University of Bath study finds gentler exercise works

January 17, 2017

Rigorous exercise provides no extra benefits for people trying to lose weight
Gentler routines work just as well and help burn the same amount of calories
It also helps to reduce blood pressure and cholesterol by the same amount

Stephen Matthews For Mailonline

Published:
06:01 EST, 17 January 2017

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Updated:
06:35 EST, 17 January 2017

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Many of our New Year’s resolutions revolve around trying to lose weight.

But new research may have just made our quest to shed those excess pounds a lot easier – and less embarrassing.

Scientists claim that there’s no need to go all out and work-up a sweat – gentler exercise works just as well.

Demanding regimes provide no extra health benefits nor do they burn more fat for people trying to lose weight, a study found.

Gentle exercise works just as well as more demanding workouts in helping people to lose weight, new research has found

Researchers at the University of Bath examined how long people should exercise for and with what intensity.

As part of the study, 38 sedentary and overweight men and post-menopausal women with an average age of 52 were asked to exercise five times per week.

They also cut the number of calories they consumed through food and drink.

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Half the participants exercised vigorously on a treadmill, while the other half at moderate-intensity.

Before and after the three-week monitoring period, participants had blood insulin measured and biopsies of fat tissue taken.

In the study, published in the journal Physiological Reports, they found that both groups lost the same amount of weight.

Demanding regimes provide no extra health benefits nor do they burn more fat for people trying to lose weight, a study found

While improvements in insulin sensitivity and metabolic health were detected in both groups.

And a similar reduction was recorded in fat mass, blood pressure, cholesterol and a range of other measures.

COUCH POTATOES

Couch potatoes are just as likely to get dementia as those born with the Alzheimer’s gene, a study claimed last week.

This means that even without any genetic risk factors, over-65s who rarely exercise are among the most likely to develop the disease.

Currently 47.5 million people worldwide are living with dementia and that number is is set to increase to due to the aging population.

But experts warn the rising rate of physical inactivity could drive up that figure even more.

Positive changes in the activation of genes within fat cells in both groups were also found, highlighting benefits within the fat tissue itself.

The vast majority of these changes were unaffected by the intensity of the exercise.

Study author, Dr Jean-Philippe Walhin, said: ‘Three weeks of increased exercise combined with a reduction in dietary intake had a dramatic impact on the overall health of the participants and on key genes within their fat tissue.

‘However, our data demonstrates that what really matters is how many calories were used up by exercising in total, not so much the intensity of the exercise sessions.’

While Dr James Betts, another of the researchers, said their study was one of the first to look into what happens within the tissue that responds most to weight loss.

‘The benefits from increased exercise and a reduction in dietary intake were evident, but mostly independent of the intensity of the exercise,’ he added.