Tabata training: one of the most energetically effective high-intensity intermittent training methods

Introduction

Interval training has been used for decades by elite athletes seeking to improve their sports performance [1]. The interval training method known as Fartlek training was invented by the Swedish coach Gösta Holmér in the 1930s [2]. Dr. Woldemar Gershler also formalized a structured system of interval training in Germany in the 1930s [3]. Interval training was popularized by the Czech runner Emil Zátopek, who won gold medals in the 5000- and 10,000-m races as well as the marathon at the Helsinki Olympic games in 1952 [4].

Thus, interval training itself is not new, and it was extensively investigated during the 1970s. The effects of high-intensity interval training on the human body’s aerobic energy-releasing system were thoroughly examined by Edward Fox [1, 5]. He showed that the improvement of the body’s maximal oxygen uptake (VO₂max) after high-intensity interval training is linearly related to the oxygen demand (expressed as % VO₂max) of the high-intensity interval training, indicating that exercise intensity is a key factor for the improvement of the body’s maximal aerobic power after high-intensity interval training [5–7]. Further, Fox showed that the improvement of the VO₂max after high-intensity interval training performed 2 days/week is not different from that achieved by training with this regimen 4 days/week [5, 7]. Since 3 days/week is the recommended frequency of training to improve the VO₂max by conventional moderate-intensity exercise training, it is apparent that high-intensity interval training is a potent stimulus for improving one’s maximal aerobic power [8]. Thus, high-intensity exercises and training have been used by elite athletes to improve their performance in sports, as such high-intensity exercise was shown to extensively recruit the aerobic energy-supplying system, resulting in the increased maximal oxygen uptake that is the most reliable factor for endurance.

New and important information about high-intensity interval training became available in 1980—i.e., the anaerobic profile of high-intensity interval training. There had been a lack of quantification of anaerobic energy during high-intensity exercise before the 1980s, when the late Lars Hermansen proposed a method [9, 10] for quantifying the anaerobic energy release that uses the accumulated oxygen deficit, which was first introduced by Krogh and Lindhard in 1920 [11]. The anaerobic energy release...