As we age, our hearts undergo some pretty dramatic changes. They start to shrink and get stiffer, kind of like how a rubber band loses its spring over time. This can make it harder for our hearts to pump blood efficiently, which can leave us feeling winded even after light exercise. And that’s not all – it also increases our risk of heart problems down the line.
But here’s the amazing part: exercise, especially the vigorous kind, can actually combat some of these effects. In fact, one landmark study, published by Ben Lavin M.D. of Internal Medicine and Sports Cardiology, found that just two years of intense exercise in people in their 50s could make their hearts look 20 years younger! That’s right, their 50-year-old hearts were indistinguishable from those of 30-year-olds. That’s the power of exercise!
So what kind of exercise are we talking about? The study participants started with a six-month ramp-up period, where they worked their way up to exercising five to six hours a week. A big chunk of that was at what’s called maximal steady state intensity – think of it like the highest level you can sustain without collapsing in a heap. They also threw in some Norwegian 4×4 max interval training.
The results were nothing short of astonishing. After just two years, these 50-year-olds had essentially reversed the aging process in their hearts. That’s the kind of benefit we’re talking about when we talk about vigorous exercise and heart health.
Okay, let’s shift gears and talk about how exercise impacts the way our bodies handle sugar. This is where things get really interesting, especially when it comes to high-intensity interval training (HIIT). It turns out HIIT is way better at improving insulin sensitivity and glucose control than your run-of-the-mill moderate-intensity workouts. And it gets those benefits way faster, too. Sure, any kind of exercise is going to help your muscles get better at handling sugar, but HIIT just does it more efficiently and more powerfully.
So why is that? Well, when you’re doing HIIT, your body is screaming for energy fast. It’s got to rely on both your aerobic (oxygen-using) and anaerobic (non-oxygen-using) systems to deliver. The anaerobic system is what kicks in when you’re really pushing it, and it produces a bunch of lactate as a byproduct. For a long time, everyone thought lactate was basically just waste that made your muscles tired. But it turns out that’s totally wrong.
Lactate is actually used as fuel by your muscles and other tissues like your heart, liver, and brain. It even gets shuttled into your mitochondria (those energy-producing powerhouses inside your cells) to be burned up. And it doesn’t stop there – lactate also acts as a signal, telling your cells to up their game. One of the key messages it sends is to increase the number of glucose transporters on your muscle cells. Those are like little doors that let sugar in. So when lactate builds up during HIIT, it’s like a signal flare going off, telling your muscles to open up those doors and let the glucose flood in. That makes your muscles way more efficient at sucking up sugar from your bloodstream, even when you’re just chillin’ on the couch. And that means your insulin sensitivity gets a big boost, and your blood sugar stays in a healthy range.
There’s been tons of research showing HIIT can improve glucose uptake, crank up insulin sensitivity, and even cut the risk of developing type 2 diabetes. A lot of that probably has to do with the intense metabolic stress of HIIT, which gets those glucose transporters really revved up. And it’s not just about the stress – HIIT also makes your muscles as a whole more fit, which helps them handle sugar better. It’s just that with HIIT, you get that lactate signal right away, telling your muscles to open up those glucose doors. With steady-state cardio, you’ve got to go longer to get the same benefit.
Okay, last thing I want to touch on is how exercise impacts your mitochondria. Those are the little energy factories inside your cells, and they’re way important for everything from your muscles to your brain to your liver. The problem is, as we age, our mitochondria start to lose their mojo. They get less efficient at cranking out energy, and that’s a problem. But there’s a silver lining – exercise, especially the vigorous kind, can actually increase the number of mitochondria you have. This is called mitochondrial biogenesis, and it’s like your cells are adapting to the demand you’re putting on them by building more of those energy factories.
One of the key ways exercise triggers mitochondrial biogenesis is through the metabolic stress of vigorous exercise. Remember how we were just talking about lactate? Well, it’s back again. When you’re doing HIIT and generating a ton of lactate, that lactate acts as a signal to rev up one of the main pathways that controls mitochondrial biogenesis. So when you’re doing that Norwegian 4×4 protocol or any other kind of intense intervals, the lactate you’re generating is like a signal flare telling your cells to build more mitochondria. And that means they’ll be more efficient at producing energy, which is good news for everything from your workouts to your overall health.
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