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Exercise is one of the keys to living well—and longer—along with eating a nutritious diet and managing your stress. But exactly which exercise regimen is best for you isn’t easy to figure out.
A new study published in BMJ Medicine might provide some guidance. The researchers studied more than 100,000 people who reported their physical activity for about 30 years and found that varying the way you move could be important for living a longer life.
The scientists analyzed data from the Nurses’ Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study that included healthy health professionals who reported on their exercise habits—what type of physical activity they did, and how long they exercised—every few years for 30 years. The researchers then compared deaths from various causes, like heart disease, cancer, and respiratory illnesses, to these exercise patterns to determine which were linked to longer life.
Not surprisingly, people who exercised more on average had anywhere from 4% to 17% lower risk of death during the study period, depending on the type of activity they did, compared to those who exercised less. But when the scientists broke down the data by exercise type, they found that even among people who reported similar amounts of physical activity, those who engaged in a combination of exercise types had an additional 19% lower risk of death compared to those who stuck to the same regimen.
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“Keeping up the total amount of activity is still the most important,” says Yang Hu, a research scientist at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health and one of the authors of the paper. “But on top of that, maybe you can try to diversify the types of activities you do by trying different things, which may gain you additional benefit.”
In the study, walking vigorously was linked to the highest reduction in risk of early death (17%) compared to those who walked less, followed by running (13%), climbing stairs (10%), and resistance training (9%).
(Swimming was not associated with a measurable benefit in the study, but Hu says that may be because people define swimming in different ways, ranging from leisurely floating in the pool to doing vigorous laps.)
There’s a reason why switching things up might maximize your benefits. Previous studies have documented the varying benefits of different types of exercise—things like running, swimming, and walking can be good for the heart and respiratory system, lowering risk of heart disease and hypertension, while strength training can better maintain muscle mass and is important for preventing falls, especially among older people. Hu says that individual physical activities also generally max out at a certain point, beyond which people don’t accrue much additional health benefit. Combining different exercises can optimize the benefits of these activities and lead to added benefits in reducing the risk of early death.
“We speculate that the variety of physical activities means that people are able to take advantage of two or even more dimensions of exercise,” Hu says. “We want to make the case that it’s possible that the mix of aerobic and resistance or strength training has complementary benefits.”
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