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The Best Way to Improve VO2 Max and Live Longer (Doctor Explains The Evidence)

The Best Way to Improve VO2 Max and Live Longer (Doctor Explains The Evidence)

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If I had to boil down long term health into one single number, it would be your VO2 max. This is a measure of how much oxygen your body can take in and actually use when you are working as hard as you possibly can, and it depends on your lungs, your heart, your blood vessels and the tiny mitochondria inside your muscle cells all working together. One of the biggest studies of its kind followed over 100,000 people and found that the least fit people had a risk of dying that was as bad as, and in some cases worse than, smoking or diabetes. The fitter people were, the longer they tended to live, with no ceiling where the benefit stopped. From around your 30s, VO2 max naturally falls by roughly 10 percent every decade if you do nothing about it. That slow decline is a big part of why people gradually lose the ability to climb stairs or carry shopping without stopping. So how do you raise it. A large meta analysis of more than 50 studies found that high intensity interval training tends to improve VO2 max faster than steady, gentle exercise. In the video I walk through two specific protocols the research points to, and explain how to work out roughly what effort level you should be aiming for. I also share a personal story about a stress fracture I got years ago while training for a triathlon, and why that changed how careful I now am about balancing hard interval work with recovery. The full weekly approach I recommend covers steady cardio, resistance training, interval sessions and simply moving more through the day. The whole point of raising your VO2 max is reserve. The bigger your engine, the more you have in the tank for whatever life throws at you as you get older. The full list of research references for this episode is in the description of the YouTube version. Disclaimer: This is not personal medical advice and does not override what your doctor says. #dralex #vo2max #longevity
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