Question about step height

[Kathie]

Hi everyone! I'm new here and so happy to find a site where people are excited about fitness! Cathe (or anyone who may know the answer to this) I have always used all four of the risers under my step, but it seems lately, during the interval parts, my knee starts to hurt. I don't want to injure myself but I do want to get the most workout that I can. If I only use the two risers do you think that I will still continue to get the most benefit from the workout? I don't have a problem with endurance, so I suppose I'm just worried that by lowering the step that I will no longer be working out as hard as I should. Thanks alot!!

 

[Cathe Friedrich]

Hi Kathie!

Welcome to the site

! When you say that your knees are bothering you during the interval parts, are you referring to Intervalmax specifically or just powerful moves in any of my tapes in general? If it is specifically Intervalmax, then I would be sure that you are only using this tape once a week or even once every other week. If this doesn't solve the problem then, yes, I would lower the risers to a 6 inch step height(2 risers total). But before you lower the risers, take a couple of weeks off of doing the workout altogether to let your knees rest. While you will still get wonderfully challenging aerobic benefits on the 6 inch step height, you may have an adjustment period where you think that you are not since it "feels" easier. But that will go away as soon as your body acclimates itself to the new step height and you become more comfortable exerting your energy in new ways with this new height. In other words, you will end up finding new ways to push your body harder on the adjusted step height.

Generally speaking, just about any interval workout is going to be very aggressive and demanding on the body in order to push it beyond its comfort zone. For this reason it is truly not recommended to be used as a "regular" workout.

Good luck and please continue to listen to your body as you have been!