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Lifting Weights Good as Running "Weight training could be as effective as endurance exercises like running when it comes to burning fat and warding off diabetes, a study suggests... a certain type of muscle - known as Type II - which develops as a result of resistance training... This is different to the muscle which forms as a result of endurance training such as running, known as Type I... "We've shown that Type II muscle does more than allow you to pick up heavy objects," said Kenneth Walsh of BUSM. "It's also important in controlling whole-body metabolism." ...an increase in this type of muscle sparks changes in the rest of the body... "If you have these muscles, even when you are not doing much, you are still burning up energy... It's something that could be particularly useful for older people who may have trouble with endurance exercise, and it can be very satisfying because the effects of resistance training appear very quickly" Resistance Training (344) "New study suggests that just twice a week resistance training is helpful for maintaining control of blood sugar levels in adults with type 2 diabetes" (Diabetes Care, December 2006) Just Ten Minutes of Physical Activity A Day Has a Major Impact ""Perhaps the most striking finding of our study is that even activity at the 4-kcal/kg per week level (approximately 72 min/wk) was associated with a significant improvement in fitness compared with women in the nonexercise control group," the authors write." (JAMA. 2007;297:2053, 2081-2091) Walk two miles and call me in the morning "Physicians have a moral responsibility to inform patients of the danger of inactivity and the health benefits of being more active... More than half of Americans fail to get the 30 minutes of physical activity recommended daily to provide health benefits... So many Americans are inactive that some experts have coined a new term for it: sedentary death syndrome. The condition helps cut short an estimated 250,000 lives annually... Research suggests that people who are sedentary spend about $1,500 more annually on medical bills than do their more active counterparts... Research shows that regular physical activity improves health by cutting the risk of heart disease, stroke, colon cancer, diabetes and high blood pressure. Even brief bouts of activity several times a day can help control weight and relieve arthritis, anxiety and depression. “Exercise is medicine,” Sallis says. “We know that it works very well. We just don’t have the proper way to administer it.”" Diabetic Exercise "It’s important to know that you’re more likely to experience angina (chest pain) due to reduced blood flow to your heart muscle (ischemia) during an aerobic activity like treadmill walking than during weight training. Studies have shown that lifting a heavy weight 10 to 12 times may increase your blood pressure more than aerobic work, but it doesn’t raise your heart rate as much. Ironically, the higher blood pressures reached during resistance training ensure that your heart muscle gets more blood than it would during aerobic activities. If you know that you have some coronary artery blockage from plaque buildup, moderate weight training may actually be a safer activity for you than most high-intensity aerobic ones... In addition to improving diabetes-related health, regular aerobic exercise lessens the potential impact of most of the other cardiovascular risk factors, including elevated blood lipids (cholesterol and other blood fats), insulin resistance, obesity, and hypertension." Even Low Levels of Exercise Have Major Health Benefits "In the study, a brisk 30-minute walk three days a week was enough to drive down blood pressure and improve overall fitness in a group of healthy sedentary adults... For optimum health, adults are recommended to engage in 30 minutes of moderately strenuous exercise on at least five days of the week. But few people achieve this level of weekly activity"
"Exercise: cheap insurance… Studies indicate that exercise causes your body to produce its own clot-busting chemicals (called tPA or tissue plasiminogen activator)… tPA levels increased an average of 44 percent after six months of exercise training… something as simple as a brisk walk can help dissolve those clots… Once You Start To Exercise, You Cannot Stop! "According to a new study, the consequences of quitting exercise may be greater than previously thought. Results showed that the weight gained during an exercise hiatus can be tough to shed when exercise is resumed at a later date... The study should prompt people to think twice before taking a break from their exercise regimens, despite the pressures of family and work obligations, or waning motivation..."
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