I know this seems like a silly question, but I’m not sure I know the answer. I’m currently in the Air Force, and we have to pass a Physical Training (PT) test at least every 6 months.
Now, i know i have to exercise enough to pass, but I am looking forward to retirement so I don’t have to do it anymore. Guys I work with don’t understand my reluctance to exercise once I don’t have to, but they can’t explain why I should. I am not overweight or anything, i limit my eating so I stay the same weight, in fact, i’ve been the same weight for about 10 years.
My question, really, is “why should I be exercising after I retire from the military?” I know people who run “just for fun” when they don’t need to, like 5 miles or so. I hate running, and can’t imagine ever doing it for fun.
well, i’m not saying i’m physically inactive, but i’m really wondering is there any point for me to go out every day and run 5 miles? should I wake up every day and do 100 push up and sit ups? what does physical activity mean in the context of whatever you are quoting there?
I am within my ideal BMI and don’t really do any gymnasium type workout stuff either. But I eat well and am active in household activities. I go for a 20 minute walk most lunch hours and I rarely snack between meals.
I could probably benefit from some cardio work-outs but overall I’m in good shape and I don’t have a regular exercise routine. Then again, I don’t have a regular couch potato routine either.
well, that’s what I am saying. I don’t have a regular workout routine either, but i similarly have a non-sitting on the couch routine too. But in my AF career I’ve seen people spend like 2-5 hours a day in the gym doing whatever. that was the basis for my original question - is there a point to it? As an anecdote, a guy i worked with worked out 4 hours a day, but when we had to move a 200 pound safe, he couldn’t do it, because his back hurt from working out, so I, someone who doesn’t workout at all, had to do it. It just seems all kindsa pointless.
Well, there is a high you get from exercise. Of course you eventually get habituated to it, and then need to exercise harder and longer to feel it again. But that is like eating too; you can just restrain yourself and enjoy it in moderation.
If you hit the right zone for activity, you will feel tremendously great a little while after exercising, and your mood will be elevated for the rest of the day. Even if you are naturally cheerful and happy.
Once you become habituated to it, you’ll start to crave it. If I miss too many days of running, I start to feel unsettled and unsatisfied.
I don’t get that high, i dread every day i have to do it now, why would i continue? also, i’m not sure what deity’s (?) have to do with it, kneeling and asking forgiveness does not equate to a 5 mile run
I don’t get it either. It’s one thing if you’re doing something you enjoy but to me running is pure torture. What is the point of enduring pain so that you can live longer. It seems like a vicious cycle of masochism. It’s like people who climb Mt Everest. Why the hell would someone pay MONEY to freeze, ache, and wheeze their way up this tourist trap?
Now you can get me on a bike if there’s some place to go. But I’d like a beer and a cigar when I get there and a ride home.
I agree 100 percent! if we were going on a bike ride in a cool forest or mountain top, then yes, i’m in!
When I was in Saudi, people would go on a “hash” which is just running in the desert then having a cookout, what for? just have a cookout. It’s from Germany where people would run from place to place and drink a beer, why not just meet up at the end and drink beer? I really can’t understand it. Maybe the people that work out everyday for more than 1 hour can explain it?
Running sucks. Put the same amount of time/effort into practically any other exercise and you’ll see better returns in health, strength, appearance, and remaining joint cartilage.
Some people enjoy running. Some people enjoy being kicked in the genitals. For the rest of us, there are countless other forms of exercise that don’t suck.
I must be missing something, because the answer seems to have already been given. But to elaborate.
If you exercise for half an hour a day, you will:
Live longer. 'Nuff said.
Have a vastly improved ability to do other things that you want, or need, to do to do. You will be able to walk up a flight of stairs without wheezing, or go for that “bike ride in a cool forest”, or play catch with your kids. As anyone will tell you, without regular exer4cise than all those things become chores after the age of ~40 and you will struggle to do them for more than half an hour.
Look better,
Feel better. Never mind the exercise high, your improved circulation, lung capacity and muscle tone will leave you feeling better, from the time you get up in the morning to the time you go yo bed. You will have more energy, better ability to concentrate and will tire less rapidly, even when you are just sitting on the couch.
You have a drastically reduced risk of injury and general wear and tear. The risk of someone over 40 damaging a disk doing normal household activities like carrying groceries is, IIRC, something like 5 times higher if they don’t exercise half an hour a day. Moreover your improved core strength, balance and proprioreception halve your risk of household injuries, everything from falling over in the shower to cutting yourself while peeling onions. Numerous other debilitating diseases like alzheimers, sleep apnea, depression and osteoporosis are both delayed in onset and reduced in severity if you exercise.
You recover faster and more completely from injuries. If you don’t exercise, your recovery time from things like joint injuries is greatly increased, and your degree of recovery from permanent injuries such as spinal damage is much, much less. That twinge n the knee or stiff back that you have while you are in shape becomes an inability to bend the knee or get out of bed when you are out of shape.
In short, exercise results in a vastly improved quality of life. No matter what age you actually die, the half an hour of daily exercise produces another 23.5 hours of greatly improved quality of life. Even if exercise is utter torture, it is well worth it. And the older you get the greater the payoff becomes.
Once you pass 40, the difference between someone who exercises and someone who doesn’t become measurably significant in every aspect of their life.
By the time you pass 50, someone who has exercised regularly has about twice the quality of life measured in terms of things like sleep, psychological outlook, community involvement, pain, injury, sex life and appetite.
IOW virtually everything that makes life worth living is vastly improved by regular exercise once you start sliding into those senior years, and it keeps getting more pronounced the older you get.
Even if exercise was half an hour of absolute torture, the benefits would still seem to make it a net benefit. But of course that’s a personal judgement call. If you honestly believe that half an hour spent cycling or swimming is so tortuous you would prefer to live the last 20 years of you life in constant pain on a cocktail of medication for numerous preventable ailments and with a non-existent sex life and social life, well that’s your call.
Nobody can say you are wrong, but that is the “point” of exercise. It improves every aspect of your life every minute of the day. What could possible have more “point”?
i find that food, any food, and even plain water tastes better after a session of cycling. but then i love to cycle and the food is just a bonus, so their reasons may be different.
Quote:
Originally Posted by thicksantorum View Post
Running sucks. Put the same amount of time/effort into practically any other exercise and you’ll see better returns in health, strength, appearance, and remaining joint cartilage.
Blake, thank you for your abundance of answers to my question, no sarcasm intended. i guess I should change my question to “Should I constantly try to improve my run times or amount of weight I can lift?” I do consider running for 1/2 an hour straight torture, and I would never willingly do that, but I would play racquetball for 2 hours straight.
However, i know people who will just willingly run 5 miles a day, and try to increase their distance every day or their run times. And I know people who can bench press like 300 pounds or whatever, and when they bench more than that, they are really, really happy. My question is, does this do anything? is running for 3 hours straight better than just playing racquetball for 3 hours? is dead-lifting 300 pounds better for you than dead-lifting 200 pounds? is running for 5 miles everyday better than running 1 mile once a week? I guess those are my questions.
also, on a side note, in the AF, we really didn’t have to do anything for the first 15 years of my career, and I had no issues. Now the we have mandatory PT everyday, my shins hurt, my legs hurt, my stomach hurts, and I feel bad after every PT session every day. I’m not sure how this jives with your “you will start to feel better and have less injuries” theme, but just thought I would throw it out there.
Lets put it this way. For the majority of human existence the daily routine involved some physical activity. It’s only in the last 50 years that jobs where you do nothing physical at all have become close to the majority.
I drive my car to work and sit on my arse all day in an office then drive home again. That’s not uncommon these days.
Now add that to the availability of cheap crap junk food and you have a recipe for disaster health wise.
When I was in my 20s and early 30’s I could eat whatever I liked and not put on weight. That stopped in the late 30’s.
Exercise doesn’t need to be running 5kms every day or hitting the gym (which most people sign up for and never go), it’s doing something physical that gets the heart rate up and gets the muscles working. Go for a walk, do some gardening, something that involves using muscles and gets the heart rate up. 30 minutes per day is what’s currently recommended as a minimum, feel free to do more, it won’t hurt
Well like i said above, i guess I need to change my question. I would gladly play racquetball for 2 hours every day, no big deal. but should I be running 5 miles a day and trying to increase my distance and/or time? People work out in the gym 2 or 3 hours a day, just because they are trying to increase the amount they can lift. Does that help anything? Is bench pressing 300 pounds instead of 250 pounds any better for you? Is running a 6 minute mile any better for you than running a 7 minute mile?
That’s a different question than what you posed in the OP. Playing racquetball 2 hours a day is exercise and will give you the benefits Blake mentioned above. The answer to your questions here are mostly no, constantly pushing yourself to extremes could even be harmful.