These Are The Exercises You Need To Do To Stay Young And Healthy

We are aware of anti-ageing benefits of exercising. But the real question is, which kind of exercising exactly has anti-ageing benefits? Scientists have revealed that endurance exercises like swimming, running and cycling are better than strength training exercise for slowing down the body's ageing process. As part of the study - published in European Heart Journal - researchers compared effects of endurance training, resistance training and high-intensity interval training (HIIT) on cellular ageing. Telomeres are responsible for ageing of cells. They are compound structures at the end of chromosomes which offer protection to our DNA. They waste away over time and cause ageing of cells.

The study had 266 volunteers aged between 30 to 60 years. Non-smoking participants who had not exercises for less than an hour in a week in the past year were defined as inactive. All the participants were assigned one form of exercise regime which they were supposed to do thrice a week for 6 months. The lifestyle otherwise, including their diet, remained same.

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As part of endurance training, participants were supposed to walk or run for 45 minutes. Resistance training included eight exercises on the machine such as crunches, pulldowns, seated rowing, seated chest presses, lying leg presses and seated leg curls. HIIT was supposed to be done by the 4x4 method, wherein 4 kinds of high intensity exercises needed to be done in a gap of 3 minutes, for 4 sets.

124 participants were able to complete the task. The ones who did HIIT and endurance training were found with lengthened telomeres activity - which can also be described as the clock of life. The same results were not produced among those who did resistance training.

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Endurance training and HIIT were also found to reduce inflammation in the body. Even though the oxygen uptake in case of resistance training is similar to that of aerobic exercises, the latter was found to delay ageing as compared to the former.

However, it has to be understood that this doesn't mean that you can ignore resistance training and only focus on aerobic exercises. Both forms of exercises have their set of benefits for the body. The two need to be done together in order to gain maximum benefits from exercising.

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What's more is that sedentary lifestyle habits like smoking and drinking alcohol also need to be given up if you want to slow down the ageing process. A healthy and balanced diet is also important to keep you young, healthy and glowing.

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