High-altitude training takes workouts to a new level

It looks like any other high-intensity fitness class, but this one elevates exercise to a whole new level.

Once you step inside the AirFit studio at the Quad in the San Francisco Bay Area, you're suddenly transported to somewhere like Denver, Half Dome or Lake Tahoe -- the altitude many pro-athletes successfully train at. A complex air filtration system sucks some of the oxygen out of the room, so you breathe less of it.

While your heart rate goes up, the oxygen in the room goes down. As the air gets thinner, the body adapts to lower levels of oxygen by increasing red blood cells and hemoglobin, which changes muscle metabolism.

"The cool thing about this room is that we're not obviously at 10,000 feet up in the mountains where we'd have to hike down or drive down like 5 hours to get to sea level," Carlo Maravilla, director of AirFit, told CBS San Francisco.

Plenty of participants say the class has elevated their cardio and strength training by providing a sweaty, fat-busting exercise session in less time.

Quad trainers say over time you become acclimated to the environment, and the shorter workouts protect your joints from injury.

Irene Rose is one of the many AirFit enthusiasts. "I feel like it's a way to up the intensity without having to go longer or do more repetitions," she told CBS San Francisco.

Dr. Grant Lipman , an emergency medicine specialist at Stanford Hospital, studies the effect of high-altitude on the body. He said that while one may feel physically fit after a high-altitude workout, the long-term effects are questionable.

"The benefits from this training are people who like to suffer," he said. "You're going to get a much more intense work out during that short about of time."

AirFit addict Michael Cherman says he's already seeing results after a month at the club. "Sixty minutes in here is worth 90 minutes outside of here so your muscles are definitely being put to the test," Cherman said.

"You're going to feel a high, you're going to feel like wow, I can move around a lot easier, I can breathe easier," Maravilla tells his clients. "We mention the mile-high club," he laughs, "in terms of working out."