmaster)
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Dancing!
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Marching in Place
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Walking
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Plank Variations (Use with Caution - very muscularly intense!): Front Plank, Side Plank, Around the World Planks, Plank Shoulder Taps