Why are isometric exercises so good for you?

Exercise is great for improving heart health. However, the thought of going to the gym or jogging may discourage some people from doing so. And if you already have heart problems, such lively exercises may not be appropriate do it safely.

The good news is that you don’t necessarily have to do a vigorous workout to see heart benefits. You can even improve your heart health by staying still and trying very difficult not to move.

Isometric trainingwhatever you call it, it becomes more and more popular as a way to lower blood pressure and hypertension and improving muscle strength and stability.

Typically, to build strength and power, our muscles need to change length as we move. Squats and bicep curls are good examples of exercises that change the length of the muscle as it moves.

Isometric training simply involves contracting your muscles, which generates force without having to move your joints. The more a muscle is contracted, the stronger it becomes (and the stronger the muscle, the more powerful we can perform the movement).

If you add weight to an isometric exercise, it will cause the muscles to contract even more strongly. Examples of isometric contractions are wall sit and plank.

Isometric exercises involve: a high degree of “neural recruitment”due to the need to maintain contraction. This means that these exercises are good at engaging specialized neurons in our brain and spinal cord that play an significant role in all the movements we make – both voluntary and involuntary. The higher the level of neuronal activation, the more muscle fibers are recruited and the more force is generated. As a result, this can lead to strength gains.

Isometric exercises have long been of interest to strength and power athletes as a way to prepare muscles for exercise generate large forces by activating them. But research also shows that isometric exercise is beneficial other areas of our health – including reducing hypertension and promoting better blood flow.

There are several reasons why isometric exercise is so good for the heart.

When a muscle is contracted, it increases in size. This causes compress blood vessels supplying this muscle, reducing blood flow and increasing blood pressure in our arteries – a mechanism known as the “pressor reflex”.

Then, as the contraction relaxes, a sudden rush of blood flows into blood vessels and muscles. This influx of blood provides more oxygen and (most importantly) nitric oxide into the blood vessels – causing them to dilate. This in turn lowers blood pressure. This effect will decrease over time arterial stiffnesswhich can lower blood pressure.

When blood flow decreases during isometric movement, the amount of available oxygen that cells need to function also decreases. It’s liberating release of metabolitessuch as hydrogen ions and lactate, which stimulate the sympathetic nervous system, which controls our “fight to escape” response. In the tiny term, this leads to an escalate in blood pressure.

But when isometric exercises are performed repeatedly over many weeks, reduction occurs activity of the sympathetic nervous system. That means blood pressure is lowered and there is less stress on the cardiovascular system, which makes these exercises good for the heart.

Isometric exercise may be even more beneficial to heart health than other types of cardiovascular exercise. A study that compared the benefits of isometric exercise with high-intensity interval training found that isometric exercise led to this much bigger discounts resting blood pressure over a study period of two to 12 weeks.

How to exploit isometric exercises

If you want to exploit isometric training to lower your blood pressure, it is recommended that you do so voluntary isometric contractions for two minutes at approximately 30-50% of maximum effort. This is enough to induce physiological improvement.

You can start by doing this four times a day, three to five times a week – focusing on the same exercise. As you progress, you can start to vary the exercises you do, add weights, or add more than one isometric exercise.

Some good isometric exercises to start with: a static squatAND sit against the wall or board. Even during these tiny bursts of exercise, your heart rate, breathing and blood pressure will fluctuate everything increases – the same reactions that occur during more conventional full-body exercises such as cycling and running.

Favorable improvements in blood pressure begin to occur approximately 4-10 weeks after starting isometric training – although it depends on the health and fitness of the person at the beginning.

Isometric training appears to be a plain, low-intensity exercise regimen that offers major cardiovascular health benefits, all with a low time commitment compared to other workouts.