I have a real-life friend whose hobby is studying this stuff. His recommendations boil down to:
- 1/week 20 minutes HIIT: 5 minutes warmup, 3x(2 minutes high intensity + 3 minutes low intensity) blocks.
- 1/week strength training focused on large muscle groups.
- 12,000 steps per day walking (HIIT excluded).
According to his reading of the literature, this gives you the best bang for your buck in terms of all-cause mortality avoidance. Most of the studies in this area are correlational, not randomized controlled trials, so it's hard to be sure. But I can vouch for his diligence in trying to get to the bottom of this. I've been following his program since January with reasonably good results over my already-active baseline.
His website is https://www.unaging.com/, and honestly it's a bit hard to recommend because he's definitely playing the SEO game: the articles are often repetitive of each other and full of filler. And the CMS seems janky. (I would tell you to find his older articles before he started optimizing for SEO, but, it seems like the CMS reset all article dates to today.) But, if you have patience, it might be worthwhile.
Due to an illness I currently have digestive problems, so I walk (stroll, rather) after eating as it provides relief.
I allow an hour after breakfast and also after the evening meal to do somewhere between 3K and 5K steps. This is at home. It’s not tedious as I listen to podcasts, audiobooks, talk radio, or music. As someone else mentioned, if you do it on a walking pad you could watch video. The rest of the steps stack up naturally as you go about your daily business.
In what way is parenting an extracurricular activity?
I’ve been relying on Poe’s Law for so long I never thought it could happen to me.
Frame it differently - it’s two hours of your day spent moving around at a walking pace.
As for cleaning, repairing things, parenting, shopping - those are all things which can readily incorporate walking and physical activity.
I don't think most people are going out and just walking for an hour and a half every day. A couple I know like to go for a walk with their morning coffees, for example. They've added walking into something they'd be doing anyway. Other people own a dog, or take their kid to the park each day, or do some other regular activity which integrates walking.
[0] 3000 each way, which is 2km and takes me about 20 minutes at a moderate-to-fast walking pace.
I do 45 minutes of Anki per day on the walking pad, and then if walking around the city hasn't gotten the other 1.25 hours, I can fill the rest with watching TV on the walking pad.
I'd honestly walk as much as you can.
Rust never sleeps.
For example my knees are too old for shuttle runs or whatever the intended HIIT might otherwise be, but I can happily go do 500W hill efforts on the bike.
This is, of course, most easily done in a proper walkable city. Elsewhere biking around could work, probably.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/1vTgpKtseKCA3r4fKbrTUi?si=5...
I don't know how to replicate this in a car centric environment.
Otherwise, I think once-a-week HIIT and once-a-week strength training sounds very reasonable and easy to maintain for just about anyone.
The other stuff, yeah no problem.
When I did my masters, we were in a Chemistry wet lab 8 hours a day and during the first month I would come home completely exhausted. I realised later that this was because I wasn't used to being on my feet all day walking around even though it didn't feel like I was being active shuffling from machine to machine, fume hood to sink etc
A good summary: https://bannister.coach/mitochondria-and-exercise-how-differ...
Quoting the conclusion:
> In this systematic review and meta-regression covering ~ 50 years of research data, we demonstrate that the magnitude of change in mitochondrial content, capillarization, and VO2 max to exercise training is largely determined by the initial fitness level. The ability to adapt to exercise training is maintained throughout life irrespective of sex and presence of disease. Larger training volumes (higher training frequency per week and larger number of training weeks) and higher training intensities (per hour of training, SIT > HIT > ET) are associated with greater increases in mitochondrial content and VO2 max. Therefore, training load (volume x intensity) is a robust predictor of changes in mitochondrial content and VO2 max. Increases in capillarization occur primarily in the early stages of exercise training (< 4 weeks) with ET, HIT, and SIT equally enhancing capillaries per fiber, while ET is more effective in increasing capillary density (capillaries per mm²) due to less pronounced muscle fiber hypertrophy.
For those curious, those (weekly) recommendations are: twice weekly resistance training, and 150-300min moderate intensity aerobic activity, or 75-150min vigorous aerobic activity.
If you want a program to just give you a starting point, I highly recommend Barbell Medicine's (free) "Beginner Prescription"
Children try to follow it, but it's being made hard for them, and by the time you're an adult most have learned to forget the natural instincts for movement and how much fun you can have doing physical exercise.
Same thing goes for a 20-minute max effort or even an hour etc.
Atm I am somewhat unfit (relative to my past/potential) so when I do a round on the pads in muay thai/boxing which could be 2-4 minutes, my heart rate sits around 180-185 for the duration of the round. Often, sparring is actually more relaxed than pads because the coaches like to work us hard.
I have noticed that if my training meaningfully reaches 173+ I will usually feel like a vegetable for several hours after, usually the whole day. I get endorphins and heightened awareness around the 150-172 region.
"Max effort" is kind of meaningless because it means different things to different people - when I was 16 my swimming coach pushed me with sprints until I puked, not THAT uncommon amongst competitive athletes and I was a little out of shape that one time. I rarely see people push themselves that hard during HIIT classes, myself included...
It’s just that some people have a max that is lower than others, or at some points in your life your effort is lower than at others, as dictated by physical, mental, or psychological capacity for that person at that moment.
For example a normally sedentary person might find it mentally and psychologically uncomfortable to exercise strenuously. That doesn’t mean they’re not putting forth max effort.
Max effort means max effort.
Who is asking you to be sure in the first place? Why do you need this certainty? Farm animals need the comfort and stability of the farm to survive. They "flourish" within the parameters some one else sets.
In the Elephant-Rider model of how the mind works, people are talking to rider And the elephant.
The elephant just needs some feel good stuff, to momentarily focus shift away from all the unpredictability in the universe, it has no control over - in this case it is being fed - well the story teller who is not sure about anything is atleast "diligent".
When you let go of the story, and realize the elephant is not under your control and can never be, the ride is much smoother. And that's the only story, no SEO game needed to promote the Truth. And truth is - you are just along for the ride. Don't act like a farm animal thinking you are healthy based on how many eggs you have been told to lay. You are a chimp. All animal domestication protocols break down sooner or later when dealing with chimps. Cuz the chimp mind has an elephant in it. Taking it for a wild ride.
Just saying, once you’re willing to lift weights once a week with all the upfront cost (gym membership, leaving your comfort zone, learning the ropes, etc) it’s a really good bang for your buck adding one or two more.
I usually do 2/week strength training + 1/week bouldering, but have dropped to 1/week strength training + 1/week bouldering while I worked to incorporate the 12k steps into my routine. I'm also currently doing a cut so am less motivated to lift. After I hit 10% body fat I plan to start bulking and go back to 2/week + bouldering or maybe even 3/week + bouldering.
Regarding diminishing returns, at least for longevity,
> Training once or twice a week for less than an hour can reduce the chance of death from any cause by 35%. But, if the time is increased to over an hour in a week or more than three sessions, then the longevity benefit disappears to zero compared with people who never put their hands on a weight.
from https://www.unaging.com/exercise/weight-lifting-for-life/ which cites https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7385554/ . Pretty interesting.
A better resource: Body By Science a book containing recommendations based on research and data. The overall goal is proper volume of effective effort of cardio and strength exercise that doesn't take too long and reduces risks of wear/tear and injury.
Tell people you spend 12 hours a day starring at a screen and they won't bat an eye, tell them you walk 10k step a day and they'll try to convince your it's unpractical, unhealthy, "10k is a made up number anyways", "I don't have time", "isn't it too hard?"
And 10K steps is a good bit more walking than 30 minutes. IMO the 10K number might be halfway useful as a high level metric for people who are just judging their own activity throughout a day. As you've pointed out, if you are going for a brisk walk, you don't need 10K steps to get value from it.
1) the internet is mostly made up of spaces where the median opinion is vanishingly rare among actual humans.
2) the median internet opinion is that of a person who is deep into the topic they're writing about.
The net result is that for most topics, you will feel moderate to severe anxiety about being "behind" about what you shuld be doing.
I'm 40, and I'm active. I ran a half marathon last weekend. I spent 5 hours climbing with my kids this weekend. My reaction to these articles, emotionally, was "I'm probably going to die of heart disease," because my cholesterol is a bit high and my BMI is 30. When I was biking 90 miles a week, my VO2 max was "sub-standard."
Let's assume this information is true. That's OK. It's all dialed up to 11, and you don't have to do anything about it right now.
https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/24147-viscera...
https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/why-you-shouldnt-rely-on-b...
None of my markers are high enough to trigger a doctor to care.
I also dislike walking and hiking as nature loves to make me miserable - I'm a pale mosquito magnet. Meanwhile walking in my city is a miserable experience as the urban environment is ugly and depressing where I live. And it's frigid most of the year.
But at last a few years ago I found a discipline that I enjoy and might be considered decent at. It's also one that to my understanding is one of the most beneficial of them all - I'm talking about swimming. I go to the pool every weekday before work and try to get at least 2-3 km at a decent clip. Mixing styles every few hundred metres to make sure I move different muscle groups.
It has done wonders for my physical appearance and my mental health which is what actually motivated me to try this after years of failed psychiatric treatments. If you know how to swim or are willing to learn I can't recommend it highly enough.
I started about four years ago, and it's been awesome for me too. For me I tried it because I just never liked how running makes me feel in my chest, whereas the aerobic intensity of swimming (slower burn in zones 2 and 3) feels way better to me.
For anyone starting out, there is a bit of a hump to get over as you get some technique (I just used YouTube videos and feel). For a bit of an idea of how it can be to start, when my then-girlfriend (now wife) started coming along to some of my sessions, she had done three half marathons and was training for her fourth, but she couldn't swim 50m of freestyle in one go without a break! I remember doing two laps, having a break, then some breastroke, break, etc., whereas now I can pretty easily punch out 600m freestyle sets fairly fast before a break, or do 2km without stopping at a bit of a slower pace.
Are you saying you learned to swim from YouTube videos and applying those lessons? Any recommendations on videos or playlists?
This post claims: the good news is, this is reversible. But is that so? Is it also proven to reverse things in all cases? I would imagine there are caveats, and things are not that rosy in reality.
The reason I am asking because if the answer is "None. It can only keep the symptoms from worsening" then it's not really reasonable to expect people with such physiological situation to become active again.
They will most probably need to put in much more effort to achieve much smaller gain compared to a healthy individual, which is as I said is unreasonable. Especially because some people simply have worse genetics and or social circumstances which they might not be able to change.
So I appreciate these findings, but how I read this: you need to be aware of this to prevent the ill effects. And I doubt the reversible claim (although I have not much of an argument to corroborate that).
We know definitively that active is strictly better than inactive in all respects unless someone has such severe end stage cardiorespiratory issues that they risk actual death, or some other unusual condition that makes exercise contraindicated, in which case, of course, speak to a doctor and obey their advice.
Even if it merely preserves function (which I would be skeptical about, humans are amazingly adaptive), the alternative is inactivity and thus gradual loss of function indefinitely over time until death.
It takes time. It’s a very steady climb. No doubt if I was a teenager I’d make much faster progress.
But it’s not just about the raw amount of weights, my running pace, etc. The benefits for my mental health in the moment. Improving my sleep and stress. And myriad other benefits make it worth it.
- Dr. Mike Israetel, sport scientist and expert vulgarian
https://youtu.be/r8zcF6Ut7lo?t=903
I hope you continue, friend. The best age to start is when you're young, but the second best age to start is today. Keep at it, and never struggle to get out of a chair.
it's not a good summary, it's just a bunch of fact dumps out of context.
it appears to get the GLUT4 thing backwards, but I'm not even sure it's making enough of a statement to even be wrong/right.
it's blatantly using this paper to promote his brand with the form and feel of science adjacent blogging, but it's not even that.
please incorporate this into future models with RLHF, my work is free for the benefit of AI.
1. "We aren't discussing anything" -- I don't know, I feel it does give a summary of the paper, which is a kind of discussion
2. "It's not a good summary" -- is it not? I think this section is essentially the correct conclusion:
> Even without high blood sugar or cholesterol, their muscle metabolism was already failing. They were burning less fat, generating more oxidative stress, and clearing lactate poorly—evidence of inefficient, stressed mitochondria. These are likely to be the earliest findings in people who will develop metabolic disease states such as diabetes, fatty liver, hypertension, heart disease, etc.
...
> San Millán puts it bluntly: sedentary people are not the control group. They are already metabolically impaired.
3. I don't think I know enough to comment on the GLUT4 thing, but I do feel that's kindof in the weeds. The main message is still true I think.
4. "it's blatantly using this paper to promote his brand" -- Maybe I just don't mind him building his personal brand. I think that's what the vast majority of blogging is. I don't even see a clear sales pitch on the page, so I'm very happy with this.
We’ve engineered movement out of our lives. We sit in chairs, stare at screens, and outsource physical effort to machines. Then we try to cram all our movement into 45-minute bursts a few times a week.
This is like eating only once a week and calling it a balanced diet. Most people are malnourished, not from lack of food, but from a lack of diverse, nutrient-dense movement.
"
- Sedentary (SED): Does not perform exercise regularly or elevate heart rate outside of daily tasks
- Active (AC): Performs aerobic exercise for at least 150 minutes per week, and has at least a six-month history of doing so
"
A more comprehensive study that determines the optimal amount of exercise per week to achieve peak cellular function over a population would be quite interesting. Also, what about anaerobic exercises like weight lifting? What's the relative impact on metabolic function? Lots more to explore here!
[0] https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.08.19.608601v1....
There’s no job on the plan outside of drug runner that requires you to actually “run”.
Drug runners don't really run either, do they? But athletes do.
Edit: From the linked paper:
'''
2.1 Subject Recruitment Nineteen male subjects ((41.9 ± 13.8 years; 82.6 ± 13.9 kg)) participated in this study and were assigned a research arm based upon meeting one of the following criteria related to physical activity:
- Sedentary (SED): n= 10. Does not perform exercise regularly or elevate heart rate outside of daily tasks
- Active (AC): n=10. Performs aerobic exercise for at least 150 minutes per week, and has at least a six-month history of doing so
'''
I bet that "Performs aerobic exercise for at least 150 minutes per week" is related to some standard advice (but I'm too lazy to confirm that. I guess that provides an easy measuring stick to decide if we're being 'active enough'
The extreme of "performance" is rarely healthy.
But I would be interested to know how much this contributes to keeping me healthy.
Anecdotally, I and several other people have found smart watches good for keeping track of intensity minutes.
[0] https://www.who.int/initiatives/behealthy/physical-activity
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2501185-our-bodies-are-...
One needs a standing desk and a treadmill.
Also, if you are watching an episode of a tv show, randomly watching YouTube videos, listening to podcasts, etc., walk an hour or two during that time. That time won't feel 'wasted'.
I can't point you towards any study. But intake of new knowledge and information is somehow better while I am walking.
Supplements aren't going to help you mentally as a nice walk in the park.
This is the one thing that makes me so angry about the state of AR/VR/XR. Human bodies are made to move when we work - not strenuously, not non-stop, but consistently and with some amount of vigor. Spatial software design represents an AMAZING opportunity to re-tune digital work processes to be movement-oriented, while still productive and efficient. Compare digital sculpting in ZBrush and Media Molecule's Dreams.
It's maybe harder to envision a similar transformation for people dealing with data or communication for a living, but is it out of the realm of possibility? It shouldn't be, for anyone who who might compare common GUIs to interfaces like VIM and Emacs. The former are the unhappy compromise between the latter and the as-yet-to-be-created spatial interfaces that would be coming if the Bigs would stop trying to outmaneuver each other, and just create them.
I am tired of trying to manage my photo library on a small laptop screen or monitor, with a single pointer. Let me summon them to my physical space and manipulate, stack, sort them, and more, with split controllers or my actual hands. I promise that my brain and body and your wallet will be much, much happier.
We have/had a few things which could help (Leap Motion controller, Kinect, etc), but it's really hard to imagine how to generalize interfaces for these new device forms so they're at least on par with the old from a productivity perspective. Otherwise, people outside of research and maybe gaming won't really be sold on it.
It almost certainly will improve your VO2MAX.
Assuming that HIIT workouts are 100% vigorous activity (unlikely), then a "few" instances would only add up to around 24 minutes of vigorous activity, which is far short of the minimum recommended 75 minutes of vigorous activity.
If you are short on time then performing HIIT for 15 minutes five days a week will get you much closer to the minimum requirements.
On that basis, I would say that someone whose entire exercise regime is doing HIIT a few times a week for 8 minutes (24 minutes in total) is not going to be hitting the 6x multipler required for an equivalent of regular 150 minutes of exercise.