Getting in shape, it's tough.
But does it have to be?
1000
What I want to know is can you get fit by doing absolutely nothing?
So as a doctor, exercise is very, very important for me.
I know the benefits physically and mentally,
I need it to keep me going.
However it's very, very difficult sometimes.
I could be going to or from hospital and I don't often have the time.
So are there any handy shortcuts?
Can you cheat yourself into shape without all the hard work?
Can you think yourself stronger?
I know this sounds pretty lazy, but neuroscientists are actually looking into this.
What they thought was how muscle could get stronger by just thinking of exercising them.
They start by seeing how strong people's calf muscles are,
similar to those leg press things you see at the gym.
Hey, never skip leg day.
Then by using ultrasound and zapping the leg with electrical impulses
you can actually identify what part of the
muscle you're actually using.
Then the fun part, the volunteers are actually trained in the art of just thinking about doing the leg exercises.
It's not just about picturing yourself in the chair and seeing your foot and
seeing the force, it's also about the sensation of the brace against your ankle.
Each session will be about 15 minutes.
The group of volunteers then trained hard over the next four weeks, and the
results are pretty staggering.
What we showed was an increase of approximately 20 percent in our ability
to activate the muscles.
Pretty great, huh?
All from the power of the mind.
The mental imagery is a rehearsal of the skill.
So you're better at recruiting the muscles in an orderly fashion so that we can activate
a larger percentage of the muscle and that then produces more force and we become stronger.
So the volunteers, their muscles didn't actually get any bigger
however, they were able to utilise more of the muscle they already had.
So there you go.
You can make your muscles stronger with just your mind.
No exercise.
Just mind force.
So what other different cheat ways can we get stronger and get into super-athletes
without actually having to move?
Now, there's some great research that actually suggests you can get the same
benefits that you do from exercise from a bathtub.
So what I want to know, and bear with me be on this one,
is a bath actually better than exercise?
This isn't something that I just dreamt up, it too has some science behind it.
There's a very big study came out of Finland where they showed that increased
rates of sauna use in the wider population actually resulted in a
reduction in marks of cardiovascular disease risk, but also overall cause of mortality.
So are the Scandinavians onto something with hot tubs and saunas?
And can a hot bath really give you the same benefits as exercise?
Well, scientists from Loughborough University actually put this research to the test.
They compared getting hot with exercise to getting hot in a bath.
They want to see how well people actually controlled their glucose levels,
which is something in medicine we know is key for good health
and actually normally helped by exercise.
Ready for bath time!
Not quite the candlelit spa that they had in mind,
I guess it turns out the baths they use for scientific research
aren't quite as cozy as the ones we have with the candles and the rubber duckies at home.
They were kept and toasty 40 degrees for one hour while their blood sugar levels
and calories were monitored and measured.
The masks they're wearing measures the calories they're burning as they get hot
To compare, they also sweated it out on an exercise bike for one hour.
So what they looked at was energy used up whilst volunteers are actually having a bath.
What we found was about an 80 percent increase in energy expenditure
just as a result of sitting in the bath for the course of an hour.
So lying in a hot bath like this one can actually burn calories
an extra sixty one, to be precise.
And it's a lot less tasking than running around on any exercise bike,
I can tell you that.
So what about blood sugar levels and that all important peak glucose measurement
that you often get after you've had a big meal.
Where we started to see differences is when you look at your peak glucose output
and the key thing that's important about peak glucose output is it's one of the
potential risk markers towards things like developing Type two diabetes.
And what we actually found with the bath versus the exercise is that your peak glucose
was actually quite a little bit lower compared to exercise,
which is completely unexpected.
So astonishingly laying in a nice hot bath like this for an hour was 10 percent
ore effective in bringing down those peak glucose levels than actually exercise itself.
So the question is, why is lying in hot water giving you this benefit?
One of the things that we think is it's down to these things called heat shock proteins
that are released in response to heat stress,
these heat shock proteins, will take some of the sugar that's in your blood stream,
out of the bloodstream and into the muscle.
Honestly, I am loving the sound of this.
I love a good reason to jump in a hot bath or kick it in the sauna.
I guess maybe we should all be a bit more Scandinavian ey?
Now, these results from these studies are incredible.
It seems like you can actually get some of the key benefits of exercise
without even having to move at all.
And as a doctor, this really makes me enthusiastic because I know how many
patients I see that aren't able to exercise like some of us.
So, yes, as we've seen, the results are pretty staggering.
However, this does not give you an excuse not to move.
We do know there is no substitute for hard work and real hard core exercise.
We know that exercise gives so many more benefits than just blood sugar levels and calories,
those endorphins you get, the social aspect of going to the gym with your mates.
There's no substitute for exercise and hard work.
So as soon as we can get out there and it's safe, let's go and get moving.
Doctor's orders.