Regular exercise is one of the most important things a person can do to maintain good health and extend life. This is a real bummer for people like me who are both naturally unathletic and sedentary.
If you don’t include exercise as part of your routine, it’s hard to know where to start. Fortunately, researchers are increasingly understanding how exercise affects the body, and are finding smarter ways for people to move smarter. Whether you’re trying to get back to regular exercise after a pandemic hiatus or just getting started…ever, here’s what experts say about the optimal ways to exercise.
How Much Exercise Should Adults Get Each Week?
The CDC recommends that adults accumulate 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity or 75 minutes of high-intensity aerobic physical activity each week. In addition, the CDC recommends two days of muscle-strengthening activity.
These recommendations are in line with World Health Organization guidelines, which suggest at least 150 to 300 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic physical activity per week or 75 to 150 minutes of vigorous-intensity physical activity per week; or approximately equivalent combinations of moderate and vigorous exercise. The WHO also suggests two days of muscle-strengthening activity per week.
What type of exercise is best for maintaining good health?
Stephen Ball, a professor of physical therapy at the University of Missouri, explains Other way around that he knows that some people may feel that those recommendations require a lot of time in the gym. And that may not appeal to everyone.
“The good news is that many alternatives to structured exercise provide the same health benefits. Research consistently shows this [physical activity]Basically, any major exercise, whether structured or not, is beneficial,” says Ball. “The human body doesn’t know if you’re doing ‘exercise’ or if you’re mowing the lawn. Many daily activities can replace exercise if the intensity is high enough.”
To determine if the activity in question puts you in the temperate zone, Ball recommends the “talk test.” If you’re doing a moderate-intensity activity, you can hold a conversation during the exercise, but you can’t sing a song.
The fundamental principle is to incorporate whatever physical activity you can into your daily routine and make it a long-lasting habit.
Emmanuel Stamatakis, says a professor of physical activity, lifestyle and public health at the University of Sydney Other way around that the most recent research he and his colleagues published “suggests that high-intensity physical activity in particular is very potent even when [it] is done as part of daily life, and in very short bursts of 1 to 2 minutes or less, what we call “vigorous intermittent physical activity.”
Don’t sleep on the strength-boosting exercise, says Stamatakis. He was one of the authors of a 2018 study that the WHO used in developing their guidelines. That study “concluded that meeting guidelines for strength-enhancing exercise is just as important as meeting guidelines for aerobic exercise,” says Stamatakis.
Which is more important: exercise frequency or duration?
Ken Nosaka, Director of Exercise and Sports Science at Edith Cowan University in Australia’s School of Medicine and Sports Science, explains Other way around that his research suggests it’s better to “exercise more frequently than to do a large amount of exercise once a week,” he says. “Our study showed that even six ‘eccentric’ contractions of the elbow flexors per day increased muscle strength when performed five days a week for four weeks.”
“The human body doesn’t know if you’re doing ‘exercise’ or if you’re mowing the lawn. The body knows that its energy needs have increased. Many daily activities can replace exercise if the intensity is high enough.”
“Eccentric” exercises, Nosaka explains, activate and lengthen muscles, often through slow, controlled movements. For example, holding a weight to do a biceps curl when you lift the weight toward your chest is a concentric contraction. An eccentric contraction is when you slowly lower the weight to your side. These are excellent for building muscle strength, and Nosaka’s work suggests that relatively few repetitions of these exercises throughout the day can result in significant gains in muscle strength.
These can be especially helpful for people with sedentary jobs, says Nosaka, because there are ways to incorporate eccentric exercise into their workday.
He suggests getting up and moving every 30 minutes or every hour for 30 seconds to a minute. “When you go to the toilet, it’s the best time to exercise!” he says.
However, strength training is only part of the equation. Ball says incorporating aerobic exercise, which increases heart rate and breathing rate over a longer period of time, as happens with exercise or swimming laps, or anaerobic exercise, which increases breathing and heart rate in short bursts, such as when a person is three to Sprinting into your schedule five days a week is a good place to start. Consider the intensity of the exercise for the duration. “For higher-intensity exercise, shorten the duration and vice versa,” he says.
Ideally, Stamatakis says, people should aim to be active every day or almost every day. “Some of the benefits of physical activity may be compromised for people who move very little during the week and try to get in a long session on the weekend,” he says. “Of course this would still be much better than being sedentary on weekends as well.”
For people with a sedentary job or who have come out of the habit of regular exercise, Stamatakis advises becoming “movement conscious” and creating as many opportunities as possible to get more exercise in everyday life. Then set realistic goals.
For example, he says that someone who sits all day and does no physical activity can start with a goal of taking a brisk 10-minute walk every day.
“Once this becomes a habit, try increasing to 15 minutes a day and adding two to three short bursts of vigorous intensity activity a day, such as choosing stairs instead of [elevators] or carrying heavy groceries [bags] for 100 meters [about 0.62 miles] or something,” he says. “By then, the total amount of physical activity would be close to the WHO’s lower recommendations. Anything above that would be a bonus.”
More important than any specific type of exercise, Stamatakis says, is finding something you can incorporate into your daily routine and stick with long-term.
The fundamental principle is to incorporate whatever physical activity you can into your daily routine and make it a long-lasting habit. From there you can set more ambitious goals.
What are some of the most effective exercises?
Ball says high-intensity interval training, which consists of short bursts of high-intensity exercise interspersed with low-intensity recovery, may be most efficient for busy people. Strictly speaking, it gives people the most bang for their buck: because it’s high-intensity, you can get more physical benefits in a shorter amount of time.
“As a rule of thumb, activities that use large muscle groups that increase heart rate or make breathing more difficult are better,” says Stamatakis. “These are physiological signs of more intense movements, provided they are frequent and regular, meaning the body is preparing to adapt to such physical demands by getting fitter.”
But if that doesn’t sound appealing or intimidating, the experts say something is definitely better than nothing.
“All types of occasional physical activity and exercise have merit and play a role in maintaining good health,” says Stamatakis.
Ball agrees, adding, “modest amounts of moderate activity can improve health. Activity comes in many forms and doesn’t need to be structured.”
More important than any specific type of exercise, Stamatakis says, is finding something you can incorporate into your daily routine and stick with long-term.
In other words, the best way to get exercise is to find something you’d like to do regularly, and then do it.
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