New Line CinemaScientists have made a shock revelation about the way in which we exercise which might just be the news you’ve been waiting for…
Apparently researchers from the University of Bath’s Department of Health, have discovered that actually, gentle exercise is equally as a good as a vigorous workout in helping people to lose weight, indy100 reports.
According to the research, the number of calories burned in a day or a week does not change and the intensity of exercise done does not affect the amount of weight lost.
This sounds like really good news if you’re allergic to the gym or don’t fancy giving that hellish-looking spinning class a go..
Bizarrely, it means that those who opt for gentle exercise over super-sweaty cardio will effectively get the same results.
It doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t exercise at all however, those who prefer a more sedate style of working out, need to do so more frequently, than those who who like to tear up the treadmill.
To conduct the study, 38, overweight, sedentary men and post-menopausal women, of around 52-years-old, were required to exercise five times a week and reduce the amount of calories they consumed.
Blood sugar levels and fat content were measured before and after the study and researchers found that both groups had lost the same amount of weight and had the same metabolisms and sensitivity to insulin.
Bizarrely still, most of the positive changes to their lifestyle were completely unaffected by the intensity level of the exercise pursued.
Professor Dylan Thompson said:
A critical feature of our experiment was that we carefully matched the groups, so all participants expanded the same calories during each exercise session and experienced the same calorie reduction by consuming less food.
If you want to increase the amount of exercise you do as a New Year’s resolution, then our study shows that benefits are similar whether you choose to exercise for longer at a lower intensity, or for less time but more vigorously.
This is quite an encouraging revelation, which could potentially change the way we think about exercise and dieting entirely.
The lead researcher on the study, Dr Jean-Philippe Wahlin said:
Three weeks of increased exercise combined with a reduction in dietary intake had a dramatic impact on the overall health of the participants and on key genes within their fat tissue. However, our data demonstrates that what really matters is how many calories were used up by exercising in total, not so much the intensity of the exercise sessions.
This is fantastic news, delivered just at the right time as we’re flagging with our new year’s resolution’s and January seems to be stretching out indefinitely….
It means we can now pick whether we want to cane it down at the gym, or take it easier and go more often, depending on how we feel (or whether have a better option…)
Result.
