How Often Should You Strength Train to Boost Bone Health?
Our bones weaken as we age, but there are things you can do to slow the process down. Your food choices can have a major impact on bone strength; your lifestyle choices including alcohol intake and smoking make a difference, and your workouts do too.
Weight-bearing exercises, the National Institute on Aging states, including jogging, hiking, walking and climbing stairs, can support how much calcium and other minerals our bones retain, thus making them denser and stronger. Resistance training or strength training, however, is the gold standard, experts say. That is, as long as you’re exercising with adequate regularity.
Fitness Tip of the Day: Strength Train 2-3 Times a Week to Improve Bone Health: Whether you opt for lighter weights for tons of repetitions or heavy weight with fewer reps, finding the sweet spot for your strength training cadence is critical, says Dr. Jocelyn Wittstein, an orthopedic surgeon and author of “The Complete Bone and Joint Health Plan.”
Excerpted from Today
