woman running

Flickr: Photo by lululemon athletica

I'm admittedly intrigued by interval training, which has gotten a lot of buzz lately.

Work out less, get more results: Where do I sign up?

A recent study says that short, intense periods of exercise  are just as, if not more, effective as putting in endless hours at the gym.

There are some naysayers, of course, and others worry that many people can't handle the intensity of interval training, which was originally developed for Olympic athletes. But there are enough credible experts who support it that I think I'm going to give it a try.

So how to start?

There are many specific interval training routines you can follow, but the basic guidelines say that for 20 minutes you should alternate between one minute of high intensity exercise and one minute of recovery time. The activity can be anything aerobic including running, rowing and the elliptical machine.

If it works, the bad news is that my frequent excuse for not working out -- "I don't have time!" -- is no longer valid. The good news would be that I can start planning what I'm going to do with all the hours currently occupied by my gym time.

Have you tried interval training?