Why/how to exercise

If exercise were a drug, it would be the best drug we have for preventing not just spinal disease, but also osteoporosis, heart disease, dementia, depression, diabetes, and obesity. The dose, however, is important. Just 15 minutes of moderate exercise (can be as simple as brisk walking, raking the yard or mopping floors, or playing tennis with a partner) can decrease risk of serious cardiovascular disease. However, exercise creates oxidative stress. After about 45 to 50 minutes of high-intensity exercise, the body’s antioxidant capacity to resolve the oxidative stress is exhausted and endothelial function is negatively affected at this point Especially after age 40 or 45, really protracted exercise will cause small amounts of damage, like overstretching and tearing of the heart.

Moderate exercise, but also high levels of social interaction can together be the best type of exercise. The Copenhagen City Heart study of 10,000 patients over 20 years showed that tennis, badminton, and soccer were actually associated with the greatest longevity benefit, followed by running, cycling, calisthenics, and swimming. If you are training for longevity, it may be wise to take it down a couple of notches, but also add something social. Make sure that you have some play and fun in your life. We played as kids, we need to be playing as adults even more because it’s so important, not only for social bonding from stress relief or antidepressant.

The road to better health involves strength, stability, flexibility, aerobic fitness, and anaerobic fitness.

The importance of zone 2 aerobic exercise, which is done at a relatively low intensity (60-70% of maximum heartrate), but approximately the highest intensity prior to mitochondrial capacity being exceeded and lactate accumulation increasing. A rough ratio should be 80% zone 2 and 20% zone 5 (i.e., max capacity). He believes this middle area of intensity (zones 3-4) is the least important zone to be training within

It showed that simply walking 12,000 steps per day decreased mortality risk by about two thirds. Also supporting the idea of their being a point of diminishing returns for exercise dosage, the benefit of walking steadily increased up until 12,000 steps per day, where it plateaued.

A lower resting heart rate is associated with increased longevity

• lifestyle factors like overtraining, poor sleep, a lot of travel, stress, and illness will typically increase his resting heart rate by 5 or more beats per minute

Alcohol consumption, stress, and inadequate sleep can all increase resting heart rate

Importance of HRV.

Source: Peter Attia podcast #134 – James O’Keefe, M.D.: Preventing cardiovascular disease and the risk of too much exercise