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LifeSprints Exercise

Below is a summary and overview of the 8-second fat loss study, the FEM trial,

the DART trial, ongoing research at UNSW, tips for doing LifeSprints, and a

website where LifeSprints music can be purchased

Steve Boutcher PhD, FACSM

Director of Fat Loss Laboratory, Faculty of Medicine, UNSW 27/06/2012

1. Overview of LifeSprints. LifeSprints is a time-efficient form of exercise that has consistently

results in more fat loss and greater reductions in insulin resistance than conventional exercise such

as walking and jogging. It is much shorter than typical fat loss exercise programs and consists of 20

minutes of exercise with 8 minutes being sprinting and 12 minutes slow pedalling. It has been

shown that overweight people and a range of patients with disease can perform intermittent

sprinting without problems of complications. For a review of high intensity intermittent exercise

effects see Boutcher (2011). We think that this form of exercise gives a more complete muscle fibre

work put by challenging the fast twitch and fast twitch oxidative Type II fibres, whereas the 12-second recovery challenges the Type I slow twitch fibres. We have carried out LifeSprints with a

number of different exercise modalities (e.g., running, outside walking, swimming, rowing, boxing,

skip jumping, stair walking, and arm ergometry) and all get the heart rates in the high range except

for swimming and outside walking. Most modalities are best performed with the 8/12 second

protocol, however, rowing is probably better suited to a 12/24 second protocol. LifeSprints are best

performed to music rather than timing each sprint.

2. 8-second fat loss study. Forty five women aged 20 years with a BMI of 23.5 kg/m2 were

randomly assigned to a high intensity intermittent exercise (LifeSprints) condition, a steady state

exercise (SSE) condition, or a control condition. Body fat was assessed by DEXA, pre and post

after the 15 week program. Blood was taken before and after to examine possible changes in

cholesterol, HDL, LDL, triglycerides, insulin, C-Reactive protein, glucose, adiponectin, leptin, and

cortisol. The LifeSprints program consisted of an 8-second sprint immediately followed by 12

seconds of slow pedaling. Women performed this continuously so that they completed 60 sprints in

the 20-minute exercise bout. There were three exercise sessions per week; 45 overall. Women

started the LifeSprints condition for only 10 minutes the first week and then built up the number of

minutes and intensity of sprint. Intensity was assessed through a maximal oxygen uptake test

performed previously so that the workload at a respiratory exchange ratio (RER) of .93 (about 60%

VO2peak) was used for each individual woman. This equated to about 90% of flat out sprinting for

most women. All women were completing the 20 minutes of LifeSprints within 6 sessions (2

weeks). Most women performed at a pedaling rate of 100-120 at a resistance of .5 to 1 kg. The SSEconsisted of three 40-minute continuous stationary bike exercise at 60% of peak oxygen uptake.

Both conditions had a 5-minute warm-up and a 5-minute cool-down. RESULTS: SSE women

increased body fat slightly by .5 kg whereas LifeSprints lost 2.5 kg. The women who lost the least

fat in the LifeSprints group were the leanest with an average BMI of below 20 kg/m 2. When these

women were removed average fat lost for the rest of the women was 3.9 kg. Two women in the

group lost between 8-9 kg of fat. The fat loss in the LifeSprints was disproportionate with the

women losing more fat off their legs than their arms. LifeSprints women also lost significant fat

from their abdomen which suggests that this type of exercise may be particularly successful with

men. LifeSprints women decreased fasting insulin by 31% and SSE women by 8%. Both exercise

groups increased their aerobic fitness; the SSE by 19%, and surprisingly, the LifeSprints group by

26%. Blood lipids did not change (all were normal at pretest). In summary, LifeSprints women lostabout three times more fat doing about half the exercise. LifeSprints also had a dramatic effect on

fasting insulin levels. This research was one study in Gail Trapps PhD program completed at

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UNSW. If you are considering trying this type of program it would be beneficial to touch bases with

an accredited EP (Exercise Physiologist) to check out your suitability. You should also consult with

your GP if you have any risk factors (e.g., on any medication) or health problems.

Co-researchers in the fat loss research program are: Yati Boutcher, UNSW; Sarah Dunn: University

of La Verne; Professor Don Chisholm: Garvan Institute; Judy Freund: St Vincents Hospital;

Mehrdad Heydari PhD candidate UNSW; Ehsan Ghahramanloo PhD candidate UNSW.

3. The FEM Trial: LifeSprints is only one important component of an optimal fat loss program.

We have recently finished the FEM trial which represents Fish oils, Exercise, and a Mediterranean

diet. We believed this combination should have a greater effect on fat loss and metabolic stability

than LifeSprints alone. Thirty two women undertook a 12-week program consisting of supervised

LifeSprints, fish oil supplement, and a Mediterranean diet at UNSW. Thus, the plan was to

undertake a 12-week kickstart program to normalize womens body weight and metabolism in as

brief a time as possible. Results were that women decreased body fat by 2.6 kg (8.2%) in 12 weeks.

Two women in the group lost between 8-9 kg of fat. LifeSprints women decreased fasting insulin

by 34% and IL-6 (a low-grade inflammation marker) by 38%. Aerobic fitness increased by 18%

and triglycerides decreased by 18%. FEM women improved their diet and reduced their caloricintake by 15%. More data are currently being analyzed for this trial. Sarah Dunn was the

coordinator of the FEM study and she has recently finished her PhD and now has an academic

position at the University of La Verne, USA.

4. The DART LifeSprints trial: our previous research has only used females as subjects. We

predict, however, that LifeSprints will be more impactful on the body fat of overweight males. This

trial is similar to the one described in (1) except the length of training was 12 weeks and we also are

examined visceral, spinal, and hepatic fat change (CT scan) with LifeSprints. Young males were

randomly assigned to either a LifeSprint (n = 20) or Control group (n = 18). The LifeSprint group

exercised three times per week for 20 minutes, for 12 weeks. The LifeSprint group had significant

reductions in total body mass, total fat mass, BMI, waist/hip circumference, arm, leg, trunk, and

central abdominal, and visceral fat (17%) compared to the control group. The reduction in the

dangerous visceral fat took significantly less time than that brought about by aerobic exercise. The

LifeSprint group also had a significant increase in lean tissue mass in the leg and trunk muscles (1.2

kg). Muscle mass is typically unchanged with aerobic exercise. As muscle mass declines with

dieting it is feasible that LifeSprints is a better form of exercise to include with dietary intervention.

There were no significant changes in hepatic fat for either group. The exercising group also had a

significant increase in maximal oxygen uptake. Thus, a LifeSprint protocol of three sessions a week

for 12 weeks produced significant fat reductions in many regions of the body, increased aerobic

power, and increased fat utilisation during exercise.

5. The DART Green Tea trial: we are currently examining the effect of LifeSprints and green tea

on fat loss.We have recently shown thatingesting green tea before LifeSprints increases fat

oxidation at rest and after exercise. This manuscript is under review (Ghahramanloo, Wang,

Boutcher, & Boutcher). Acute Lifesprints results in elevated catecholamines and green tea slows

down catecholamine degradation. Catecholamines are the major fat burning hormones. Thus,

regular Lifesprints and green tea may result in greater decreases in body fat and increases in

metabolic health. This trial is similar to the DART trial except subjects will be exercising with

green tea ingestion over 12 weeks.

6. Barriers to fat loss: will you lose fat if you carry out a program as described above? Maybe,

however, not all individuals will lose fat. Losing fat is NOT simply brought about by eating lessand exercising more. We know this combination is not particularly successful. The design of fat

loss programs should be based on an in-depth examination of many individual factors that may

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hinder or prevent the body from burning fat. For example, birth weight, muscle fibre type,

mitochondrial inefficiency, inflammation status, free radical status, adipocyte and muscle cell

insulin resistance, resting metabolic rate, virus history, quality of sleep, amount of daily stress,

ethnicity, weight cycling history, and many more factors effect our ability to lose fat (see Boutcher

& Dunn, 2009). These factors should be assessed by qualified individuals. Also many of the facts

we hear about weight loss are myths. For example, the evidence is overwhelming that starvation

diets make people fat and obese. They also bring about more lifestyle diseases such as heart disease.Another myth is that eating fat makes you fat or eating a low fat diet makes you thin. In our

Mediterranean diet, clients typically will eat more fat and more calories. However, the fats are

good fats called monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats which are found in fish and nuts. The

most important message is to eat a lot of unprocessed foods such as fruits and vegetables. Dont

worry about having to learn to read food labels but eat foods that dont have a label! In general,

unprocessed foods contain a variety of phytonutrients which directly or indirectly turn on fat

burning in fat cells. The data supporting the ability of the Mediterranean diet to lose weight and

reduce heart and other disease is strong. So people should not starve themselves but should eat

unprocessed foods that excite fat burning. Processed foods, in general, produce the opposite effect

by turning on fat storage. They also make many cells operate inefficiently resulting in overweight

and problems such as high cholesterol levels. Fat loss programs are best done under the supervisionof a team of professionals so that clients do not waste energy and money carrying out programs that

will not work because their bodies have been programmed to store fat rather than to burn fat. Thus,

we believe the key to fat loss is to adopt a way of life that allows your cells to burn fat.

Publications:

Boutcher, S.H. (in press). Variation in adipose tissue mass loss in the obese. In Hansen D. (Ed.),Exercise

Therapy in Adult Obesity.Nova Publishers.

Heydari, M., Freund, J., & Boutcher, S.H. (2012). The effect of high-intensity

intermittent exercise onbody composition of overweight young males. Journal of Obesity. Volume 2012,

Article ID480467, doi: 10.1155/2012/480467

Boutcher, S.H. (2011). The effects of high intensity intermittent exercise on fat loss.Journal of Obesity,

671-680.

Boutcher, S.H., Dunn, S.L., Trapp, E.G., & Freund, J. (2011). Leg fat mass predictsinsulin resistance in

young European and Asian Australian women. Scandanavian Journal of Clinicaland Laboratory

Investigation, 71, 653-657.

Boutcher, S.H., & Dunn, S. (2009). Factors that may impede the weight loss responseto exercise-based

interventions. Obesity Reviews, 10, 6, 671-680.

Dunn, S.L., Sui, W., Freund, J., & Boutcher, S.H. The effects of exercise and dietaryintervention ofmetabolic syndrome markers of overweight women (Under review Medicine &

Science in

Sports & Exercise).

Ghahramanloo, E., Wang, R., Boutcher, Y.N., and Boutcher S.H. Green tea, intermittent sprinting exercise,

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and fat oxidation. (Under review Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise).

Hamer, M., Boutcher, Y.N., & Boutcher, S.H. (2007). Fatness is related to bluntedvascular stress

responsitivity, independent of cardiorespiratory fitness in normal andoverweight men.

International Journal of Psychophysiology, 63, 251-257.

Trapp, G., Chisholm, D., Freund, J. & Boutcher, S.H. (2008). The effect of high-intensity,intermittent

exercise training on fat loss and fasting insulin levels of young women.International Journal of

Obesity, 32, 684-691.

Trapp, G., Chisholm, D., & Boutcher, S.H. (2007). Metabolic response to high intensityintermittent

cycle exercises.American Journal of Physiology, 293, R2370-R2375.

7. Other research in this area: as mentioned above we are also interested in finding out why

some people cannot lose fat when they exercise or diet. With some individuals their bodies want to

store fat rather than oxidize (or burn) fat. Currently, we are completing a series of studies that

examine the interaction between bioactive supplements (such as green tea) and LifeSprints. Our

first results are really promising and as mentioned we are conducting a randomized trial examining

the effects of 12 weeks of LifeSprints and green tea on body composition.

Our publications focusing on LifeSprints were described previously. The only other article, to my

knowledge, directly on intermittent sprinting and fat loss is:

Tremblay, A. et al. (1994). Impact of exercise intensity on body fatness and skeletal musclemetabolism.Metabolism, 43, 814-818.

There are a number of articles that have examined muscle adaptation to intermittent exercise (see

Boutcher, 2011). A really good book about metabolism and fat loss is:

Hyman, M. (2006). Ultra-metabolism. Schwartz Publishing. ISBN: 978 1 86395 318 4

8. How to do LifeSprints:

Sprinting technique and tipsa. set up bike appropriately. Adjust saddle height (5% at knee). Adjust handle bars so arms can

rest on top of curved part of handle while gripping the straight part (the part nearest to the centre of

the bars). Make sure pedals have grips that work.

b. Make sure you have decided on a suitable range of pedal rate (100-120+) and load (.5-1.5 kg).

c. Teach the exerciser about: a) timing their sprint to the music, b) pushing and pulling with their

hamstrings and quads, and c) pushing back slightly with the arms to stabilize the pelvis.

a) get the exerciser to start pedalling when hearing the 3, 2, 1 on the music. Teach them to feeltheir appropriate sprint intensity. This is important as the pedal rate displayed on the bike always

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lags behind the real pedal rate. Thus, they need to learn what if feels like to sprint at 110, 120, 130

revolutions per minute (RPM), and so forth.

b) pushing and pulling with their hamstrings and quads is important because it is much easier to

attain higher pedal rates. It also involves more leg muscle mass and thus may produce more fat

burning.

c) pushing back slightly with the arms to stabilize the pelvis prevents rocking and bouncing of the

pelvis. This avoids unnecessary soreness after exercise.

d. Point out to the exerciser how their bodies are responding to the sprinting exercise. For example,

most subjects will not start breathing heavily until about 5 minutes into exercise. Typically, this is

the time they will start sweating. We think this form of exercise depletes the short term energy

supplies after about 5 minutes and the body has to switch to intramuscular fat to drive exercise and

to recover from the mini sprints. This involves more breathing. As fat burning is more likely to

occur in the latter stages women and men should be encouraged to keep working at the correct

intensity right throughout the 20 minutes.

e. The pedal rate is more important than the load. Thus, start the average woman on .5 kg

resistance and get her to sprint just over 100 RPM. Fitter or stronger women/men may require a

heavier load (e.g., 1 kg). The load and RPM will need to be adjusted as the exerciser gets fitter after

training. The initial target heart rates will be from 150 - 160 bpm for women/men in their 20s.

There should be about 10-20 bpm of cardiovascular drift during a 20-minute session. Thus, do not

start the heart rates to high (e.g., 160 bpm) as it will end up around 180 bpm.

f. Try to organize the exercisers in groups and try to make the exercise fun. Point out how the

exercise is short (only 8 minutes of sprinting) but can empower and vitalize. Most women/men will

recover from this kind of exercise far more quickly than jogging outside for 40 minutes or so. Thus,

this kind of exercise better fits into busy lifestyles.

g. We think that this form of exercise gives a more complete muscle fibre work put. For example,

sprinting challenges the fast twitch and fast twitch oxidative Type II fibres, whereas the 12-second

recovery challenges the Type I slow twitch fibres. The act of sprinting places stress on the core

muscles and thus should also improve spinal musculature.

h. We have carried out LifeSprints with a number of different exercise modalities (e.g., running,

outside walking, swimming, rowing, boxing, skip jumping, stair walking, and arm ergometry) and

all get the heart rates in the high range except for swimming and outside walking. Most modalities

are best performed with the 8/12 second protocol, however, rowing is probably better suited to a12/24 second protocol. LifeSprints are best performed to music rather than timing each sprint.

i. The best time of day to doLifeSprints is early in the morning before breakfast. If you can do it

without any food ingestion we believe it will result in increased fat burning. Try to drink only water

for a long as possible after exercise. Ingestion of nutrients such as sugar (or protein) will

immediately result in an increase in blood insulin levels and will impede fat burning. If you cant

exercise in the morning then try to stop eating for two hours before exercise.

LifeSprints music can be purchased from:

www.musicandmotion.com.au

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Good luck:

Steve Boutcher PhD, FACSM

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