Daily, High Intensity Exercise Could Damage Heart Health
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According to new studies there may be a limit to the benefits of exercise. The research found too much exercise is actually bad for the heart. In a Swedish study researchers followed more than 44,000 men between the ages of 45 to 79. They observed their exercise patterns over the past years, and then tracked their heart health for an average of 12 years.
The data revealed that 30-year old men who exercised intensely for more than five hours a week were 19 percent more likely to develop an abnormal heartbeat condition called atrial fibrillation by age 60, compared with men who exercised for less than one hour a week.
Atrial fibrillation is a condition where the heart beats rapidly and irregularly which can lead to poor blood flow and significantly increase the risk of stroke.
In addition researchers in Germany looked at about 1,000 people in their 60s who had heart conditions but had enrolled in exercise programs in an effort to improve their heart health.
They followed the participants for 10 years and found that people who were the least active, as well as those who did daily, high-intensity exercise, had a higher risk of death from a heart attack or stroke than people in the middle.
The absolute lowest risk of dying of a heart attack or stroke was seen in the patients who exercised vigorously for two to four days a week.
Both studies were published May 14 in the journal Heart.
From Live Science:
The new findings suggest that people get maximum benefits from physical activity if they exercise moderately, according to Dr. Lluís Mont, of Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, and a colleague who wrote an editorial that accompanied the studies.
The studies also point to a delayed effect of intense exercise on the heart, Mont wrote. The researchers found that men who did more than five hours of intense exercise weekly at age 30 and had stopped their training in middle age, wound up having a nearly 50 percent higher risk of developing an irregular heartbeat when they were 60.
Conversely, men older than 50 who did a similar intense pattern of exercise didn’t show the same increase in risk. Men who cycled or walked briskly for at least an hour daily at age 60 were 12 percent less likely to develop atrial fibrillation than those who did no exercise at all.
“The benefits of exercise are definitely not to be questioned; on the contrary, they should be reinforced,” Mont and his colleague wrote. But the new findings and future studies “will serve to maximize benefits obtained by regular exercise while preventing undesirable effects—just like all other drugs and therapies.”
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I get all the exercise I need. I blink regularly 🙂
When I underwent my training program to be a Nautilus Center owner, they were very firm about limiting workouts to three days per week.
Done properly, Nautilus training is VERY high intensity. Each exercise is supposed to be done to muscle failure, considerably beyond the pain failure where most people stop.
Only one set of each exercise is to be done and, if your entire circuit takes you over 30-40 minutes, you’re doing it wrong.
I still exercise to that level except for my daily walking. When I have my complete medical exam, including a heart stress test, every year or so, I have never failed to max out the stress test. Nor has any heart problems been detected other than a minor arterial stenosis, which I have been assured is still too minor to be worth treating.
That doesn’t mean that someday I will not drop dead from a heart attack, but I prefer to think I will be shot by a large gang of jealous husbands. 🙂
I think dying in one’s sleep is the best way to go. Life doesn’t end well otherwise for most people.
I agree. I want to die in my sleep like my grandfather.
Not crying and screaming like the people in his car.