Alison’s Fitness & Wellness Corner – Exercise & The Immune System
Alison’s Fitness & Wellness Corner
Hi everyone, let me take this opportunity to introduce myself to you.
I’m Alison Ngethe, 50 years young with a passion for Holistic overall Wellness. I have been in the Fitness, Education, Spa, and Wellness industry for over 25 years, and super excited to have a little corner here to engage with you on various related topics. Please feel free to email me at [email protected] Or DM on Instagram @alisonngethe if there are any questions you have or topics you’d like to bring to the table.
As a first article, and given we are in our cold months, June/July, I thought we could start with exercise and the immune system.
Does Exercise Actually Help or Hurt Your Immune System?
Do your workouts help your immune system or can they actually weaken it? It’s a question that people are asking more and more given the pandemic and wondering if there is anything they can do to improve their chances of fighting off a virus.
Firstly, it’s important to understand how exercise affects your immune system:
Exercise stimulates and kickstarts the immune processes. When you engage in any physical activity that gets your heart beating faster than normal, for a constant minimum of 30 minutes, your body senses this as a stressor and therefore releases certain blood cells from different parts of your body to flood your bloodstream. These blood cells and powerful immune cells that come out and circulate during exercise are at a higher rate than normal, and any viruses/ bacteria detected are attacked during this process. Two or so hours after your workout these immune cells start to decline in the bloodstream.
People who engage in regular exercise tend to get sick less frequently. According to a study of more than 1,000 adults which was published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, people who exercised for at least 20 minutes a day, five or more days per week, reported 43% fewer days with upper respiratory tract infection symptoms than those who were sedentary. And when they did get sick, their symptoms tended to be less severe. That’s not to say that exercise will automatically trigger your immune system to destroy any germ that invades your system, but it will help you improve your odds of fighting it off.
Is more exercise better, or can too much exercise hurt your immune system?
If a moderate exercise can stimulate your immune system, will longer more intense exercise have a greater effect?
I get asked this question a lot.
To me, there is something to be said for pushing your body to extremes (over 90 mins) hard intensity daily, which starts to over-stress the immune system, the body will definitely be vulnerable especially in the 2 to 3 hours after the exercise when the fighting blood cells decrease. Your body needs time to rest and re-build, so with over-exercising, you can be impacting it negatively, that alone, however, is not the only reason your immune system may not be top-notch. People who have trouble sleeping and those that don’t get enough sleep are more likely to develop a cold than those who sleep soundly for longer.
My advice is to develop a routine that is sustainable at least 4 times a week of moderate to high intensity, not longer than 60 mins, and if a higher intensity 30 to 45 minutes, and rest when you are feeling too tired (your body is talking to you) so learn to listen to it.
And in the meantime,
Stay Warm
Alison
Alison Ngethe
Founder/Owner ~ Body by Alison Caroline and Alison Caroline Institute