Taking a surreptitious peek at your phone and wondering just how to cram your to-do list into the little that’s left of today? You won’t be the only one. Back in 2015, a study of the work-life balance in 71 cities around the world showed that Hongkongers spent the most time in the office.
While a 40-hour working week was more or less the average in most developed nations, the wage slaves of the SAR routinely turned in 50.1 hours – a whopping 25.25 percent more. In a work culture where office dwell time seems more prized than efficiency or effectiveness, it’s a statistic unlikely to decline anytime soon.
With ostentatious exercise regimes right up there with nocturnal office occupancy as two of the Fragrant Harbour’s Big Three Most Lauded Lifestyle Affectations (with conspicuous charitable giving completing the collection), it is, of course, compulsory to fit in a full-on fitness programme alongside your dozen daily hours of desk duty. All of this may explain just why High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) is currently so in vogue. Essentially a programme of repeated sessions of relatively brief, intermittent exercise, HIIT requires participants to gradually build up the may last anything from a few seconds to several minutes, with breaks punctuating each iteration. With sessions typically focusing on cycling, running, jumping or squats, each activity is undertaken three times a week as part of a two- to six-week cycle.
With more than 20 Hong Kong exercise centres now offering it as a workout option, there is no doubt that HIIT is something of a hit locally. As to its effectiveness, well, for every study dubbing it the Best Thing Ever To Happen to Unfit Folk, there’s at least one that bills it as the Next Best Thing at Parting Overweight Over-Earners From Their Income With No Real Discernible Benefit.
That’s not to say that HIIT is the latest missive from Charlatan Central, aimed squarely at the gallantly gullible and those hoping that coughing up cash will mean bidding farewell to thick thighs without all the hassle of cutting back on calories. It’s certainly to be recommended above valiantly doing nothing on a long-term basis, while hoping for the best, but it’s still worth evaluating for yourself, independently monitoring your progress and taking little on trust from those who may be more interested in having a healthy bank balance than having a healthy client base.
Text: Bailey Atkinson