IUBio

Live shortening effects of sport

John de Rivaz John at longevb.demon.co.uk
Fri Feb 9 04:07:20 EST 1996


I had wondered about this. After all, if you "exercise" a car you wear it 
out.

Exercise with animals obviously has two factors:
1. It programs muscle building and other beneficial effects
2. It wears out mechanical parts

In young people 1 outweighs 2.

I suggest as a useful line of research for biochemists that they find out 
the mechanism by which exercise builds muscle and other improving factors, 
and find a nutritional way of replicating this with no side effects.

After all, excercise must by itself be damaging, that is clear. But the 
body rteceives the information that this damage is taking place and 
corrects it, indeed overcorrects it in some aspects by strengthening muscle 
and bone. The actual strengthening of muscle and bone are chemical not 
mechanical processes, and they are initiated by the *information* that 
excercise is taking place. If we can fool the body into beleiving that 
excercise is taking place when it isn't, then we have the benefits without 
the mechanical wear. 

Of course people will still take excercise beacue they like what they are 
doing, eg sports and recreations, but the won't waste their time jumping on 
the spot etc (and wearing out their joints) just to tone themselves up for 
their sports.

In article: <4fb2tm$bj9 at altrade.nijmegen.inter.nl.net>  
H.O.van.den.Berg at Inter.NL.net writes:
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> The oldest cat (yes, cat) of my part of Holland is a cat that
> was wounded when little, so that it could barely walk.
> It's now 23 and still going strong.
> 
> Racing horces life years shorter than recreation horses.
> 
> In an experiment where flies were not allowed to fly theze non-fliers
> lived up to 200 % longer than the flies that could fly freely.
> 
> So I think it's reasonable to assume that sports progresses the
> aging process. Probably even a lot of "lean muscle tissue"
> does the same (consuming more oxygen).
> 
> But to confuse us, sports in first instant results in youthy
> appearance, more power and stamina.
> 
> Is sport like sun beathing ?; (you look great shortly after
> but worse years after...)
> 
> Is muscle tissue and sports activity the reason for the fact
> that women live longer ?
> 
> Yes, I know about the finish study of ski-sportsmen. But they were
> compared to their collegue sports, not a control group of couch
> potatoes.
> 
> And if we pay this price for sports, what sport would give 
> the best physical results for the lowes oxygen price ?
> 
> 
> Cheers !
> 
> 
> Harrie
> 
> 
-- 
Sincerely,     ****************************************       
               * Publisher of        Longevity Report *
John de Rivaz  *                     Fractal Report   *
               *          details on request          *
               ****************************************
In the information age, sharing can increase world wealth enormously,
because giving information does not decrease your information.
          http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/JohndeR    
                Fast loading, very few slow pictures






More information about the Ageing mailing list

Send comments to us at biosci-help [At] net.bio.net