Article Link Muscle’s Many Powers

[hch]

(Although I first posted this article as an addition to another thread, I later changed my mind about not posting it on its own.)

Muscle’s Many Powers
Scientists are learning that resistance training confers much more than strength. It’s key to your overall health.

But "what scientists are just now understanding," says Andy Galpin, director of the Biochemistry and Molecular Exercise Physiology Laboratory at California State University–Fullerton, "is just how synonymous muscle health is with all health."

Maybe I should follow "fitness news" more than I've lately tended to do, but I find the possibilities fairly exciting. Some points from the article:

Muscle mass and strength an indicators

- A 2017 study identifies "lean muscle mass" as a better indicator of health than BMI. I couldn't find it after some searching, but I did find a similar-looking 2014 one, "Muscle mass index as a predictor of longevity in older adults." (This index looks like BMI with muscle mass substituted for overall mass.)

- A 2015 Lancet study identifies grip strength (a "surrogate" for strength and health in general) as a better predictor of the probability of death from heart disease than blood pressure. This one was easier to find: "Prognostic value of grip strength: findings from the Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiology (PURE) study."

A few other "new" things about muscle

- Muscle has significant endocrine effects, as a "massive endocrine organ" that sends hormones and helps with handling glucose.

- Muscle is the body's biggest reserve of amino acids, which the body uses when it needs them for healing and other sorts of functions. "That may in large part explain why people with more muscle live longer and are better able to combat disease, says Arny A. Ferrando, a professor of geriatrics with the Center for Translational Research in Aging and Longevity at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences."

"All of these fields are starting to turn their eyes heavily toward muscle and say, 'OK, muscle is a major priority,' " Galpin says. "If muscle is out of whack, the rest of our treatments and interventions become secondary to affecting the muscle issue."

P.S.

One caution in reading the recommendations is that the term "compound exercises" (as the list of examples should make clear) is used in the more predominant "multi-joint" sense (such as squatting), not the sense in which VFers more commonly use it (such as squatting and performing a biceps curl at the same time).

[daisymae]

Great article! Thanks for sharing!

I love this: "If muscle is out of whack, the rest of our treatments and interventions become secondary to affecting the muscle issue."

Also, how the body is a symphony: "There are different instruments at play, but it's them coming together that creates effective motion."

[Sharaz]

Just read the article and love it! The importance of ramping up the routine by progressive overload was highlighted among other factors.

[hch]

Originally Posted by daisymae

Great article! Thanks for sharing!

I love this: "If muscle is out of whack, the rest of our treatments and interventions become secondary to affecting the muscle issue."

Also, how the body is a symphony: "There are different instruments at play, but it's them coming together that creates effective motion."

You're welcome! Elsewhere in the article, Andy Galpin says one more thing, related to muscle and its relationship to other parts, that I want to quote:

"We tend to compartmentalize the body as the muscular system and the skeletal system and the cardiovascular system and the nervous system and the immune system, but the body is one system," Galpin says. "When one part gets healthier, everything gets healthier. And muscle is the one part over which you have the most direct control."

I don't want to suggest "decompartmentalization" as a general principle without specific evidence in each case, but that theme reminds me of at least three other things, some of them mentioned in this article.

- You've already mentioned the part about working the body.

- This article and others have this subtext: muscle and strength training are considerably more useful, otherwise beneficial, and even interesting than scientists, trainers, and exercisers in general may have historically thought. See the subtitle of this article, for example--"Scientists are learning that resistance training confers much more than strength."

I also wouldn't be surprised to see thematically similar findings about other forms of exercise, though the change in the reputation of strength training is probably the most significant. (There's more of a history of articles that may be described as discussing "surprising benefits of cardio.")

- I like to think that different forms of exercise can benefit one another; I've never liked discussions that treat different forms of movement like opposites or adversaries.

The most obvious and sudden example in my life was that adding Pilates noticeably benefited both my cardio and my weight training (and, of course, my "ordinary movements' as well)--as may be appropriate for this discussion, my body felt more integrated and connected.

I've also been reading more about some of the specific points mentioned in the article and will post more later about them.

[hch]

Originally Posted by Sharaz

Just read the article and love it! The importance of ramping up the routine by progressive overload was highlighted among other factors.

I'm still thinking about older exercisers (thanks mainly to how this discussion began): I've noticed, in my reading elsewhere, that I have yet to see a reputable-looking recent source discouraging progression simply because someone is "older." Obviously we shouldn't ignore genuine impediments, and of course we can't force exercisers to do what they're afraid of doing. But I hope that these discussions encourage exercisers to consider the idea of trying progression, if they've been avoiding it simply because of what they think people their age are capable of lifting safely.

Another tip from the article promotes "active recovery," which includes "low-intensity aerobic exercise," though there isn't much specific guidance or suggestions about details like quantity. The article mentions supporting research, but I can't quickly find it.

[Sue B]

Here is a new study: https://www.news.iastate.edu/news/20.../resistancecvd

"Lifting weights for less than an hour a week may reduce your risk for a heart attack or stroke by 40 to 70 percent, according to a new Iowa State University study. Spending more than an hour in the weight room did not yield any additional benefit, the researchers found. The results show benefits of strength training are independent of running, walking or other aerobic activity."

[hch]

Originally Posted by Sue B

Here is a new study: https://www.news.iastate.edu/news/20.../resistancecvd

"Lifting weights for less than an hour a week may reduce your risk for a heart attack or stroke by 40 to 70 percent, according to a new Iowa State University study. Spending more than an hour in the weight room did not yield any additional benefit, the researchers found. The results show benefits of strength training are independent of running, walking or other aerobic activity."

Thanks for posting--I still haven't begun watching for new studies about weight training and health, and otherwise I would've found this one much later, if at all.

- Beyond the associations with reduced risk for a heart attack or a stroke, the dataset used here also had associations between weight training and a reduced risk of metabolic syndrome and of high cholesterol--in a way that was also independent of aerobic exercise. Yes, the conclusion of at least one of these two studies talks about the need for further research, but both conclusions suggest recommending resistance training.

- According to this news service, these are "some of the first [research results] to look at resistance exercise and cardiovascular disease," though I wonder what this wording is intended to mean--I've seen what I'd call earlier related work. Maybe these are some of the first studies to look at "resistance exercise and cardiovasular disease" in a particular way, which this release didn't further describe. If it really took this many years for scientists to start investigating at all, the lack of research may be revealing.

- "In other words, you do not have to meet the recommended guidelines for aerobic physical activity to lower your risk; weight training alone is enough." I myself would've chosen different wording that didn't imply that aerobic exercise is superfluous to an overall active life or reduced risk of disease. At the same time, I do notice once again that attitudes towards weight training have changed much over the past several decades. (I'm most reminded of the idea that weight training supposedly does nearly nothing to benefit health, an idea that increasingly appears to be rather unfounded and probably even harmful.)

I have more reactions to this page and will try to write more about these things later (and also still intend to write more about other things related to the original article of this thread).