Cardio Questions

[Sh8kin]

OK, so I have decided to incorporate HIIT Cardio into my training. I have a few questions that have been on the back of my mind. Here goes.

1. Do I need to eat more calories to compensate on cardio days? For example, if you need 2000 calories for maintenience and your diet consists of 2000 calories, but then you do cardio, should you eat more to meet that 2000? Same with cutting, etc. I don't want to start losing muscle.
2. Should I have a post cardio shake? What?
3. I will be doing the cardio on my non-lifting days, so 2-3 days a week. Each session will be 20 minutes. I was thinking I would do it maybe twice a day? Once in the mornings and then later again that day. Is this not needed or would it provide some benefit? I guess the question is, Is it too much?

This is all at the moment. I will add to the list if I think of any more.

TIA-

 

[dfauteux]

I was curious about HIIT also, what the heck does it mean? High intensity must be, but how is it different from normal cardio? Do you go as fast as you can?

 

[musclepump]

HIIT works the cardiovascular system differently. Rather than slow, continually easy/moderate pace, you push yourself for short periods of time. By doing this you're often able to do less time but earn the same results.

Sh8kin> Are you cutting? If not, why are you doing this much cardio? And why HIIT especially if you're not cutting?

 

[Sh8kin]

Yes, I am cutting at the moment. Is 2 -3 days of cardio considered "a lot"? I was just going to incorporate it on my non-lifting days. Probably 2 days a week. So my example week would be:


Day1 - Lift
Day2 - Lift
Day3 - Off / Cardio
Day4 - Lift
Day5 - Lift
Day6 - Off / Cardio
Day7 - Off

Sorry if my post wasn't too clear, the example I gave in Q1 was for maintaining but I also wanted to know if the rules were the same for Bulking, Cutting, etc? ie.

 

[musclepump]

Of my 17 weeks of pre-contest dieting, I was losing good weight simply by diet through the first 14 weeks. It depends on how your body responds as to how much you need to do.

 

[Sh8kin]

Well, I'll see how my body responds to the 2 days of cardio. I'll just do 2 20-minute sessions a week on my non-lifting days as described above and see how it works out.