The Benefits of Cardio Interval Training for Your Heart & Health

In a long-term study of health in the United States, the U.S. Public Health Service documented the chances of developing heart disease among various groups in the population. Long before the any symptoms appeared, epidemiological research could identify high-risk groups.

Among the highest risk factors are male sex, age over 35, cigarette smoking, high blood pressure, high levels of certain blood fats such as triglycerides, and a family history of cardiovascular disorders.

Other researchers have added to this list another risk factor: the compulsive, hard-driving, highly anxious "type A" personality. The greater the number or severity of the above risk factors, the greater the person’s overall risk.

Measurement of blood pressure in arm with a sphygmomanometer. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

These threats to the heart can be divided into two main categories: those beyond individual control, such as age, sex, and heredity, and those that can be controlled, avoided, or even eliminated. Among those in the second category are what cardiologists call “the triple threat.” These are high blood pressure, cigarette smoking, and high cholesterol and triglyceride levels in the blood.

If you smoke a pack of cigarettes a day, your risk of having a heart attack is twice that of a nonsmoker. If you smoke, have hypertension, and eat a diet high in sugar and carbohydrates without any exercise at all, your risk is five times greater than normal.

The Healthy Heart

If these risk factors endanger the heart’s health, what enhances its well-being and improves its odds of working long and well?

Obviously, quitting smoking and eating a balanced healthy diet will help. The next best thing you can do for your heart’s sake is to give it what it needs: regular exercise and in particular, the right kind of exercise, such as cardio interval training.

The heart is a muscle, or, more accurately, a group or “package” of muscles, similar in many ways to the muscles of the arms and legs. And just as exercise strengthens and improves limb muscles, it enhances the health of the heart muscles as well.

Since World War II, several large-scale statistical studies have evaluated the relationship between physical activity and cardiovascular disease. One well-known survey compared 31,000 drivers and conductors of several bus companies. The more sedentary drivers had a significantly higher rate of heart disease than the conductors, who walked around the buses and climbed stairs to the upper level.

The why and how behind these statistics were best explained by classic experiments with dogs whose coronary arteries were surgically narrowed to resemble those of humans with arteriosclerosis. Dogs who were exercised had much better blood flow than those kept inactive.

The exercise seemed to stimulate the development of new connections between the impaired and the nearly normal blood vessels, so exercised dogs had a better blood supply to all the muscle tissues of the heart. The human heart reacts in the same way to provide blood to the portion that was damaged by a heart attack.

An example of how a heart attack occurs. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

To enable the damaged heart muscle to heal, the heart relies on new small blood vessels for what is called collateral circulation. These new branches on the arterial tress can develop long before a heart attack — and can prevent a heart attack if the new network takes on enough of the function of the narrowed vessels.

With all these facts in mind, the question becomes, how do we strengthen the heart muscle and keep it healthy, and help it develop these new connections if it is already damaged?

A number of studies have shown that moderate exercise several times a week is more effective in building up these auxiliary pathways than extremely vigorous exercise done twice as often.

The general rule is that exercise helps reduce the risk of harm to the heart. Some researchers further attested to the link between exercise and a healthy heart based on the findings that the non-exercisers had a 49% greater risk of heart attack than the other people included in the study. The study attributed a third of that risk to sedentary lifestyle alone.

By employing cardio interval training, you can absolutely expect positive results not only on areas that relate to your cardiovascular system but on the overall status of your health as well.

This type of activity consists of a cycle of “repeated segments” of intense nature. These segments are separated by periods of recuperation to allow the heart rate to return to normal. This not only strengthens the heart muscle, but as you can imagine, it more closely mirrors the nature of human activity. Most people don't move at a constant high rate of intensity. Your body just wasn't designed for that. It is much more natural for you to experience a high rate of exertion for a short time, followed by a period of rest.

Consequently, engaging in this type of activity can bring you many more positive results than you may have previously experienced from steady-state exercise. These are:

1. The threat of a heart attack is lessened - sometimes quite drastically

2. Enhanced heart strength and ability to handle bursts of activity - for example, shoveling snow or moving heavy objects

3. Increased metabolism and increased calorie burn, even after you're finished with your workout, which leads to easier and faster weight loss

4. Improved lung capacity

5. Helps lessen or eliminate stress

Indeed, cardio interval training is one of the best ways to create a healthy, happy heart and body.

There are a number of interval training resources available, but my favorite is the PACE Express program by Dr. Al Sears. This is a comprehensive workout program that is designed to get you great results in just 6 weeks. It comes with 6 DVDs, each of which contains 6 workouts. They each take only 15 minutes, and believe me, you will feel like you worked out for an hour! They are fast, fun, and effective, and they help you shed fat with ease. If you would like to learn more, just click the link above, and check back Thursday for an interview with Dr. Sears and how and why he developed his unique program.

Yoga For Weight Loss

In today's society carrying excess weight is becoming the norm rather than the exception.  Lifestyles are increasingly sedentary, diets are becoming increasingly processed and fatty, and food contains more and more calories, additives and preservatives.  Children prefer television over playing with their friends (which is perhaps a direct reflection on parents who prefer television over socializing or even making time for their children).  This only scratches the surface of the social move towards a sedentary and unhealthy society which is making more and more people fat. 

Image via WikipediaYoga is a discipline designed to make the body strong and flexible and enhance the overall health of the digestive system as well as the hormonal and circulatory systems.  It also assists us in controlling mental stress and achieving peace and clarity of mind.  Yoga also has strong spiritual benefits which will see you becoming more content with yourself and more comfortable with who you are, all aspects which will lead to emotional stability.  This mental component is often neglected in a physical approach to weight loss, but it is critical and should not be overlooked.  So called "Comfort food" is a frequent problem for people who yo-yo diet (rapidly lose and gain weight) and the ability to be happy with your health and who you are reduces the need for this.

Yoga is based on deep and controlled breathing which is a method for enhancing our oxygen intake.  This allows oxygen to travel to the fat cells in our body and assist in their processing.  One has to ask given the benefits why more people don't practice Yoga?

One reason is that many people think of Yoga as a passive or mystical discipline - something for hippies - not them.  This is a shame as Yoga improves the physical body as well as our mental health.  While it is practiced by a great many people in Eastern Populations only about 2% of the population in the United States has clicked on to the many benefits of yoga.

Image via WikipediaYoga considers all the aspects that contribute to obesity - not just the physical but also the mental and spiritual reasons behind them. Yoga is not only relaxing but brings the body back towards its ideal weight, and at the same time enhances strength, flexibility and stamina.  Yoga nuts tend to end up slim, agile and flexible, and what's more, yoga is suitable for people of all ages.

A more active form of Yoga, Kundalini, was introduced to America in 1969 by Yogi Bhajan.  It is a more active form of Yoga combining different methods of breathing, meditation and movement to compensate for the fact the American population has been conditioned to see exercise as requiring sweating.

Yoga can also be used to resist the temptation of snacking between meals.  Techniques learned from yoga can be used to suppress impulses such as that we think of as hunger between meals (if you eat proper meals you cannot be hungry between them - merely bored or restless). 

Yoga is not just a method of losing weight, it is actually a method which restores a natural balance to our body and moves us towards our natural state.  This has an interesting consequence with weight.  It we are overweight then yes, doing regular Yoga will cause us to lose weight.  However if we are at our ideal weight we will not drop weight, and if we weigh too little we will gain weight until we are at our biologically natural size. This is thought to result from the balancing effect that Yoga has on all of our bodily systems.

The Many Benefits of Stretching

In many exercise programs, be it weight lifting for building and toning muscles or cardiovascular exercises for increasing stamina and to lose weight, most people do not perform enough stretching exercises even though stretching exercises can be performed by anyone at any age unless that person has some physical restriction to stretch. What is worse, many people do not even stretch before and after exercising. Unknown to most people, stretching also has anti-aging benefits.

Benefits Of Stretching Exercises for Muscle Growth

Image via WikipediaStretching is an important aspect of exercising and should be a part of any exercise routine and program. There are many wonderful benefits when you perform regular stretching exercises. Stretching exercises not only help you to warm up and cool down before and after your workouts, it can and will actually help your muscles to grow bigger and stronger too. Don’t believe me? Then read on.

Stretching exercises help muscle growth because stretching lengthens your muscles and thus giving your muscle fibers a greater range of motion when lifting weights. So in effect, it recruits more muscle fibers and thus causing your muscles to grow stronger and bigger from your weight training.

By stretching your muscles after an intensive workout will reduce muscle soreness commonly known as DOMS (delayed onset muscle sore) which usually occurs a day after your workout.

Performing stretching exercises before your workout or before a physically demanding sporting activity will also decrease your chances of sustaining injuries and muscle cramps which will certainly destroy the joy of your activity.

When you stretch regularly, stretching exercises will help you gain agility which will make your daily chores much more pleasant and if you play sports, you will notice your agility is much better than others who do not stretch. This will put you in a more beneficial position against your opponents.

Anti-Aging Benefits Of Stretching Exercises

Image via WikipediaIf you are a baby boomer and age is catching up, this agility will make your life so much more pleasurable because you will be able to avoid stiff muscles and stiff joints unlike your peers who do not stretch. You will be more mobile, agile and suffering from less pain associated with aging and stiff body parts. These anti aging benefits from stretching regularly are priceless - benefits that money can never buy.

What's more, you can stretch anytime and anywhere as and when you like. Stretching exercises need not be limited to a pre- and post-workout activity. So start a stretching exercise routine soon and make it part of your everyday lifestyle. You will surely enjoy the pleasures and anti aging benefits that a regular stretching routine can bring you.