How Inactivity Affects Improvements in Metabolism After Exercise

A fitness expert that I follow recently posted about this topic, and I felt like it was important to share.

Movement is such a large part of our total health, and yet 77% of Americans don’t meet the physical activity guidelines. The amount of inactivity in folk’s daily and weekly lives probably isn’t shocking to most - but did you know it can play a role on our metabolism DURING exercise?

“Inactivity causes unique detrimental physiological effects and as such is more than simply lack of exercise”

One of the negative impacts of a sedentary lifestyle is the impact on fat metabolism. Acute inactivity is related to a decrease in the ability to breakdown fat and remove it from the body via expiration, urine or excrement. This means fats stay in our blood longer as they are being transported around the body, which over time can lead to cardiovascular diseases.

Essentially, an hour long workout doesn’t out-work spending the rest of the day sedentary (or under 5k steps per day, roughly). This is why the American Heart Association encourages daily movement in adults, and a simple way to make that happen is by aiming for 8k steps per day and above, in ADDITION to your workout.

Easy ways to make this happen are to be aware of the amount of time you are sitting in a day, and try to stand and take a short walk every 30-60min. If we want to maintain a healthy heart and body fat percentage (please remember that number is between you and your doctor! Only the two of you can decide what is healthy for your body!), we want to capitalize on our body’s ability to metabolize our fat cells (aka dispose of them with efficient transport) by staying generally active.

Now, no one is saying we all need to become marathon runners or do hours of cardio a day. BUT! You’ll be surprised how quickly steps add up when you give yourself short breaks to move throughout the day. Our bodies are amazing at adapting to whatever we choose to do - so don’t we want them to adapt in a way that is helpful for our long-term health?