We live in an “instant” society. From instant coffee and instant oatmeal to drive-thru tellers, we don’t like to have to wait. So I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that so much of the latest offerings for exercise programs pick up the same theme.
Martin Gibala did a good book called “The One Minute Workout.” Doug McGuff’s book “Body By Science” says you can get all the exercise you need in one 12-minute session a week. Wow. My boss and I looked at a workout gadget that promised all the health benefits exercise could deliver in just 4-minutes a workout. Now I think we are getting a bit carried away. Will anybody from Madison Avenue dare to raise their voice and tell people the truth?
Your body is begging you for daily exercise.
Whew! I said it. Sure, the longer we go in exercise science the more we understand what the proper stimulus is to get the kind of results we want. We can become more efficient. But these promises for brief workouts that produce great results are first of all very hard and secondly they do not give you all the benefits of exercise. We need to be more well-rounded in our routines for that.
But I thought three days a week was enough
It’s true that our country’s most respected health, fitness and medical organizations have adopted a similar refrain to the publishers of health books, that less is more, train don’t strain, any exercise is better than nothing-type of thinking. From a public policy point of view it is understandable. So few people are exercising as it is. We now know that just getting off the couch and starting a regular routine is where the biggest jump in improvement can be found, so why risk an even larger dropout rate by saying that people have to work harder?
Nevertheless, these scaled-back recommendations don’t change the truth: You should get some exercise every day because it is good for you. Yes, three days a week is better than none, but five or six is better than three, even if the workouts are much shorter.
Dr. Michael Colgan reported from his institute that when they put people on 30-minute-a-day, 5-day-a-week exercise programs they experienced a greater jump in daily metabolism than those exercising for 70 minutes three days week. And that is even though the 3-day-a-weekers actually exercised a full hour more each week.
There is a lot to be said for regularity. Not only is it better for your metabolism and fat loss, but it builds a better habit into your days than 3-day-a-week workouts. And if you should miss one, it is much less damaging than when you only work out once every few days.
Swimming against the tide
If the notion of everyday exercise seems crazy, recognize that the process of everyday decay from aging and inactivity is also as relentless as the tide. If you don’t stimulate your body regularly with exercise, giving it the signals to overcome this decay process and build fitter, stronger cells, you will go downhill much faster. It is not exercising regularly that is crazy. Doing something about it is sane.
You don’t even have to think about it as exercise. Consider it as sending a constant “grow” or “repair” message to your cells to overcome the decay process. You are sending a message of health and development to your body in the only language your muscle cells and bones understand — movement.
Action points
No matter who you are, or what your calling in life, you will need good physical health and conditioning to see it through to the end. In our 21st century lives today many of us are sedentary, even many who work on their feet and with power tools. Yet, our bodies are capable of the most amazing levels of physical health and conditioning. They are literally designed for action.
Understand that you will not experience your optimum health until you build your conditioning up to at least 30 minutes of endurance-type physical activity, of at least moderate intensity (enough to breathe deeply and break a sweat), most days of the week. This would also equal at least 7,000-plus steps a day if you wear one of those trackers.
Additional health and functional benefits can be had by adding even more moderate activity (up to an hour or more, six days a week) or by substituting more vigorous activity. Strength-developing activities should be performed at least twice per week.
Thomas Morrison is a fitness coordinator at the Bradley Wellness Center.