How Exercise Can Reverse Age-Related Heart Stiffness
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In this clip from Dr. Rhonda Patrick's appearance on The School of Greatness, she uses the Dallas Bed Rest Study to show how quickly inactivity can reduce cardiorespiratory fitness. Five men who completed both assessments lost more aerobic capacity during three weeks of bed rest as young adults than they lost during 30 years of aging. [1]
VO2 max measures the body's capacity to transport and use oxygen. A laboratory exercise test provides a direct measurement, while the 12-minute Cooper run offers a practical field estimate. Dr. Patrick describes vigorous intervals as one effective way to improve fitness. In 27 men with metabolic syndrome, four four-minute intervals near 90 percent of peak heart rate improved VO2 max more than work-matched moderate exercise. [2]
A two-year randomized trial used a broader progressive program in healthy, sedentary adults around age 53. Participants built toward four to five weekly sessions that combined intervals, continuous aerobic work, and resistance exercise. VO2 max increased by 18 percent, and left-ventricular stiffness improved, showing that progressive midlife training can produce substantial gains in cardiac function. [3]
This clip is excerpted, with permission, from Dr. Rhonda Patrick's appearance on The School of Greatness. Thank you to The School of Greatness for allowing us to share it.
- ^ Malik I; Danesh J; Whincup P; Bhatia V; Papacosta O; Walker M, et al. (2001). Soluble adhesion molecules and prediction of coronary heart disease: a prospective study and meta-analysis. Lancet 358, 9286.
- ^ Helgerud J; Høydal K; Wang E; Karlsen T; Berg P; Bjerkaas M, et al. (2007). Aerobic high-intensity intervals improve VO2max more than moderate training. Med Sci Sports Exerc 39, 4.
- ^ 10.1161/circulationaha.117.030617
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: They measure what 30 years of aging does on their cardiovascular system. And do you want to know what is insane? 30 years of aging was not worse than what three weeks of bed rest did.
Lewis Howes: Oh my gosh, that's crazy.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: It was not worse than 3 weeks of bed rest in terms of their cardiorespiratory fitness, which I personally think is one of the best markers for longevity that we can measure. VO2 max. Everyone's
Lewis Howes: How often are you studying? I've actually never tested my VO2 max. Right. So I How often do you test it?
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Good question. Okay. So embarrassingly I do an estimator for it. I have
Lewis Howes: So how do you measure VO2 max? Okay.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: So you put the mask on. You have to go into a lab. You have to go to really precisely measure it. You get a lab and you can Google whatever. Right. You I do my Apple Watch, but also there's something called the 12-minute run test which is a good way to do it. It's actually a little better than the Apple Watch I think. So, what you'd have to do is because your Apple Watch is measuring. So, I do a lot of running, but I do a lot of trail running and trail running is like hills, okay? And you run slower when you're on hill running on a hill, right? And so, your true VO2 max, you want to have a flat surface where you're running. So, you have to find like a track field and you want to run as as fast as you can maintain for that 12 minutes. So it has to be a sustainable 12 minute speed. You don't want to go too fast, but you don't want to go too slow, right? So it has to be like a sustainable speed that you're you're really pushing hard, but you're able to sustain that for 12 minutes and you do that 12-minute run test on a flat flat track.
Lewis Howes: So you don't have a track now also, right?
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You just have to have measure your distance. So measure your distance that you ran and the time and then there's an equation you can plug it into. It's called the Cooper test. And that'll give you pretty much that's what your Apple Watch is doing. Yeah. Um or your whatever device that's measuring VO2 max is doing something similar. But again, if you're just using like I use my Apple Watch and I look at it, I'm like, "Oh, but it's like I'm running on all these hills." It's not really like true, right? You need a flat. So, it could be a flat treadmill or like a track.
Lewis Howes: And what do you get? You get the distance, the time, and then what?
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Um that's all you need. You need to know the distance and your time. There's an equation
Lewis Howes: and the equation tells you your VO2 max.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Yeah, there's like an equation. I don't remember.
Lewis Howes: Based on your height and weight or is this like
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: um No. So you're So So it's not No, it's not. No. Then you can like compare what your VO2 max is based on your height and your your gender and your weight and all that.
Lewis Howes: Okay. Your age and all that stuff. Yeah.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Right. You you'll know where you category. You'll know where you rank, right? Oh, like I'm supposed to be here, but I'm top 10%. Yeah. Exactly. But um and one of the best ways to improve VO2 max is high intensity interval training. So there's been those studies done where like even people that are doing so what's the what what do we hear about physical activity requirements? We hear two and a half hours of moderate intensity exercise a week. Right. That would be you know the kind of exercise where you can the talk test. So you can talk you can have a sort of have a conversation but you're breathy.
Lewis Howes: Yes. Right.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Um
Lewis Howes: but you should be doing how much HIIT a week?
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Well so this is where
Lewis Howes: you can't talk.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Right. Well that well so that how many minutes a week? It all depends. Right. So, so people that are doing 2 and a half hours of this moderate intensity, about 40% of those people still can't improve their VO2 max until they add in high intensity, right? Now, the question is, well, how much how much do you want to improve, right? I mean, obviously, you don't want to like burn out like like all your exercises hit like it's a bit much, right? But um you know if you're doing some of the best ways to do it would be like a longer interval. So like a one minute interval of like going harder or there's the Norwegian 4x4. This is one of the best ways to improve your VO2 max. And that is where you go four minutes at at an intensity um that's pretty high that you can maintain and sustain for that entire four minutes. Usually it's about 85% max heart rate. So you're going pretty hard um for the entire four minutes. as hard as you can maintain for the entire four minutes and then you rest for three minutes. Rest as in low intensity, very low. You want your heart rate to come down and then you do it repeat four. So you do it four times and that is one of the best ways to improve your cardiorespiratory fitness. And in fact that same guy researcher Dr. Ben Levine that I talked about with the Dallas it's called the Dallas bed rest study. It's just phenomenal. Interesting. Well, he in my opinion has done an even more interesting study where um he took 50 year olds, so he and his colleagues is lab. They took 50 year olds that were sedentary. So now they weren't physically active, but they hadn't been identified with any other disease besides sedentaryism, which I think is a disease. They hadn't been identified with type two diabetes or hypertension or anything else. So they were quote unquote what they would call healthy, right?
Lewis Howes: Um but they didn't work out.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: But they didn't work out. So I wouldn't call them healthy, but this is what you
Lewis Howes: They were diseaseless.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: They were disease-free. No, but they were sedentary. So I wouldn't That's a disease. Yeah. Yeah. So um but they took them and they put them on a 2-year pretty intense exercise intervention protocol. Okay.
Lewis Howes: They probably transformed.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Unbelievable.
Lewis Howes: They didn't even look like the same person.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: They Okay, so they went from not exercising to 5 to 6 hours of physical activity a week. a large portion of that they were doing what's called maximum maximal um maximal sustainable intensity. So you're you're doing it's a lot of vigorous exercise. They're like 80% max heart rate, 75 80% max heart rate and then they were doing the Norwegian 4x4 once a week.
Lewis Howes: And they didn't start them out with this right out the gate. It was like the first six months was like progressive, right?
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: And after the two years, okay, so as we age, our hearts get smaller and stiffer. Okay, smaller and stiffer as we age. And that affects not only our exercise capacity but it affects our cardiovascular disease risk, our heart attack risk, hypertension risk, right? All of these things are connected. So after those two years of you know 5 to 6 hours of physical pretty good physical exercise every single week, their hearts looked 20 years younger in terms of structure.
Lewis Howes: Holy structure
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: 20 years younger. So they were 50. And if you look just at the the the structure of the heart, their hearts look like 30 year olds.
Lewis Howes: Wow.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Incredible. And it's really, I think, a a very motivating piece of evidence that's like it's never too late, right? It's never too late. 50. They're doing this at 50, so it's never too late. But also just look what look what exercise can do.
Lewis Howes: Wow.
Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Right. And that's like for me, I like to understand. I get this like dopamine. I'm like, "Oh, yes. Like this is what I can do. I'm I'm on it." you know, and it's it's like that's it helps me adopt a type of, you know, protocol where I'm I'm doing, you know, my exercise and I'm motivated. And that's that was definitely part of it,
[Source clip ends on an incomplete trailing clause.]
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