How Much Exercise Do I need for my age?

The World Health Organisation says for adults :

150 minutes of moderate exercise per week (or 90 mins of intense ) and 2 weight sessions.

For under 18’s it’s 60 minutes a day.

I have just finished reading Exercised, by Daniel Lieberman. A very interesting read on why something we didn’t “evolve” to do is good for us, and why some of us want to do it more than others.

My 3 Golden take aways from this book are -

1.        Exercise   - is THE thing that will keep you living your best life. From improving your heart and blood pressure, to keeping your joints limber and your bones strong. There is evidence that ALL the diseases we associate with aging can be decreased or avoided by doing the above amounts of exercise. (That is a mind blowing claim to fame for movement. Note it’s not saying - become a marathon runner, a body builder or anything else extreme, just move moderately for 150 minutes a week, or 90 minutes of high energy movement .)

2.        Endorphin rewards from exercise are what keep us coming back. We might not WANT to do it, but we LIKE how we feel after. But we are not all the same. The fitter we are, the quicker the reward – cruel hey? When first starting to increase fitness the rewards come slower, and are smaller. It takes time to feel the same high as someone who is really fit. And then -  some people have a genetic predisposition to “laziness”. This makes it harder to want to move, and even when these people do the rewards will never be the same as someone without this genetic make up.

3.        Active grandparenting is the ORIGINAL way to go. In a Hunter Gatherer society older members of the tribe do MORE of the physical labour while the younger ones are child raising.

Here’s some numbers to finish : The average American Woman under 50 walks on average 0.92 m per second. But slows down considerably to 0.67m a second. However in the Hazda tribe in Africa women average 1.1m per second into their 70’s.

At Sublime Pilates this looks right to me, some of the hardest classes done in my week are by my 70+ years young clients.