Can you tell how long you’ll live? For seniors, how fit you are may offer a clearer forecast of life span than traditional markers such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes and smoking, a new study suggests. It included more than 6,500 people, age 70 and older, who had an exercise stress test between 1991 and 2009. The test measured their fitness by having them exercise on the treadmill as hard as they could. After the test, participants were tracked for an average of just under 10 years. During the follow-up, 39 percent died. Researchers found that the people who were most fit were more than twice as likely to be alive a decade later than the least fit. Surprisingly, the number of heart disease risk factors was not associated with odds of death. Participants with no risk factors had about the same chance of dying as those with three or more risk factors, according to the study, though researchers only found an association between fitness and life span. “We found fitness is an extremely strong risk predictor of survival in the older age group — that is, regardless of whether you are otherwise healthy or have cardiovascular risk factors, being more fit means you’re more likely to live longer than someone who is less fit,” said lead author Dr. Seamus Whelton. He’s an…  read on >

“Athlete’s heart” — an enlarged heart created by intense physical training — is a common and often brushed-off condition within elite and professional sports. But a new study of National Football League players is raising concern about the long-term consequences of athlete’s heart when it comes to retirees who have long left the field. These retirees are as likely to have an enlarged heart as those who’ve recently retired, according to a Tulane University study sponsored by the NFL Player Care Foundation. This runs counter to previous assumptions that an elite player’s enlarged heart would return to normal after stopping the intense training associated with his sport, researchers said. “I think we anticipated as these guys got older, they would actually change from having the enlarged heart back to a more normal-sized heart,” said study senior author Dr. Gregory Stewart, co-director of the Sports Medicine Program at Tulane University in New Orleans. “We didn’t see that.” The researchers are to present their findings at the American College of Cardiology’s (ACC) annual meeting March 16-18, in New Orleans. Research presented at meetings is typically considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal. Dr. Matthew Martinez, head of the ACC’s Sports and Exercise Cardiology Council, expects the findings to be “provocative.” “You’re seeing bigger and bigger folks running faster and faster,” said Martinez, a cardiologist in Allentown,…  read on >

Sweating it out on a treadmill is great, especially when the weather is bad. You might even be motivated by watching exciting vistas on an interactive panel. But to keep a walking or running routine from becoming stale, kick it up a notch by taking your workout outside. Running or walking in the great outdoors can burn more calories, because you have to work against the wind and you don’t have a moving tread to keep you going. If you’re used to monitoring the length of your treadmill workouts on a built-in screen, stay motivated by finding other ways to track your output. If you already have a smartwatch, there’s a good chance it has a step counter app already installed. If not, you can download any number of fitness apps that count time and distance, calorie expenditure and more. If you don’t have a smartwatch and are on a tight gadget budget, you can buy an inexpensive pedometer to count your steps. Remember that it takes about 2,000 to 2,500 steps to make a mile, depending on the length of your stride. Now you’re ready to rev up your walking/running. Here are four ideas you can mix and match. To add intensity to your outdoor workout and increase your cardio effort, choose a route with some hills. Pick up the pace with interval training.…  read on >

Exercise has countless benefits, even in small doses. And new research suggests the payoffs might extend to colon cancer patients. Short sessions of intense exercise may slow the growth of colon cancer, Australian researchers report. “We have shown that exercise may play a role in inhibiting the growth of colon cancer cells,” said lead author James Devin, from the University of Queensland. The report was published Feb. 27 in the Journal of Physiology. “After an acute bout of high intensity exercise, there were specific increases in inflammation immediately after exercise, which are hypothesized to be involved in reducing the number of cancer cells,” Devin said in a journal news release. Devin and his colleagues at the University of Queensland worked with researchers at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. The team took blood samples from 10 colon cancer survivors who had one session of intense exercise, and 10 survivors who had 12 exercise sessions over four weeks. Analyzing the samples for the growth of cancer cells, the researchers found that even one session of high intensity exercise appeared to reduce the growth of colon cancer cells. These short exercise bouts are as important as longer regular exercise, they said. The findings also suggest that continued exercise may aid in the “fight against cancer.” Moreover, they highlight the importance of regular exercise and leading a…  read on >