Quincy
- If you have hypertension you are not alone. Millions of
older adults have blood pressure readings above desirable
levels, which are 120 mmHg for systolic pressure and 80 mmHg
for diastolic pressure. There are many means for reducing
your resting blood pressure, including losing body weight,
cutting back on sodium (salt) intake, increasing potassium
intake, avoiding stressful situations, and taking
physician-prescribed blood pressure medications.
In addition to these
measures, certain exercises have proven highly effective for
lowering resting blood pressure. You are probably aware that
aerobic activities have a beneficial effect on resting blood
pressure. These include walking, jogging, cycling, swimming,
stairclimbing, rowing, elliptical training and similar forms
of endurance exercise.
For the best training effect, try to perform aerobic
activities at a moderate level of intensity, which generally
corresponds to an exercise heart rate between 60 and 90
percent of your maximum heart rate.
Another means for monitoring your intensity level is the
talk test. If you are able to speak in short sentences, your
effort level is appropriate. If you have difficulty talking
your effort level is too high, and if you can carry on a
normal conversation your effort level is too low.
Your endurance exercise session should last between 20 and
60 minutes. Of course, higher intensity activities such as
jogging would typically be performed for shorter periods of
time (e.g., 20 to 30 minutes), whereas lower intensity
activities such as walking would typically be performed for
longer periods of time (e.g., 40 to 60 minutes).
Because they are less intense than strength training
exercises, aerobic activities may be performed several days
a week, with 3 to 5 training sessions normally recommended.
However, to reduce the risk of overtraining and overuse
injuries, I suggest doing a variety of aerobic activities
rather than just one. For example, you may walk/jog on
Mondays and Thursdays, cycle on Tuesdays, and swim on
Saturdays. By training in this manner, you use many major
muscle groups for better overall conditioning and less
stress on specific joint structures.
You may be surprised to learn that properly performed
strength exercise is equally effective as aerobic activity
for reducing resting blood pressure. Numerous blood pressure
studies, including several of our own, have shown that
sensible strength training lowers resting blood pressure by
about three percent systolically and about four percent
diastolically after several weeks of regular workouts. As a
case in point, the 77 participants in our senior golfers
program reduced their average resting blood pressure
readings by 4.5 mmHg after just two months of strength
training.
The key factors in sensible and successful strength training
are as follows.
•
Perform one set of 8 to 10 different exercises that work the
major muscle groups.
•
Use a resistance that can be performed for 10 to 15 good
repetitions.
•
Perform every repetition with a moderate movement speed
(about six seconds per rep), and through a full movement
range.
•
Do your strength exercises two or three non-consecutive days
per week (e.g., Mondays and Thursdays or Mondays, Wednesdays
and Friday).
•
Breathe throughout every exercise repetition, exhaling
during the lifting phase and inhaling during the downward
phase.
Our fitness program members attain best blood pressure
results when they combine both aerobic activities and
strength training for a comprehensive cardiovascular and
muscular conditioning program. |
