The Truth About: Exercise

In an age of fad diets and exercise programs offering a six-pack in only 12 weeks, we as a society are ironically becoming bigger and unhealthier.

It doesn't matter if you're a student or a professional working in an office, modern life is more sedentary now than at any point in human history.

But while the focus on health and exercise for many is simply a matter of looking good, according to Dr Ben Rattray, an exercise physiologist with the University of Canberra's Discipline of Sport and Exercise Science, there are "literally thousands of benefits" to getting up off the couch and doing some exercise.

From a body working at peak efficiency, a reduced risk of illness and disease, to a happier life through better mental health, there are many great benefits to becoming more active.

Healthy pipes means healthy life

When talking about the benefits of exercise most people think about their cardiovascular system, getting the heart pumping and lungs full of air.

But perhaps the greatest cardiovascular benefit we can get from exercise is in our blood vessels. Blood vessels play a crucial role in ensuring the body functions at its best, a role which Dr Rattray believes is greatly underestimated.

"We probably don't give them as much credit as they deserve. They're even better than we originally thought they were"

Just like the plumbing of your home, clogging from waste products reduces the ability for blood to easily flow through the body. And just like exercising muscles, blood pumping through the body helps blood vessels to become big and strong.

"When your heart is pumping blood faster, the actual blood pumping through the pipes is really crucial for the blood vessels" explained Dr Rattray.

Blood pumping through the pipes is really crucial for the blood vessels

"Without that increased pressure going through the blood vessel, the vessel ages, loses it elasticity and gets little clots on it which can lead to heart attacks."

It's not just the ability for blood to flow that improves with exercise, but healthier blood vessels are also much more efficient at completing their many important functions.

"It turns out that the healthier the blood vessel is the easier it is for things like blood sugars to get into different cells in the body for muscle health. It's easier for oxygen to get taken up, it's easier to remove waste products from the body.

So those pipes are crucial not just from thinking about cardiovascular health, but it's really important for things like diabetes and kidney function."

Reducing the waist line is more than just looking good

For many of us, the success or failure of an exercise program is found in the numbers on a scale.

However, Dr Rattray warns that it's not how much we weight that is important, rather the amount of unneeded fat we may be carrying.

"There's a never ending issue of people wanting to lose weight so they do exercise. We should really be talking about excess fat and not wanting to hold onto that."

We should really be talking about excess fat and not wanting to hold onto that

Exercise can help your body to more efficiently and effectively use fat and helps you reduce excess fat faster with greater overall health benefits than simply changing your diet.

"We know that the enzymes that help your body to take up fat and use it as normal fuel, and liver function which controls different cholesterol levels both improve with exercise."

Carrying excess fat has far more consequences than simply not having a beach body.  Not only does fat increase the risk of illness and disease, but it can also impede the normal function of many vital organs.

"[excess fat] actually crams everything into a small space. All your main organs that are in your body like your stomach, intestines, lungs, kidneys, liver, heart, are all under pressure, so none of those things are quite working the way they are supposed to."

Exercise for your brain and not just your body

It's not just the body which becomes healthier and more efficient through exercise, the brain also benefits greatly with increased performance and better mental health.

"Healthier blood vessels in the brain will help with mental health. The health of all the neurotransmitters, nerve cells and everything else that's in the brain."

And just like the blood vessels in the rest of the body, those in the brain benefit from the increased blood flow from exercise.

"Exercise increases blood flow in the brain, so it's important for blood vessels in the brain" explained Dr Rattray.

"The blood vessels in the brain are similar in many ways to the blood vessels everywhere else. They are unhealthy if blood is not pumping through them and we're not using them."

Healthier blood vessels in the brain will help with mental health

While increased blood flow provides many great benefits for your brain, exercise can also influence many of the 'feel good' neurotransmitters which make us feel happy.

During exercise muscles release 'growth factors', signalling molecules that instruct a number of different mechanisms to happen in the body. These growth factors can have a direct impact on our happiness and mental health.

"When you're being physically active you release a lot more growth factors. A lot of those are capable of influencing neurotransmitters, so things like serotonin, dopamine, those neurotransmitters which make you feel happy."

Fight off injury, illness and disease

Unsurprisingly, a happy and healthier body is also much better at fighting off illness, recovering from illness and preventing diseases.

"There's a lot of research which shows that physical activity is linked to strong immune function in the body, less days off work, and quicker recovery from viruses.

The immune system will respond to regular physical activity in a positive way by reducing inflammation which can reduce or inhibit immune function. Growth factors which are coming out of the muscles and organs all help the immune system."

There's a lot of research which shows that physical activity is linked to strong immune function in the body

But it is not only because a healthy body is more efficient that those who exercise are healthier. Excess fat in the body can also have a range of negative effects on health.

"The adipose tissue where the fat gets stored most of the time is an endocrine organ which means it pumps hormones out. And not only hormones, but it also creates a lot of inflammation which goes around the body and causes all sorts of interference.

Inflammation is linked to diabetes quite strongly and interferes with the cells' ability to take glucose up into itself. The inflammation can also interfere with the immune system."

Even the risk of some cancers can be reduced by increasing physical activity.

"There are a lot of cancers where there is a decreased risk with physical activity. Those cancers are potentially fuelled by negative growth factors such as high insulin levels."

Getting up and active

Now we know how much of a positive effect exercise can have on our bodies, minds and lives, how much exercise should you be doing, and what is the best way to get active?

Australian guidelines currently recommend 300 minutes of physical activity a week, or less if you are participating in high intensity training. For those not meeting these guidelines, Dr Rattray suggests an easy way to increase your physical activity is to make regular everyday tasks a little more physically difficult.

"Park a little bit further away at work and the supermarket and walk in, if you're not on the ground floor walk up the stairs instead of taking the lift. That's probably the best way to increase physical activity, do those little things throughout the day. The trick is to do what you can and hopefully and gradually increase over time."

Enjoyment is the number one thing

Dr Rattray is also a firm believer in the power of interval training to not only get the heart pumping, but also decrease fat stored in the body.

"There's a lot of research showing that high intensity exercise such as interval training not only burns more energy, but you can gain the biggest benefits to cardiovascular fitness, which is closely linked to health."

But for Dr Rattray, the real key to increasing physical activity and sustaining it over the long term is simply doing what you enjoy.

"Enjoyment is the number one thing. Some people love playing team sport, some people just love getting out and walking. I think walking is a really good medium, sometimes we don't really give it enough credit."

If you would like to learn more about research being conducted by the University of Canberra into the many benefits of exercise and physical activity visit the Research Institute for Sport and Exercise.

UC also has a wide range of sport and exercise related degrees, check out our personalized course guide to learn more about courses you can enrol in today.

Words by Daniel Murphy