600 seconds

600 seconds.

That's all the time you need to reap the rewards of physical activity.

Or is it?

Does that sound like a lot of your time? To put it into perspective, your entire day is 86,400 seconds!

Since we typically don't speak of time in seconds, let's go with minutes.

That is 10 minutes out of the 1440 minutes in a day.

Still pretty astounding stuff!

This is the health promoting messaging I speak of every week with my patients:

For as little as 10 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity, you will get health benefits.
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​Yet, this week some new research passed over my desk. Research out of the UK that looked at over 79,000 adults' physical activity and mortality risk.

The research findings concluded that any time spent in moderate to vigorous physical activity was beneficial to reduce the risk of death.

So imagine all the combination of ways to accumulate your physical activity in a day!

Got 7 minutes?

Take a walk around the block.

Got 5 minutes?

Climb up and down a set of stairs.

Got less than 3 minutes?

Turn on your favourite song and dance! 🕺🏽

Top 1950's song, Jailhouse Rock is only 2 minutes 26 seconds.

Top 1960's song, Twist and Shout is only 2 minutes 34 seconds.
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Top 1970's song, Love Train is only 2 minutes 58 seconds.

Top 1980's song, The Loco-Motion is only 3 minutes 13 seconds.

Top 1990's song, Wannabe is only 2 minutes 52 seconds.

So many songs to choose from! Here is the Spotify playlist for you!​

Now, we always need to remember that this is only one study and this research was not done on you. There is a growing body of research that is demonstrating the benefits of short duration physical activity.

Time for insight to action:

What are the ways you could build in short duration physical activity into your day?

If you deal with pain, injury or a chronic health condition, could you slice and dice your physical activity into 10 three minute bouts in the day?
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Make a list of all the places in your day that you could sneak in an extra 3 minutes of movement.

Overall, keep in mind that the more you move your body, the more benefits to be had!

Stay well and happy moving,
Lisa