One way you can make that easier is to make it a part of your everyday routine. What’s most important is that you exercise regularly. You don’t have to employ the same exercise strategy that I do to get the heart-healthy benefits of cardio exercise. I may work out at the gym for 30 minutes total, but I’ll use three different machines for 10 minutes each to switch it up and keep exercise more interesting for me. My patients often ask me, “What’s the best type of exercise for heart health?” Here’s what I tell them: I don’t care what type of exercise you do as long as you do something! Reduce your risk for heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, stroke, and some kinds of cancer.Lower your blood pressure and cholesterol.Improve the flow of oxygen throughout your body.Strengthen your heart and blood vessels.Regular exercise does more than help you lose weight and build muscle - although it’s definitely good for those reasons!Īerobic exercise, also known as “cardio” exercise, uses repetitive contraction of large muscle groups to get your heart beating faster and is the most beneficial type of exercise for your cardiovascular system (your heart and blood vessels). This also helps prevent obesity and provide long-term benefits on various health outcomes.Today is a perfect time to get moving on your fitness goals. "If you build muscle, even if you're not aerobically active, you burn more energy because you have more muscle. I don't think this is well appreciated," Lee said. Building muscle helps move your joints and bones, but also there are metabolic benefits. "Muscle is the power plant to burn calories. The results for both studies also were independent of aerobic exercise. The risk of hypercholesterolemia was 32 percent lower. Less than an hour of weekly resistance exercise (compared with no resistance exercise) was associated with a 29 percent lower risk of developing metabolic syndrome, which increases risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes. The two studies, published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, found resistance exercise lowered the risk for both. Using the same dataset, Lee and his colleagues looked at the relationship between resistance exercise and diabetes as well as hypercholesterolemia, or high cholesterol. Lee says weight lifting is just as good for your heart, and there are other benefits. When it comes to reducing the risk for cardiovascular disease, most people think of running or other cardio activity. Much of the research on strength training has focused on bone health, physical function and quality of life in older adults. "My muscle doesn't know the difference if I'm digging in the yard, carrying heavy shopping bags or lifting a dumbbell." "Lifting any weight that increases resistance on your muscles is the key," Lee said. While this latest study looked specifically at use of free weights and weight machines, Lee says people will still benefit from other resistance exercises or any muscle-strengthening activities. Not only does it offer more options for resistance exercise, but in a previous study Lee found people with a gym membership exercised more. And while people may have a treadmill or stationary bike at home, they likely do not have access to a variety of weight machines.įor these reasons, Lee says a gym membership may be beneficial. Lee says people can move more by walking or biking to the office or taking the steps, but there are few natural activities associated with lifting. The researchers recognize that unlike aerobic activity, resistance exercise is not as easy to incorporate into our daily routine. "The results are encouraging, but will people make weightlifting part of their lifestyle? Will they do it and stick with it? That's the million-dollar question," Lee said. Lee says resistance exercise reduced the risk for all three. They measured three health outcomes: cardiovascular events such as heart attack and stroke that did not result in death, all cardiovascular events including death and any type of death. Lee and his colleagues analyzed data of nearly 13,000 adults in the Aerobics Center Longitudinal Study. The study is published in Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. In other words, you do not have to meet the recommended guidelines for aerobic physical activity to lower your risk weight training alone is enough. The results - some of the first to look at resistance exercise and cardiovascular disease - show benefits of strength training are independent of running, walking or other aerobic activity. "People may think they need to spend a lot of time lifting weights, but just two sets of bench presses that take less than 5 minutes could be effective," said DC (Duck-chul) Lee, associate professor of kinesiology.
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