Charles said:I've been doing regular three day a week workouts on Mondays,
Wednesdays and Fridays since I left the Armed Forces six years ago. I
have almost always done them at lunchtimes between 1200 and 1400.
On Monday and today I was obliged to do an early morning start, which
I have to say was not to my liking. It was really quite a weird
feeling to be so out of routine, and my gym was unbelievably busy.
I know many people swear by early-morning training sessions, and there
is a theory that it is the best time of day to encourage weight loss,
but I really can't see what he attraction is.
To be honest, I felt quite fatigued and on completion didn't really
feel my usual mood of well-being and contentment. I had the option of
training in the evenings but that appealed to me even less.
I don't think I shall be too keen to repeat the process, but I don't
really know why. Habit I suppose, but that doesn't make sense as I
used to train at any time of the day while I was in the Service!!
this seems like a good time to quote "New Scientist" from their April
2-8 issue:
"Body Rhythms Set a Dangerous Beat"
The body's natural clock influences much more than just our sleep-wake
patterns and hormonal cycles. Physicists have found that circadian
rhythms affect the variability of heartbeats and even the movement of
limbs.
It has long been known that heart attacks and other heart-related
failures occur most often in the hours around 10 am, presumably
reflecting the stress of morning activity following a night of rest.
But Eugene Stanley's team from Boston University in Massachusetts
discovered that circadian rhythms might also have a role to play. They
studied the variability in the time between heartbeats in different
people. Lower variability has been linked to heart disease.
"Individuals with a regular heartbeat, statistically, are likely to
have a less healthy heart," says Stanley.
The team found that circadian rhythms appear to influence this
variability: the unhealthiest heartbeat patterns appear around 10 am,
regardless of whether a person is awake or asleep, active or inactive.
It is possible that the body's clock pushes already weak hearts into
the danger zone, says team member Plamen Ivanov.
The researchers also recorded for the first time the influence of
circadian rhythms on motor activity. They fitted volunteers with
wristwatch-like sensors to measure forearm motion in different times
of day and night. They found that arms accelerated most rapidly in the
afternoon, regardless of what physical activity the volunteers were
engaging in. "We find that the activity level is not random, and this
may provide some useful information for clinical use," says team
member Kun Hu.
Ivanov says the circadian influences on heartbeat and arm motion
appear to reflect deep linksin the way the nervous system controls
body functions.
--
"... the street term for it would be 'Byxmyndig' *legal to get in
pants* (it's true)" - Dukeman, in AGHL
