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15 min in the AM, 15 in the PM = Win? For many of you that may sound laughable, but according to a recent study from the University of Copenhagen it is at least as effective as three "mammoth" workouts-sessions per week.

What kind of trainee are you? Do you hit the gym thrice a week, spend two hours there and crawl out of the gymdoors totally exhausted? Yeah... Well that means you're not the fitness model guy, who trains twice a day for 15-20 minutes only and swears that this is the only way to do it?

After all these questions you're probably asking yourself if the answers you gave in your mind were good or bad for ya? Right? Well, eventually, both forms of training can be equally effective. If we take a closer look at the non-significant study outcomes in a recent paper by scientists from the University of Copenhagen (Kilen. 2015), though body composition and strength may in fact benefit more if you train more frequently - even if the total workout volume is the same.
Workout volume? Yes, that's the number of sets and reps. So, let's say you do three 45-minute training sessions weekly, including 1 strength on Monday, 1 high intensity cardiovascular (HIIT) session on Wednesday, and 1 muscle endurance session on Thursday, then those 3x45 minutes + warm-up exercise are your total workout volume.

In case that's what you're doing on a regular basis, you're training just like those of the 21 study subjects (10 men, 11 women; 25 +/- 3 years) with some previous training experience who were randomly assigned to the "classical" training program in the previously mentioned study by Kilen, et al. (2015). If you're rather the fitness model type, you may recognize your own training in what the other subjects did, i.e. a "micro training" program with a total of nine 15-minute training sessions weekly that were divided equally between strength training, high-intensity cardiovascular training, and muscle endurance training and performed in the AM and PM from Monday to Friday (there was no PM training on Friday, though, and cardio and strength were rotated | see caption of Table 1).

Table 1: Description of the two different training regimen (Kilen. 2015) | *To minimize the potential negative effect of concurrent cardio + strength training, MI performed 2 days of strength (Mon and + Tue) and 1 day of cardio training (Wed) in odd weeks, and 1 day of strength (Mon) and 2 days of cardio training (Tue + Wed) in even weeks.

Unlike the training frequency and rest between workouts, the strength training, HIIT and muscular endurance training sessions, themselves, were identical in both groups:

• Strength training consisted of leg exercises (deadlifts, lunges, step-ups, and 1 leg squats), with 1–2 warm-up sets and 2–3 target sets of 8RM, and upper-body exercises (pullups, dips, weighted push-ups, and 1 arm rows), with 1–2 warm-up sets and 2–3 target sets of 5RM. For progression, the exercises were adjusted using extra loading (sandbags in 1-kg steps) if the subjects were able to accomplish more repetitions than prescribed. If the subjects were not able to perform the number of repetitions prescribed, they performed as many as they could in proper form and finished the set conducting only the eccentric phase of the exercise. 
• High-intensity cardiovascular training (HIIT) consisted of running for 2 and 4 minutes at an average speed of 15.1 and 14.5 km/h, respectively, which elicited ;90% maximal heart rate during exercise. Micro training performed two 4-minute run intervals in the morning with 3 minutes of rest in between and four 2-minute run intervals in the afternoon with 1 minute of rest in between. Classical training performed three 4-minute and six 2-minute run intervals in the same training session with the same rest as MI in between. The training volume was evaluated and the only significant difference was running distance during 2-minute and 4-minute intervals, where MI ran significantly further than CL in each interval. 
• Muscle endurance training consisted of three 5-minute exercise sessions involving 5 different exercises performed continuously for 30 seconds with 30-second rest periods. Micro training conducted 3 sessions; the first was “easy,” the second “hard,” and the third “very hard.” Classical training conducted 9 sessions in the same order, starting over with “easy” on the fourth and seventh sessions. The exercises were weighted lunges (with a 20-kg sandbag); push-ups; shuttle runs; abdominal exercises ([a] regular sit-ups from a supine position with knees bent at 908, fists in contact with the ears and the lumbar arch supported by a folded towel, and [b] diagonal sit-ups from a horizontal supine position, outstretched hand to opposite raised foot, alternating); and back exercises ([a] back extensions on an incline bench and [b] kettlebell swings in a standing position). 

As Kilen et al. point out, "[a]ll training sessions were supervised by scientific staff, and subject attendance" as well as "[h]eart rate [...] during high-intensity cardiovascular training and muscle endurance training for the last 5 weeks of the training intervention" (Kilen. 2015) were recorded.

Figure 1: Relative pre- vs. post changes in all measures performance markers (calculated based on Kilen. 2015).

After the 8-weeks on the respective training regiment, a comparison of the pre- vs. post-training data yielded the following results:

• Increases in shuttle run performance were observed in both group, albeit with a higher significance as far as the pre- vs. post-difference is concerned in the classical training (CL) vs. micro training (MI) group (MI: 1,373 +/- 133 m vs. 1,498 +/- 126 m, p < 0.05; CL: 1,074 6 213 m vs. 1,451 6 202 m, p , 0.001).
• Significant improvements in peak oxygen uptake (3,744 6 +/- 615 mL/min vs. 3,963 +/- 753 mL/min | p < 0.05), maximal voluntary isometric (MVC) force of the knee extensors (646 +/- 135 N vs. 659 +/- 209 N | p < 0.001), MVC of the finger flexors (408 +/- 109 N vs. 441 +/- 131 N, p < 0.05), and the maximal number of lunges performed in 2 minutes (65 +/- 3 vs. 73 +/- 2, p , 0.001), however, were seen only in the micro = high frequency training group.

The question you may be asking yourselves now is: Why does the headline say that there were no significant differences? Well, the lack of statistical significance of the improvements in the classical training group does not suffice for a statistically significant between difference to the micro training group. Statistical significant inter-group differences did not exist either before or after the study. The scientists conclusion that

"similar training adaptations can be obtained with short, frequent exercise sessions or longer, less frequent sessions where the total volume of weekly training performed is the same" (Kilen. 2015)

is thus absolutely correct. The fact that statistical significance for the aforementioned study outcomes was achieved in the micro, yet not in the classical training group does still suggest that the high(er) frequency training regimen may have an adaptive edge... albeit in terms of study outcomes not everyone will deem practically relevant.
References:

• Kilen, Anders, et al. "Adaptations to Short, Frequent Sessions of Endurance and Strength Training Are Similar to Longer, Less Frequent Exercise Sessions When the Total Volume Is the Same." The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 29 (2015): S46-S51.

Even though, the study at hand confirms that NaHCO3 doesn't work for everyone previous studies show it's worth trying.

You will probably have asked yourselves, whether I had already forgotten about sodium bicarbonate and the performance enhancing effects of pH buffers, right? No, I didn't, but unfortunately, many researchers have... well, many, but not all researchers. Gabriela Froio de Araujo Dias and her colleagues from the University of Sao Paulo, for example, have just released a paper in which they describe the intriguing results of the first bicarbonate study that was specifically designed to (a) determine within- and (b) inter-individual variation that could potentially compromise the magnitude of an effect that's determined based on averages (e.g. if you use bicarb three times and have performance increases of 0.4%, 5% and 0.3% it will look less effective).
In the corresponding experiment, the scientists had 15 physically active males (age 25±4 y; body mass 76.0±7.3 kg; height 1.77±0.05 m) complete six cycling capacity tests at 110% of maximum power output (CCT110%) following ingestion of either

• 0.3 g/kg body mass of sodium bicarbonate (SB | 4 trials) or
• alcium carbonate placebo (PL, 2 trials).

Just in case you're wondering: Calcium carbonate has no reasonable buffering effect as it will not, as you can see in Figure 1 affect the pH, bicarbonate levels of base excess of the blood in the way bicarbonate does. It is thus the standard choice in corresponding experiments.

Figure 1: Line graphs for blood measurements (mean ± 1SD) at Baseline, Pre-exercise, Post-exercise and 5-min post-exercise. Panel A displays pH; Panel B displays bicarbonate; Panel C displays base excess; Panel D displays lactate. PL trials are represented by dashed lines and SB trials are represented by solid lines (de Araujo Dias. 2015).

As you may already know from previous waredownloadsoft articles on bicarbonate, the increases in blood pH, bicarbonate, base excess and lactate you see in Figure 1 are important to tell what exactly triggers the net effect of using baking soda as a pH buffer. What every athletes will yet be more interested in, though is whether the buffer allowed the recreationally active men who participated in the study saw statistically significant increases in the total work done (TWD) during the 110% high-intensity cycling capacity test, or not.
As you can see in Figure 2, the average subject saw the highest improvement in the last of the four trials (7%); an improvement of which statistics tell us that it says that there's 93% chance of general substantial improvement - with lower values for the other trials.

Figure 2: Rel increase (%) in total work (figures over the bars indicate likelihood of relevant benefits and relative increase, e.g. for bar 4: "It's 93% likely that the 7% increase displays a real-world relevant performance increase) - left; Total work done during SB trial as function of total work done during PLA trial - right (de Araujo Dias. 201).

Apropos "other trials", when the scientists removed the subjects who reported sick during trial 1 and trial 3, the results of trial 1 suggest a "likely" benefit (81%) and those of trial 3 a "possible" (50%) benefit. The notion that whether you benefit or not can / will depend on how well you tolerate the bicarbonate solution would also be confirmed by the data in Figure 2, right. The latter is a plot of the ratio of total work done in the sodium bicarbonate trial #4 vs. the control trial; a plot that easily tells us who saw benefits and who didn't because all "winners" are above, while all "losers" are below the transverse line. And since the distance to said line is a marker of the performance increase, you can also see that even among those who did benefit, the benefits ranged from hardly measurable as in subject #7 to a whopping 30% increase in total work done during the high-intensity cycling capacity test in subjects #12.
References: