To get in shape, having a regular workout schedule matters.
But how much do regular workouts really matter?
According to research from the University of Copenhagen, young adults who didn’t stay physically active for just two weeks lost a third of their muscular strength, making them about as strong as someone 50 years older than them.
In addition, it accelerates the loss of muscle mass–something that also affects a person’s metabolism.
“Our experiments reveal that inactivity affects the muscular strength in young and older men equally,” says Andreas Vigelsoe, Ph.D., a researcher from the Center for Healthy Aging and the Department of Biomedical Sciences at the University of Copenhagen. “Having had one leg immobilized for two weeks, young people lose up to a third of their muscular strength, while older people lose approx. one fourth. A young man who is immobilized for two weeks loses muscular strength in his leg equivalent to aging by 40 or 50 years.”
The study, which now appears in the online version of the Journal of Rehabilitation Medicine, first immobilized the legs of 17 young men and 15 older men, testing out how it would affect their leg strength. After two weeks, they examined their legs to see how it affected their strength.
While all men in the study showed decreased leg strength, the younger men suffered the worst–retaining only one-third of their leg strength.
From there, researchers had them build up their leg strength again by doing aerobic exercise for 6 weeks. Their goal was to see if this exercise would restore their strength.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.
“Unfortunately, bicycle-training is not enough for the participants to regain their original muscular strength,” says Vigelsoe. “Cycling is, however, sufficient to help people regain lost muscle mass and reach their former fitness level.”
On the upside, however, researchers note that it isn’t impossible to rebuild lost muscle mass after a period of inactivity. Weight training helps people regain their muscle strength more rapidly, for instance; although aerobic exercise helps as well, it won’t improve a person’s strength because it’s meant to improve a person’s heart function instead.
Bottom line? Stay active–and if you can’t be active, make sure to lift weights instead once you decide to work out again.
“If you want to regain your muscular strength following a period of inactivity; you need to include weight training,” says Vigelsoe. “Short-term leg immobilization had marked effects on leg strength, and work capacity and 6 weeks’ retraining was sufficient to increase, but not completely rehabilitate, muscle strength, and to rehabilitate aerobic work capacity and leg lean mass (in the young men).”
Readers: Do you weight train? Why or why not?
Sources:
Inactivity Reduces People’s Muscle Strength – ScienceDaily.com
Six Weeks’ Aerobic Retraining After Two Weeks’ Immobilization Restores Leg Lean Mass and Aerobic Capacity but Does Not Fully Rehabilitate Leg Strength in Young and Older Men (Study) – MedicalJournals.se
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