Exercise Guidelines

And other thoughts about inactivity.

At the beginning of the week, I asked if you got the recommended 150 minutes of activity per week, no matter what it was. Did you do any type of exercise regularly for 150 minutes most weeks?

I would like to thank the one person who said no. You are the typical North American adult.

I am also pretty excited that so many of you said yes. That makes me feel pretty happy. And for those of you who said, yes, more than 150 minutes a week, congratulations. You can probably stop reading now.

Because the stats aren’t good.

21% of all Canadians, 19% of American men and 26% of American women meet the recommended guidelines for aerobic exercise.

The stats for resistance training are even worse.

3% of the population meets these guidelines.

Do you know the resistance training recommendations?

That is what I thought… most likely not, but that isn’t really your fault.

Eric Rawson, Ph.D., CSCS, one of the keynote speakers at the American College of Sports Medicine Conference said “we are doing a good job at promoting cardiovascular fitness, but not resistance training”

Sorry, but I can’t agree. 20% of the North American adult population meeting the minimum amount of cardiovascular exercise is not a “good job.”

I do agree we are doing a really terrible job at promoting resistance training (or strength or weight training or whatever you want to call it).

Why this matters.

Muscle really is life.

Stuart Phillips, Ph.D., professor at McMaster University, studies both cardiovascular training and resistance training and says,

Resistance Training can prevent and treat most of our chronic health conditions, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, depression and anxiety.

He also takes issue with how the Canadian guidelines for resistance training are stated. For the record, all the guidelines follow the World Health Organization recommendations.

The Canadian guidelines are,

Notice how it says “it is also beneficial to add muscle and bone strengthening exercises?

Yes, very beneficial.

Especially when it comes to maintaining your health. If you want to stay functional, remain independent, recover from injury or surgery faster, and be healthy at any weight. Adding muscle and bone strengthening exercises are vital for your health and fitness.

Even less than the minimum is a good start.

Change your mind, change your health,

Shayla