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Switch between walking and sprinting
You get the most testosterone benefit out of training at the two ends of the cardiovascular spectrum. So, regularly go out and get your low intensity walks for long periods of time, 60 minutes or more, and if you are reasonably fit pop on a rucksack to add some more weight and make sure your heart is working hard enough. The top end of Zone 2 and just into Zone 3 is where your heart rate needs to be – that’s low intensity continuous exercise, when you’ll be breathing hard, able to have a conversation but not easily.
Then on top of that, do high intensity training with heart rate up in Zone 5, going all out for 60-90 seconds and then recover to bring your heart rate back down to low Zone 2 before you repeat again. It’s best to use a heart rate monitor to track your heart rate, but if you don’t have one you can place two fingers on your wrist to count your heart beats for 10 seconds then multiply by six to get your full heart rate, although this is obviously not as precise or convenient. Use heart rate to measure your recovery every time so that you know your body has recovered rather than just timing it. The further into the session you go the longer the recovery will take so don’t over do it. Aim to repeat this 8-10 times but gradually build up to this level.
Don’t over-train
It is not the case that more is better. There is an optimum sweet spot for stimulating testosterone. Training harder or training more will just lead to fatigue and this has the opposite effect on hormonal health.
Planning your week of activity is essential. You need to hit all the right activities at the right intensity to create the perfect stimulus for improvement and testosterone production.
You need to strength train at least twice per week, perform low intensity cardio at least twice per week and perform HIIT training twice per week. If you’re new to this, you can see how easily you could end up exhausting yourself and over-training, so take a progressive approach and build up slowly.
Maximise your recovery
Sleep is so important for hormonal health. This is when the hypothalamus, a part of the brain that acts as a key regulatory centre, turns up the dial on testosterone production. So quite simply, if you limit your sleep, you limit your testosterone.
Getting enough sleep is stage one, but you also need to make sure you’re getting good quality sleep. There are plenty of wearable devices that now give you some good data on this. Look at how long you have managed to be in deep and REM sleep, the key phases for recovery and restoration. According to the sleep tracking company Whoop, we should have a combined 2.5-3 hours per night of the two, within a seven-hour sleep. Then, if possible, start understanding your HRV (heart rate variability) score. This gives you a great indicator of how well your body is recovering and also how hard your body can be pushed on any given day.
If you don’t have a device, consider keeping a sleep journal and documenting what you did before bed and then how you feel when you wake each morning. Over time you will likely notice trends of what is working well for you or not.
If you find you have trouble with quality sleep, start to experiment with eating earlier, cut out alcohol, try magnesium baths or supplements, and 5-HTP or GABA supplements before bed. Use your device to monitor to see if there is a positive response to the trial. If so, keep up the good habits.
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