Question about mixing up my cardio routine..

I try to mix things up every few months or so, but my options are limited because I have bad knees.

5x a week I do 40 minutes of cardio.. either elliptical, bike, treadmill, or stepper. Sometimes I do 2 machines for 20 minutes each, I do interval training here and there on them, do various other incline increase/redux routines, etc. (The other 2 days of the week I do strength training)

I sweat, I get my heart rate up, but I'm worried my body is getting into an "I'm used to this" rut.

My question is, do you think if instead of 40 minutes every day, I did 60 some days and 30 others it would be enough to "surprise" my body and make an impact? I can't up it to 60 minutes every day because of time constraints. Or is it more important that I get over 30 minutes every day I do cardio?

Thoughts? Any other ideas on how to mix things up?

Message edited 1/23/2009 9:37:49 AM.

Re: Question about mixing up my cardio routine..

Crap I have no suggestions for you

What are you trying to do? Lose, maintain, tone?

Re: Question about mixing up my cardio routine..

Re: Question about mixing up my cardio routine..

Posted by melbalalala

Posted by azoodie

What are you trying to do? Lose, maintain, tone?

Lose, lose, lose, for sure!

Come on, you are the QUEEN of fitness now, you can do it! HELP!

Message edited 1/23/2009 5:07:31 PM.

Re: Question about mixing up my cardio routine..

Mixing it up is supposed to be great so yeah I think doing different machines, time amounts, intervals, each workout should be different I think. HTH

Re: Question about mixing up my cardio routine..

Posted by azoodie

Posted by melbalalala

Posted by azoodie

What are you trying to do? Lose, maintain, tone?

Lose, lose, lose, for sure!

Come on, you are the QUEEN of fitness now, you can do it! HELP!

Oy! Okay....

If you are trying to lose and you think your intensity is high enough it sounds like you are doing the right thing. You are switching up the machines you are working on. You are strength training. You're even squeezing in intervals.

BUT, if you really want to lose and maximize your time at the gym I would say to just do high intensity interval training. You sound like you are already fit so you would want to take it to that next level. Whatever intervals you are already doing you can always make harder by by increasing the number of sprint intervals and/or the duration of them.

Sorry that's the best I've got. I feel like I'm having a brain fart.