Why Beginners Need to Be Careful With The Assault Bike

Beginners, especially those who have been sedentary for extended periods of time, need to be very careful about jumping straight into high intensity outputs. Yes, high intensity training is safe and can be done by beginners, but that doesn’t mean there should be a goal to put yourself in a position where you are putting your health at risk through raising the intensity so high.

If we were to consider a beginner and their approach to strength training, no coach with any experience would start by doing heavy singles. The same approach should be taken with high intensity interval training.

HIIT Doesn’t Mean 100%

The first thing we need to realise is that high intensity training doesn’t have to be a complete max effort, 100% all out effort. It can be another over 80% heart rate maximum. That means that those who are just starting with high intensity training and those just starting with cardiovascular training should try and hover around the 70-80% mark. They will still see great adaptations from this style of training and will not put themselves in a position of danger.

The idea that all high intensity outputs need to be 100% is a complete misnomer that needs to be removed from the fitness industry. Imagine if every time we wanted to increase strength we performed max lifts, it would lead to injury and over training and would not be sustainable.

Building A Cardiovascular Base

Before a beginner, especially a sedentary one with poor cardiovascular fitness, starts high intensity interval training they should try and build a base of cardiovascular training using zone 2 training. My clients can do base building for a few month before being introduced to high intensity interval training.

Heart Rate Recovery Awareness

A good way to gauge if the intervals are too intense or not is if your heart rate is able to come back down to warm up levels after 2-3 minutes of rest. If it is not able to come back down then it is highly likely that these intervals were too intense for the moment. More advanced individuals can perform outputs that keep their heart rate high, but I would not recommend it for beginners.

Try These 3 Assault Bike Workouts for Beginners

Workout 1

3 x 3 minutes on 3 minutes off @70-80%

This will give you a chance to feel out what high intensity interval training might feel like on the assault bike. If in doubt about the percentage, start too easy and go from there.

Workout 2

5 x 1 minute on 1 minute off at set intensity.

The assault bike will give you the cadence your currently pedalling at, this is akin to the speed or intensity. During these intervals you would select an intensity that you find challenging but that will by no means put you into high levels of fatigue. This is obviously dependant on the individual and their current abilities. With my clients I will start easy here and build slowly over time week by week for a couple of weeks before changing the session structure. Through setting specfic intensities we are ensuring that the intervals are not max output tests, this is similar to setting the weights for a strength training session.

Workout 3

30-45 minutes at a conversational pace. (50-60%)

This workout is not a high intensity workout but a low intensity one and will do wonders for your cardiovascular system development. I highly recommend doing both HIIT and LISS workouts within your week to develop a well rounded cardiovascular system.