Choose something you enjoy and begin gradually![]() Photo by Mark Daynes on Unsplash Working out is known to improve the moods of people with depression, although why it works is still somewhat a mystery.
What is not a mystery is research which reveals that exercise intensity is not associated with the level of mood improvement. For example, in this study, all participants experienced about the same level of reduced depression after hard, moderate and light aerobic exercise. Building regular exercise into your day will improve your day, and you can start as small as you like. Here's how. Your weak hip muscles are costing you running efficiency![]() Photo by Jenny Hill on Unsplash Judging by the number of other runners who ask me what I am doing, it's apparent that warming up, warming down and stretching our hip flexors is a bit of a lost art. That's unfortunate, and not just for runners.
I do a simple couple of hip flexor warm-ups and warm-downs, which I recommend for all runners. It's attention to these kinds of movements that has enabled me to run every day ~5km for nearly 300 days injury-free. Hip mobility is essential for everyone and runners in particular. (When running we use our hip flexors, especially the iliopsoas, to lift the leg with each stride.) With running, hip flexors can suffer from muscle weakness and muscle tightness, causing tenderness and pain. The risk of obesity increases by 9% for each 1-hour decrease in sleep duration![]() Photo by Yogendra Singh on Unsplash Good quality sleep often alludes us, and poor sleep leads to various health problems (WebMD) such as heart disease, heart attack, heart failure, irregular heartbeat, high blood pressure, stroke and diabetes.
Here's what you need to know to optimise your sleep duration and to minimise the risk of sleep-related obesity. Over nearly two decades, sleep has been increasingly recognised as a potential risk for obesity. For example, many observational studies have shown links between short sleep duration and weight gain. However, a recent study which sought to validate such prior studies found the evidence to be inconclusive. Despite the findings of the recent survey, there are plausible associations between good health and too little or too much sleep which are essential to know. ![]() Photo by Bret Kavanaugh on Unsplash Plus, to reduce risk of early death forget your weight and start measuring your waist, says global study of 2.5 million people[Copy of my weekly newsletter] Surprisingly, intermittent fasting has been found to improve our brain health and functioning - see #1. Forget the scales, measure your waist - check item #2. The pandemic has more people exercising - are you one of them? - item #3. The reverse lunge with front-kick is one of my fav movements, for all purposes - item #4. #staysafe #keepmoving #stayhealthy Here are my 4 Most Valuable pieces of content from around the web, to help you live longer better:
⭑ Your brain will stay brighter for longer if fasting is part of your life ⭑ Even if your BMI and weight is good your belly fat might kill you earlier ⭑ The ways we've reacted positively to the pandemic ⭑ Kicking your way to better balance and less hip pain Five ways to kick-start fasting to improve your cognitive fitness![]() Photo by Viviana Rishe on Unsplash It's daunting to contemplate how to get started with intermittent fasting. It has become synonymous with keto and faddish diets and has elements of a cult - which turns people off. That's unfortunate because intermittent fasting can keep our brain functioning better for longer.
Here's how to get started, without having to "go keto" or remove yourself from family dinners. The reluctance to make fasting part of our lifestyle is not helped by the fact that until this year (2020), intermittent fasting was yet to be assessed in a rigorous clinical trial. The publication of a small "rigorous clinical trial" - just 58 subjects - reported "weight loss and improved cardiometabolic measures". Intermittent fasting (IF) diets fall generally into two categories: daily time-restricted feeding, which narrows eating times to 6-8 hours per day, and so-called 5:2 intermittent fasting, in which people limit themselves to one moderate-sized meal two days each week. Dr Mattson's two findings on how to live longer better![]() Photo by Aleksandar Popovski on Unsplash After a lifetime studying the how aging and the brain interact, Dr Mark P Mattson recently retired from the National Institute on Aging. Dr Mattson is a renown expert in understanding neurobiological responses to physical exercise and dietary restriction and their relationship to ageing and age-related disease.
His two seminal findings can help us all live longer better. As we age, our brain inevitably loses its edge. But there is detailed research which shows two specific ways in which we can slow the rate of brain aging. Both are freely available and require no subscriptions, payment plans, nor coaches. Better posture isn’t the answer - it's a symptom of something else![]() Photo by Hulki Okan Tabak on Unsplash The pandemic, and working from home, has led to us spending long hours in awkward body positions, typically resulting in hunching our shoulders forward. NYC dentist Tammy Chen, says “I’ve seen more tooth fractures in the last six weeks than in the previous six years".
It’s not just fractures but jaw pain, tooth sensitivity, achiness in the cheeks and migraines — sound familiar? The simple, universal cure is an appeal to "better posture". However, this is not the cure, as "better posture" is often a prescription for the wrong disease. In this post, I'll explain what the real cause it, and cures that work. This will not necessarily get you sitting up in a textbook posture, but it should cure you from damaging your teeth. ![]() Photo by Yurii Fadeev on Unsplash Plus, Grandma was right - eat your beets. They strengthen our lungs and keep Covid at bay[Copy of my weekly newsletter] Simple light therapy helps maintain our hormonal balance, says Cleveland Clinic. Recent research found that beetroot is better for us then even Grandma said! Can you imagine eating lab-grown sushi - some call it FrankenFish - what do you think, read on. And there's a lying exercise with a towel that will strengthen your whole body, you can do every morning easily. #staysafe #keepmoving #stayhealthy
Here are my 4 Most Valuable pieces of content from around the web, to help you live longer better: ⭑ Serving breakfast with a side of light therapy will put you in a better mood ⭑ The humble beetroot deserves more credit ⭑ FrankenFish may be healthier than farmed fish! ⭑ How to extend your core and strengthen your back and shoulders If you eat farmed fish now then you've nothing to lose![]() Photo by Vineeth Vinod on Unsplash In a mere five years, lab-grown salmon will be on the sushi conveyer-belt, at least if a number of startups have their way. Well, they will have their way. Like the coronavirus vaccine, it is only a matter of time.
In fact, Finless Foods was hoping to bring its cell-based bluefin tuna to market by the end of 2019. Although it hasn't entirely made it, it is very close and has served small select audiences its early production lab-grown shrimp. WildType, a startup making lab-grown salmon, has opened up a pre-order list for select chefs. Although the company is as much as five years out from commercial production, according to founders the company is looking to partner with chefs who want to incorporate WildType's sushi-grade salmon product into their menus. Could these lab-based meal creations be better for us than the real thing, and would you eat it? You might be surprised. Over 50? Do Exactly These Seven Things To Improve Your Muscle Strength - 30 Years Research16/9/2020 It's clear and simple but not what you might expectThe most confusing aspects of how to start exercising are to decide on how many repetitions, how many sets, what weight load, what rest between sets, etc etc. When I first enrolled in a gym more than 20 years ago, like most men I just started jiggling dumbbells about, then barbells. It was inefficient and ultimately unsatisfying.
To be honest, I wasted a couple of years which could have been better spent. One of the things which held me back from asking the trainers was my age. I was over 50, and it was rare to see anyone else my age doing strength training. I knew enough to see that the younger ones were doing things that had little relevance to living longer better or fitness, which were my objectives. I drifted into classes, and kettlebells, and came back to barbell training years later. Two recent studies provided the answers that would have helped me then, and it is clear and simple. These two studies compared young and old healthy adults, and older adults, across different strength training protocols. The results are very interesting. |
ChoicesSince I was diagnosed at 50 with Type 2 diabetes I've been learning how to do bone-building fitness training which lowers my age. You can too. It's your choice. Walter Categories
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