Getting Fit For Life

This should be everyone's objective. Being "fit" is being healthy which means you'll be more productive, better organized, more energized, and you'll feel younger longer. Some active people will be middle age clear into their 60's. You see them on the Golf Course, walking the course instead of using a golf cart. You see them jogging in the park and riding bikes in the long charity races. These people might not come in first anymore, but they still compete.

I found this post on WebMD and had to reblog it just to try and get more people motivated into exercise.

Why Exercise Matters

There are many reasons you should stay physically active, especially if you want to live a long life.

It can help:

Keep your bones, muscles, and joints healthy
Lower your chances of things like diabetes, colon cancer, and osteoporosis
Lower blood pressure
Manage stress and improve your mood
Ease symptoms of anxiety and depression
Lower your risk of heart disease
Manage chronic conditions like arthritis or diabetes, by improving symptoms like stamina, joint swelling, pain, and muscle strength
With balance, so you're less likely to fall and fracture bones

Sometimes as you get older, you may be a bit fearful of exercise. Maybe you think you might hurt yourself. You may believe you have to join a gym. Or you may not be sure what exercises you should do.

The key thing isn't how or where you get active, it's just to start moving.

Healthy adults should shoot for 150 minutes of moderate-intensity, aerobic activity every week. Sure, you can do that in exercise classes. But you can also get it by brisk walking. It's also important to do movements that work all your major muscles at least 2 days a week. Also, try to do flexibility exercises 2 or 3 days a week to improve your range of motion.

Though 150 minutes sounds like a lot, you don't have to get it in big chunks. You can take a 10-minute walk around the block or spend 10 minutes sweeping the porch. It all adds up.

Feeling really motivated? You'll get even more health benefits if you work up to 300 minutes or more of exercise a week.

But a simple goal is to try to get 30 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise on most days. You may be able to do that on some weeks and not others. Remember, it's a goal and not a rule. Do what works for you.

How to Get Moving

There are two ways to move: exercise and physical activity.

Exercise is planned activity like aerobics classes, tai chi, spin classes, or swimming. Physical activity is the way you "sneak" movement into your day, like walking the dog or gardening. Adding both to your routine will help you stay healthy and live longer.

Always check with your doctor before increasing your activity level.

Ready to move? You can go to the gym or community center and take water aerobics or dance classes and do strength-training exercises.

To get in motion in a less formal way, you can:

Take a brisk walk or jog
Ride a bike
Rake leaves or pushes a lawnmower
Sweep or dust
Play tennis
Walk up and downstairs
Carry groceries

You don't need fancy clothes or equipment to start. Just get moving. You should start to feel stronger and have more energy in just a few weeks. That's the key to a longer, happier life. Be more active every day and stop eating processed foods and your body will burn off the excess body fat that you're storing.

If you really want to lose your body fat then look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Can Your Diet Affect Your Appearance?

"Can you look older because you're eating crap? Absolutely."

I like this post from WebMD.com. It tells you the truth about what bad food choices can do to your health. 

“For example, eating too much sugar and processed carbohydrates (like some pasta, bread, and baked goods made with enriched flour) can lead to damage in your skin's collagen, which keeps your skin springy and resists wrinkles”, says Andrea Giancoli, MPH, RD. 

“What's more, these foods put your overall health at risk. They are tied to diseases like heart disease and diabetes”, she says.

Did you know that Obesity can cause heart damage without any symptoms. Other foods, like fruits and vegetables, are good for your body and your overall appearance. When you look good, you feel good and your body is working the way it was built to.

A person can be considered middle-age even past 65 or even 70 by the condition of their body. Your body doesn’t know what the calendar is. Your body only knows that your not fully grown or that your are fully grown or that your getting close to “end of life”. And your body can determine this by the condition of your body. This is what is call your “biological age”. 

Aging is really not about how old you are in chronological years, aging is about how old you are in biological years. A study done in a university in New Zealand recently showed that out of the 1000 people in a study of people in the late 30’s, some had a biological age as high as 60, some of them have actually stopped aging and some had a biological age less then their chronological age.




You can’t reverse aging but the study shows that in some cases people have actually stopped aging. Yes, some of this may be caused by the genes you were born with, but most of these people have stopped aging because of their diet and activity levels.




Everyone is born with a different set of genes and some genes maybe better then others, for instance we know that your genes depend a lot on the condition of your parents at the time you were conceived. As an adult goes through life his or her genes age along with the biological age. 




So genes your born with do play a factor in your biological age and that maybe why some people in the study were found to have a biological age 20 years older then their actual age. But most of the aging process can be controlled by your diet and exercise.

Science doesn't know how long man can live. It only has history to go by. Science and a team from Google are doing research now to try and determine if man can live to age 500. Other scientists believe we can live to age 1000 in theory but I don't think any research is being done yet. No one really knows how long man can live. 

Medicine may have it all wrong. Today Doctor's are treating the medical problems the patient has, but now they think that they need to be preventing the diseases and illnesses that people could get. Prevention is the next step for medicine. So in theory, if we never get a disease or illness then how long could we live?




You don’t have to age, it’s mostly up to you. You can slow down or even stop the aging process if you want. You won’t stop aging forever but in the study some of the adults did have a biological age younger then their chronological age. When your biological age is younger, your body stopped aging several years ago because of your lifestyle. If your interested, you can calculate your biological age by looking on the internet and finding the formula. Just do a search Biological Age and you'll find several websites to help you. 

You can stop the aging process at any age if you take control of your diet and exercise. Losing body fat will make a big difference in your health. I have a friend about my age with a weight problem and his Doctor warned him he was pre-diabetic and would have to start taking insulin if he couldn't lose weight. My friend could remember when his father had to take insulin and he knew that wasn't for him. In 6 months he lost the weight and was off his medications. At the age of 60, he was one happy guy. 

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Looking For The Fountain Of Youth

Science tells us that what we call “aging” occurs with age, but not simply because of age. 
The stiffening of the blood vessels and the decline of brain function associated with getting older are affected by what we eat and how much we exercise. If we follow the lifestyle habits associated with slower cardiovascular and brain aging, can we extend lifespan and healthspan? Advances in nutritional science have taught us that eating the right foods enables weight loss and helps to prevent heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.

Consider  what happened to a friend of mine  when he made radical changes to the way he eats.
When he was 60 years old, he could not walk a city block without feeling pressure in his chest. Yet, as a gift to himself for his 68thbirthday, he celebrated with a brisk run-up and down the rolling hills of Central Park in New York City.

  What enabled him to achieve such a feat?  As I like to say, the road to good health is as close as the end of your fork.

He began eating primarily nutrient-rich, whole foods:  greens and other colorful vegetables, beans, fresh fruits, nuts, seeds and whole grains. He minimized meat, eggs and dairy and eliminated added sugars, oils, white flour, white rice and processed foods.  In doing so, he reduced the number of calories he consumed while simultaneously increasing the amount of micronutrients (vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals) and fiber he ingests. I coined the word Nutritarian to describe this longevity-promoting style of eating, that is nutrient-dense and plant rich.

Paul usually ate a huge salad with raw onions and shredded cruciferous vegetables for lunch with a great tasting  nut-based dressing. He also ate beans or lentils in a vegetable-based soup or stew each day. He included three fruits each day, making especially sure to eat berries, pomegranate, cherries, plums, and oranges.

He ate raw nuts and seeds between meals, with a special emphasis on walnuts, hemp, flax and chia seeds, all of which are high in omega-3 fatty acids. And he also made sure to eat a double-size serving of steamed greens at dinner, often adding  mushrooms and onions.

Though eating  nutrient-rich food is critically important, it is not the only factor that determines good health. For example, Vitamin D, vitamin B12, and proper omega-3 intake are important for optimal health, as well as  limiting sodium and high glycemic carbohydrates.

You may be surprised by how your body can heal itself  by simply eating right and getting exercise. 
You may also be amazed that your taste improves as you start to eat healthier, that you actually get more pleasure from eating and you can eat generous portions of great tasting healthy dishes.  Some people would say that they could never give up the processed food they crave. But you need to know that rejecting these foods is a mere temporary loss. What you gain is the highest level of energy and good health you ever had. If you were searching for the Fountain of Youth, you certainly found it. As he told people who asked him how he felt on his 68th birthday, “I honestly feel – no joking, no exaggeration – that I am only at the halfway point of my life.”  The facts are the same dietary portfolio that protects your heart also protects your brain from aging and prevents cancer.

We now know a lot about the factors associated with longevity. 

Studies of calorie restriction in animals have given us information about the cellular signaling pathways associated with longevity, and we can turn on those same genes and signaling pathways with dietary and lifestyle habits.  

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

How Healthy Are You?

Surprisingly Simple Longevity Tests

Most of us think that we're in good enough shape. We tend to judge ourselves by other about the same age. Actually, that's probably not good. We tend to judge ourselves by others who aren't in good condition. I don't know anyone who compares himself with the 80 year olds that Golf three times a week. If you don't know anyone like that it might be you don't live in Arizona or Florida.

Your physical condition is a good indicator of "how long you'll live". Most people think they're in better shape than they really are. As a result, they're usually shocked to find out the results. Try it for yourself.

No one can predict exactly how long you'll live, but researchers have devised some surprisingly simple tests that are strongly correlated with a risk of early death - or a longer life - in the years to come.  Here's a look at some basic ways scientists are attempting to assess your physical capability and the associated chances of living longer.

1.   Sitting-Rising Test:  Developed in the late 1990s by Brazilian scientist Claudio Gil Soares de Araujo at Gama Filho University in Rio de Janeiro, this test simply involves going from a standing position in a small (2 meters by 2 meters) area to a sitting position on the floor, and then rising again.

Subjects are scored according to how many supports they require to perform the cycle: a point lost for using a hand, forearm, or knee, for example, to either sit or stand.  Another half-point is deducted for generally unstable execution.  A total of 10 points can be achieved for each full cycle.

In a 2014 paper published in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, Araujo and others discovered that older adults had a 5 times greater risk of mortality during the 6.3-year follow-up period, if they scored only 0-3 points on the test, relative to the top-performers scoring between 8-10 points.  A total of 2002 adults between the ages of 51 and 80 years participated in the study.

Araujo's team writes that the Sitting-Rising Test (SRT) is a simple gauge of musculoskeletal fitness, with the capacity to predict mortality among community-dwelling adults in this age range.

Another version is the Chair Rise Speed Test, which calculates how many times you can rise from a chair and sit back down again, within a minute.

 A 2014 paper published in the British Medical Journal compared the fastest sitters with the slowest among 2766 53-year old adults. At baseline, women performed anywhere from 21 stands/minute on the low end to almost 37 stands/minute.  The range among men was just under 22 stands/minute for the low performers, to 39 stands/minute at the high end.

After 13 years, those of either gender who performed poorest at the outset had more than twice the risk of death from any cause when compared with those with a higher chair rise speed at the start of the study.

2.    Grip Strength:   The strength of your hand grip is typically measured using an electronic dynamometer.  In numerous studies, a stronger grip has been linked with lower all-cause mortality, especially among older adults. In the 2014 UK study of adults aged 53, women's grip strength ranged from 21kg (46lb) to almost 34kg (75lb), while the men squeezed from 36kg (79lb) to 54.5kg (120lb).  Averaged across both sexes, and taking other risk factors like body mass index, smoking status and physical activity levels into account, the 53-year olds with the poorest grip strength had anywhere from a 29% to 98% greater risk of death from any cause during the 13 years of follow-up.

3.    Standing Balance Time:  The same 2014 BMJ paper examined how long its subjects could stand on one foot with their eyes closed.

 The resulting times were short, with a maximum average of just 19 seconds for men, and 10 seconds for women.  The good news: achieving simply those brief standing balance times was linked with lower mortality.  Poor performers of the standing balance test -  clocking in at just 3 seconds for both women and men - had a 2.5 greater chance of dying from any cause, during the 13-year study.

4.    Sitting Height:  If you think your overall height is the only tallness measure researchers are interested in, you're wrong.  Sitting height, an anthropometric measurement which compares the relative proportions of the torso and legs, has been linked in Western populations to the incidence of heart disease. Greater leg length (and less relative sitting height) has been viewed as an indicator of better childhood health, which may protect against age-related illnesses like heart disease and diabetes in adulthood.  

Data on other ethnic populations are less clear, however; a 2007 Chinese study found that greater sitting height was linked to more diabetes and abnormal lipid levels (dyslipidemia), whereas a 2011 paper published in the International Journal of Epidemiology found no relationship between height (including sitting height) with mortality among 136,202 adults in the Shanghai Women's and Men's Health Studies.

5.    Gait Speed:  Can how fast you naturally walk say anything about your longevity?  Yes - according to epidemiologists from the University of Pittsburgh and elsewhere, in their 2011 paper published in JAMA. The researchers examined 9 separate studies involving a total of 34,485 participants and found that among both sexes, gait speed was linked with survival at all ages. A natural gait speed of 0.8 metres/second (about 1.8 miles/hour) corresponded with average life expectancy for each age; walking faster than that as a natural pace was linked with better than average longevity.

Since walking requires energy, balance, and engages multiple organ systems to work together, the researchers suggest slower speed may indicate hidden illness or poor overall conditioning.

6.    Waist to Height Ratio:  Some researchers believe that waist to height ratio - calculated by dividing the waist circumference in centimetres by a person's height (also measured in centimetres) is a better predictor of disease than weight or body mass index.  The advice is simple: keep your abdominal fat down, and make sure your waist measurement is not greater than half your height.

Bottom line:  These tests are simple tools to measure the statistical probability of an early death, as indicators of overall health and conditioning.  You can improve your own odds of living a long, healthy life by staying physically active, eating an anti-aging diet, staying active within your social circle, keeping stress at bay, not smoking, and drinking only in moderation.

Medical science knows little about how long human should live. They can only go by past records. But they do predict that humans will live longer in the future because we are learning more about the body and what we need to do to take care of ourselves. The benefits of living a healthy lifestyle will be to age slower and to stay young longer and if that leads to a longer life, okay, but for me, I want to enjoy my days as long as a can. 

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

My Belly Fat Won't Budge

This is a common problem. I found this post on Healthnet.com and it explains what's going on.

Whether you’re bothered by a little too much padding on your hips, thighs, belly or any other place else on your body, you probably know that spot-reducing isn’t possible. “When you gain weight it’s circular, meaning that you store fat all over your body,” says Obi Obadike, fitness expert and celebrity trainer whose washboard abs have graced many a fitness magazine cover.

“But certain parts of your body are prone to store more fat than others.” For some it’s the hips or butt. For others, it’s right smack in the middle of the body.

What’s the secret to losing the tubby tummy? Obadike says there are three things you must do:

1. Eat a Clean/Lean Healthy Diet: “Abs are not made in the gym, they are made in the kitchen.” Obadike says this is something he and many fitness experts tell their clients. “Flat abs are not indicative of 1,000 sit ups a day, they’re indicative of how low your body fat is. And reducing your body fat comes from a clean, healthy diet.” 

That includes at least two protein servings a day, at least two servings of veggies/fruits, good fats and at least two servings of good carbs. “Diet is 80% of your success in losing belly fat,” says Obadike. “But by combining that with a rigorous cardio and weight-training plan, you increase your chances of losing belly fat by 15% to 20%.” That gives you a 95% to 100% chance of success. Not bad odds! 

Clean/Lean foods to add to your diet include oatmeal, brown rice, sweet potatoes, baked or broiled chicken breast, baked or broiled turkey breast, fish and, of course, fruits and veggies. “I teach my clients the 90/10 rule,” says Obadike. “That is eat clean 90% of the time and cheat 10% of the time.” Of course, a cheat isn’t a plate of chicken parm followed by a slice of tiramisu. Examples of a “cheat” would be one slice of pizza, a small hamburger or small slice of chocolate cake. The serving size should fit roughly in the palm of your hand. 

How many calories should you limit yourself to each day to shed pounds? “A weight loss caloric diet that I use is 10 to 12 calories per pound,” says Obadike. For example, if you weigh 180 pounds, your daily caloric intake would be between 1,800 to 2,160 calories (180 x 10 = 1,800; 180 x 12 = 2,160). “I’ve had great success with my clients using this formula,” he says. “They never feel hungry even though it is a low-calorie diet.

2. Follow a Weekly Cardio Program: “To see results you’ll need to do 30 to 45 minutes of cardio at least four times a week,” Obadike says. His favorite fat-blasting equipment? The elliptical, stairmaster and treadmill. “They help you burn calories fairly fast,” he says. But walking on the treadmill while reading a magazine won’t cut it. “I always tell my clients, if you aren’t sweating then you aren’t working.

3. Work Those Abs: “Abs exercises are important for strengthening your stomach muscles,” says Obadike. But they must go along with the fat-melting cardio. Otherwise, he says, the abs are “hibernating” under the belly fat.

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Losing Weight Made Easy

It’s not that hard to lose weight but there’s a “but” clause in here. There’s many different way to lose weight and not every way will work for you. That’s the BUT CLAUSE, "not every way is going to work for you". There's going to be some "trial and error” if you’re going to find the best way for you. 

There is one constant that applies to any diet, YOUR BODY HAS TO BURN MORE CALORIES THAN YOU CONSUME. The way the body works is what we might call “real time”. In other words, we are suppose to first eat (that first hour after we wake-up from a nights sleep) and then use that food for energy and then eat again and use that food for energy and so on. You want to eat first thing in the morning because your body has been working all night on repairing the body and doing the basic organ functions like pumping blood and breathing air. So you need some nutrition and you need to drink a full glass of water to hydrate your body after that long sleep.

As I mentioned before you have to burn more calories then you eat. So the big question is "how many calories do I burn?” That’s the part that most everyone gets wrong. And if you get that wrong you won’t lose weight. Statistics show the the average women who works 8 hours a day may only burn about 1200 calories all day, because most working women will spend most of that 8 hours sitting at a desk.  While the average mother with school age children will burn a little more because there more active and have more time to workout, so the average goes up to 1500 calories for non-working or unemployed women. For men the number are a little different. Actually most men not working out of the home will burn less calories, about 1500 and men working out of the home will burn closer to 1800 calories. 

Now these are marly averages, and that’s were most dieters go wrong. I thing the numbers may be correct if your of normal weight, but if you’re overweight you’ll burn less calories. Why, you might ask. As you gain body fat you tend to burn less calories. You may not realize it, but you’re slowing down as you add weight. It’s a gradual process so in most cases you don’t realize that you’re slowing down. Most people don’t realize their overweight until their 30+ pounds over. 

So what has really happened is that you may be only burning 800 or 900 calories a day. At this point you have to cut your calories down to 800 a day to see if you can start losing fat. I understand that it’s not going to be easy and here is were exercise can help. If you don’t exercise now and you want to lose weight, one hour a day of real heart-pumping exercise will burn about 300 calories, so if you were burning an extra 300 a day you could eat more calories.  So now you would be up to 1100 calories. If you change your meal plan and go with 5 small meals a day about 3 hours apart, eating 200 calories per meal, you can stay under 1100 calories and control food cravings. 

Now you have to find 200 calories that will give you nutrition to hold you for that 3 hours. Your in luck, just GOOGLE “200 calorie meals” and there’s several websites to help you. Remember to spend your 200 calories wisely, that’s all you get for 3 hours. If you just eat a snack and think that if you save 200 calories now so I can eat more later, that doesn’t work. It takes your body time to process food and if you eat say 500 calories for one meal, your food won’t have fully processed in 3 hours and your body will have to store some of those calories in fat cells so it can begin to process the next meal. 

If you find that your losing weight and you want to increase calories, I suggest 6 small meals a day about 2 hours apart. This is better for cutting out food cravings but you have to be the judge of which plan will help you lose weight.

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

What's The Best Time Of The Day To Workout?

There might be some logic to this post, but I can't agree with the conclusion. I think the best time to exercise is the first hour after you wake up. I'm not going back on that last statement, but there's a new concesses that thinks the afternoons like 3 or 4 pm is the best time. Read the following and you decide. No matter what time you pick I think you have to stick to it.

Two of the top reasons people give for not exercising regularly include lack of results and lack of time. So, for many people, the best time to exercise is the time that is most convenient and the time that fits into a busy schedule.

Research on exercise and time of day is growing, but still limited and not without controversy. In general, if you can find a time for exercise that you can stick with consistently, you will be much more likely to train regularly and get better results.

Human sleep and wake cycles follow a daily cycle called circadian rhythms. It's this cycle that regulates our body temperature, blood pressure, alertness, and metabolism, among other physiological functions. In general, these rhythms conform to our 24-hour day and may be reset based on environmental cues. The time of day that we typically exercise is one of these cues. Research by the University of North Texas in Denton found that although circadian rhythms are inborn we can reset them based upon our behaviors. For example, using an alarm clock, establishing meal times and even when we workout are all cues to help rest our rhythms. They found that people who consistently exercise in the morning "teach" their body to be most ready for exercise at that time of day. When they switched to evening exercise, they didn't feel as strong.

Also See: Does Jet Lag Decrease Athletic Performance?

The ability to adjust your rhythms is important for athletes training for a specific event. The message is to train at the same time of day that the event will occur. Research supports this advice. Studies show that your ability to maintain exercise intensity will adapt to your training time. Therefore, if you do your marathon training in the morning, you may perform better on race day (marathons typically start in the morning).

But if you train in the evening, a morning race day may leave you feeling weaker and slower.

Individual Differences and Exercise Timing

Some people are just naturally morning people. They have no trouble exercising first thing in the morning. Others don't get moving so quickly and are more likely to feel like exercising later in the day. If you have such an obvious preference it's pretty easy to decide what sort of exercise schedule you might stick with. The interesting thing is that research shows that no matter when you think you are better able to exercise, almost all of us are, in fact, physically stronger and have more endurance in the late afternoon.

Scheduling Exercise

Not everyone can choose to exercise when they feel like it. Work and family commitments often take priority and we end up squeezing in some exercise. If you find that the only time you have to exercise is when you least feel like it, don't despair. As we learned earlier, you can change your rhythms and your body can adapt to a new exercise time.

However, it may take about a month to reset your internal exercise clock. (get tips on adjusting your circadian rhythms during air travel).

Research and the Best Time to Exercise

While there is specific research being conducted on this topic, unfortunately, the answer to the question, "What is the best time for exercise?" varies based on the specific question you ask, your training goals, and your exercise adherence. Here are some of the latest specific research findings:

Late Afternoon is Best for Exercise
Research shows that the optimal time to exercise is when our body temperature is at its highest, which, for most people is 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. (body temperature is at its lowest just before waking).
Strength is Greater in the Afternoon
Dr. Hill reported that strength output is 5% higher at around mid-day; anaerobic performance, such as sprinting, improves by 5% in the late afternoon.
Endurance is Greater in the Afternoon
Aerobic capacity (endurance) is approximately 4percent higher in the afternoon.
Injuries Are Less Likely in the Afternoon
Afternoon exercise is the best if you want to avoid injuries for many reasons. We are most alert; our body temperature is the highest so our muscles are warm and flexible; our muscle strength is at its greatest. These three factors make it less likely that we will get injured.
Morning Exercisers Are More Consistent
Even though afternoon exercise might be optimal from a physiological standpoint, research also shows that morning exercisers are more likely to stick to it than late-day athletes.
Evening Exercise and Sleep
Most research supports the idea that exercise can improve sleep quality. But does exercising too late in the evening keep you up? Studies have shown improvements in sleep from both morning and afternoon exercise, so it's not yet clear if evening exercise keeps you up. One study even showed that vigorous exercise half an hour before bedtime did not affect sleep.
One thing that is agreed upon is that sleep deprivation can hinder sports performance.

The Bottom Line

The good news is that you get to decide the best time for you to exercise based upon your personal goals, schedule, and lifestyle. Ideally, you will pick a time that you are able to stick with consistently and make part of your daily or weekly schedule. If you are training for competition, it's wise to modify your training to accommodate the event start time, and it's always wise to warm up before any workout. Also See: Why Your Workouts Don't Work.

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