Fitness trainer Or German presents a short workout for a flat stomach (Photo: Or German)
Taking the stairs to your apartment instead of taking the elevator, running to the bus, or even a short (and brisk) walk—these small bursts of exercise, if intense enough, can add up and do you good, according to new research.
The study is among the first to examine what many sports researchers have long assumed: a little vigorous exercise can make a big difference.
The article, published in Nature Medicine, shows that short periods of physical activity throughout the day are associated with a significant reduction in the risk of various diseases.
Researchers used data from fitness trackers collected by UK Biobank, a large medical database with health information from people across the UK.
They looked at the records of over 25,000 people who didn't exercise regularly, with an average age of around 60, and followed them over nearly seven years.
Those who engaged in one or two minutes of physical activity about three times a day, such as brisk walking on the way to work or briskly climbing the stairs, showed a nearly 50 percent reduction in the risk of cardiovascular death and about a 40 percent reduction in the risk of death from cancer as well as from all causes of death, compared to those who did not. They didn't do it at all.
Take the stairs instead of the elevator.
A woman goes up the stairs (Photo: ShutterStock)
One 2020 study linked four-minute bursts of exercise with longer life expectancy, another in 2019 found that climbing stairs for 20 seconds, several times a day, improved aerobic fitness.
And still other studies have found that repeating intervals of just four seconds of intense activity can increase strength or counteract the harmful effect of sitting for long periods of time.
"Intensity is very effective at building muscle and stressing the cardiovascular system," said Professor Ed Coyle, a kinesiology and health education expert at the University of Texas who has studied short, intense exercise.
According to him, vigorous physical activity, performed repeatedly with short rest periods, can increase oxygen uptake and prevent heart artery clogging, as well as prompt the heart to pump more blood and function better in general.
The new research, however, shows that the average person doesn't have to go out of their way to recognize those small increases in activity;
Daily movements, strengthened, can be enough.
And because they collected data from wearable devices that participants wore on their wrists, rather than questionnaires, which some exercise studies rely on, the researchers were able to analyze the impact of small movements.
How vigorous is vigorous?
"Fitness researchers divide the intensity of physical activity into three categories," said Professor Emmanuel Stamatakis, from the Charles Perkins Center at the University of Sydney and lead author of the new study.
"If you can sing while doing the activity, it's an easy exercise. If you can't sing, but you can talk comfortably, it's moderate."
Dr. Stamatakis recommended a brisk walk where you can only speak a few words, or none at all, after 30 seconds or so.
Dr. Stamatakis also suggested some ways for people to incorporate short bursts of vigorous movement into their lives. "If you have a walk of a few hundred meters - for example, from the apartment to the grocery store - you don't need to run all the time," he said, "but increase your pace by two or three times every few hundred meters. Instead of taking the elevator, choose the stairs. Carrying about five percent of your body weight for a minute or two can It also fits, like carrying a large backpack. In addition,
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