You may have heard the news that women need to exercise an hour a day, five days a week to keep post-diet weight loss from coming back. And you may have been tempted—like I was—to mentally file it under Super Depressing Health News That Must Be Ignored.
Who has time for five hours of exercise a week? The current recommendation is 30 minutes a day, five days a week, and I don’t even get close to that. If you have kids, a job, or a life, an hour of daily exercise can seem like a luxury reserved for tennis-playing socialites.
So I talked to the lead researcher, John Jakicic, PhD, chair of the department of health and physical activity at the University of Pittsburgh, to get a reality check.
You don’t have to run a marathon
In the Archives of Internal Medicine study, Jakicic and his colleagues put 201 women (all overweight or obese, and aged 21 to 45) on a 1,200-1,500 calorie-a-day diet and one of four exercise regimens.
The women lost 8%-10% of their body weight in six months, regardless of the group they were in. Most of them gained it back by the end of the two-year study.
But the researchers took a glass-half-full approach and zeroed in on the weight loss “success stories”—the 25% of women who did manage to keep the weight off.
They found these women were exercising more—about 275 minutes per week, or roughly one hour five times a week—than the weight gainers.
The good news is that they weren’t training for a triathlon.
“When I talk about exercise or physical activity, I’m not talking about going to the gym—95% of these women didn’t go to the gym,” he tells me. “These people basically, most of the time, elected to go out for a walk. And that walk can be as short as 10 minutes at a time.”
It all sounds great. But really—how did they do it? I think even 10 free minutes would be tough to find on some days.
Sweating not necessary
Turns out the women squeezed exercise into super-packed schedules, says Jakicic. The women had once-a-week group meetings in which they talked with their peers about their diet and exercise problems. And the group offered solutions.
“We’re not talking about major changes here, we’re talking about little things that make a difference,” says Jakicic. “We hear this all the time: ‘I always have to take my kids to a soccer game and I have to be there an hour and a half and all I do is sit.’ Well, [I tell them to] get up off the bleachers and walk around the soccer field and all the sudden the light goes on and they go, ‘Yeah.’ It s almost like it’s so simple they couldn’t think of it on their own.”
Apparently, sweating isn’t necessary.
“Instead of going for half an hour and just sitting there and eating on your lunch break, go outside and take a walk for 10 minutes and then come back and have your lunch,” he said. “Absolutely you can do this and not sweat. It makes a big difference for people.”
Jakicic emphasizes that you do have to change your diet to lose the weight in the first place. And as we all know, cutting out the cake isn’t a cakewalk.
But the only thing worse than having to diet to lose weight, is to have to do it again. It’s enough to get you moving.
(PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO)
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Comments (16)
whats the difference with this article than allthe other ones? bascially it comes down to no one has time to go for a walk when they could be getting dinner done doing the household chores helping with homework or running children to there daily activities. It would be nice to actually find some that fits in with american busy daily life style on the go.
i have no any comment but iwant to learn some thing this website can we help for me that situation
How can someone say they don’t have 10 minutes to go for a walk? We all have time for what’s most important to us. If you make exercise, health & wellness your priority then you will make time for it. I understand people have careers & kids, but the reality is you have to make time for yourself. There are some things not worth compromising. Sure your family & career are part of this list, but so is your health.
It’s all about prioritizing your time. Yes, it’s hard. But don’t you want to be here and healthy to take care of your family? Then take care of yourself!
There are easy ways to fit exercise in a busy schedule….you can get up early to go to the gym, find an activity that you and your family enjoy (that involves moving around), find an exercise DVD that you enjoy and have your kids participate too. If you don’t exercise it leads to a host of problems and you’ll end up spending more time on them than you would if you exercise.
Your health is one of the most important things in life. You have to make a priority to eat correctly and exercise. I am a Nurse Practitioner, I tell my patients, exercise is like sleeping and eating. It should be considered part of your every day activities. I work full-time, have kids, and am a neat freak when it comes to having a nice clean house. I still make it a priority to exercise every day. In our society our lifesyles don’t require us to move like they did 25 years ago and more, so we have to exercise–no compromise.
Chair yoga is great exercise for desk-bound, obese, chronically ill, and time-challenged people. There’s a great DVD out called Get Fit Where You Sit! that teaches a simple but effective set of yoga-based poses you do sitting in a chair with your feet flat on the floor that stretch and strengthen without sweat.
I am 50 and very active, but my active life does not keep off the pounds, additional exercise does. If you have time to watch TV you have time to exercise, put some kind of stationary machine–bike etc.–in front of the tv while you watch, park as far away as possible in a parking lot, take the stairs always and then fit in the gym or the longer walk when you can. This has worked for me for most of my life. It really helps if you find a friend to walk with you.
To incorporate exercise into your life, you have to take a radically different approach – you have to change your whole lifestyle. You can’t set “exercise” aside as some separate and distinct (and additional) activity, you have to substitute for the labor-saving devices, e.g. take the stairs instead of the escalator or elevator; walk instead of driving; rake your leaves, don’t use a blower. If you’re hard-core, use a mortar and pestle instead of a food processor, knead bread by hand instead of using a bread machine. It’s due to all our machines that we struggle with obesity. It’s this generation; my parents’ generation (born in the 1920’s in rural areas) had nothing like the rates of obesity we have now. And they did NOT go to a gym :-). You DO, however, have to sweat.
The way I figure it is I don’t have hours to wait in a doctor’s office or weeks to recover from bypass surgery, so I exercise everyday! Guess what? Short term thinking leads to long term time loss if you don’t start walking, dancing, laughing, etc. now. You can do it! Make for laps around the outside aisles of the store before you even start to shop!
Eating healthy,exercising 4or5 times for week,getting enough sleep, drinking water and being active even when not exercising.
I learned after the weight just can on me all at once.I couldn’t wear anything and I was always tired.I made my mind up to take back my life.Now I exercise 6 days a weeks for an hour.The rewards are priceless…..priceless it is a life style for me now.
This is a very good article because there is truth in the medical study. I’ve lived this research in my own life by walking for over 17 years. I’ve found he secret is in the starting. Then weight control and fitness will build with time and effort. Go carefully and slowly, but most importantly stick with it.
Mike Zume at ZumeWalk
I really have a tough time knowing my priorities and I spend my time getting caught up with so many things that have to be taken care of now…like computer issues…cell broke down…keep up with the refrigerator…cleaning…paying bills. I struggle with exercise being a priority…I find when I do it often feeling resentful and then I quit. I want to be like you all seem but it still doesn’t work for me. I’m lucky if I get in 20 minutes three times a week. Thanks for sharing.
Also, does anyone have trouble getting down their vitamins. Frankly, they make me sick and the multi-vitamin just smells bad. I do my best and I make sure I’ve eaten something. However, I may not have eaten enough because I’m rushed and of course getting sicker then and at times just quit taking them.
Maybe – just maybe working long hours with shorter holidays than most other western countries is NOT the lifestyle to follow. Everyone is busy working to earn more to spend more. I meet people whose idea of a day out is to go round a mall. It isn’t that healthy – I’ll guess most people reading this column watch at least an hour of TV a day – so switch it off and do something else.