All Exercise Matters But Intense Matters More If You Want To Live Longer

Photo by Geronimo Giqueaux on Unsplash

Each higher level of intensity improves your survival rate

Physical exercise guidelines generally recommend 300 minutes of moderately-intensive exercise a week as a good minimum. Doing any physical activity is better than none. But would you rather try a little harder and live longer?

A research study conducted nearly 20 years ago and since cited by nearly 1000 other studies tested the prognostic capacity of exercise for mortality. The study tracked 6,213 men over 6 years, during which time there were a total of 1256 deaths. 

​Here's what the data showed, which is exciting. Exercise capacity is the most powerful predictor of mortality, even among those with existing cardiovascular diseases risk factors. Exercise capacity is not relative capacity adjusted for age - that was not found to be a good predictor - but absolute fitness.

In fact, the research assigned a number to the increasing value of exercise capacity. Each 1-MET increase in exercise capacity conferred a 12 per cent improvement in survival. (One MET is the energy expended in sitting quietly, which is equivalent to a body oxygen consumption of approximately 3.5 ml per kilogram of body weight per minute for an average adult.)

More intense exercise requires us to use more energy, and hence rates higher in METS. The useful thing about METS is that we can compare the intensity of different exercises e.g. walking is 3 METS, jogging 6. The study grouped participants into three blocks of exercise intensity:

• Below 5 METS
• Between 5 and 8 METS
• Above 8 METS.

​The average exercise intensity of the Above 8 METS group was 9.7 METS and 80% more of this group had survived compared to those in the low exercise group - the Below 5 METS.

That's worth fighting for!

Knowing Your METS Will Help You Stick With Your Exercise Program For Longer

Consistent with other studies of fitness and longevity

The result is consistent with many other studies:

• A 25-year long 66,000 patient-strong Cooper Clinic Longitudinal Study suggested that exercise capacity improved the classification of heart risk, over and above the traditional risk factors (smoking, age, BP, blood sugar and cholesterol).
• A 2004 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found very similar results to the Cooper Institute data, determining that fitness, rather than body weight alone, was the stronger predictor of health.
• An earlier study of 2014 Norwegian men followed over a 16-year period found that physical fitness appears to be a predictor of mortality from cardiovascular disease in healthy men and "a high level of fitness was also associated with lower mortality from any cause".

What this means for you - level-up and live longer

It's a fantastic thing to know that there's a number to motivate you to up your exercise intensity. Especially since is it not too challenging to lift your level of effort by 1 MET.

This chart shows the MET levels of various activities. You might be able to spot something that you currently like doing, and how to lift the intensity to the next level.

Image Credit: Loh Xiu Ming https://oss.adm.ntu.edu.sg/xloh002/activity-range/

​Or, for example, here are other suggestions, with METS shown:

• If you are cycling slowly (5) lift to a faster pace (7)
• If you are jogging (9) try running slowly (13)
• If you are rope skipping at 66/min (10) try 120/min (12)
• If you are rowing gently (5.5) up the pace (11)
• If you are swimming moderately (8) try fast lane (11)
• If you are walking slowly (2) try brisk walking (5).

If you like classes, join an interval training class. Even the average Boxing class will be a step up if you aren't very active. Lifting your METS by 1 is as simple as not leaning on the handrails when using a treadmill, not taking 2 minutes between a few easy exercises, doing what the instructor asks at Spin, or adding slopes into your daily walk.

Ditch The Leg-days Chest-days And Do Real Days If You Want To Live Longer Better

​Finally, if you are doing Yoga (3-METS) keep it up and add in another more intense exercise. I doubt that HIIT Yoga will help, although it does show how meaningless the phrase HITT has become !

Image Credit: Screenshot - The Author

Use your own perceived effort as a measure

Alternatively use your own level of breathing to determine how hard you are exerting yourself, and keep doing the things you love. Just take it up a notch to be a little more breathless as often as you can.

Use the perceived exertion scale (based on the 20-point Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion).

10-Point Levels of Perceived Exertion

• Level 1: At rest - watching TV, reading a book
• Level 2: Walking but not enough to speed up your breathing
• Level 3: I'm still comfortable, but breathing a bit harder
• Level 4: Sweating a little, but feel good and can carry on a conversation effortlessly
• Level 5: Just above comfortable, brisk walking, sweating and can still talk easily
• Level 6: Still talk, but slightly breathless
• Level 7: Can still talk, but don't really want to
• Level 8: Can grunt in response to questions but can't talk and can only keep this pace for a short time period
• Level 9: Over the top now and hurting, very strong breathing
• Level 10: A burst that is going to fade very soon

Build up from where you perceive yourself to be today, to as many levels above that you can build into your regular exercise - for life. Remember every 1-MET lift in your exercise intensity that you maintain consistently will return you a 12 percent improvement in survival rate.

Good luck, it’s worth it.

PS If you have done the maths and are starting from inactivity, and plan to go to 10 METS of intensity, you might wonder of how you can get a 120 percent improvement in survival rate. Without going into too much detail the research analysis is based on a straight line linear regression. This underestimates the improvement moving from 1-MET of intensity to 2-METS, and overestimates the improvement from say 11 METS to 12 METS. 

This is good news both ways. If you are just starting to exercise then you will get disproportionate benefits (many research studies have validated this and it is the basis of public health activity guidelines). If you are already regularly exercising at 11 METS then you are well at the top of your survival statistics anyway.

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