Originally Posted by
TimothyH
Efficiency of the heart and even longevity are only part of life and too much of one thing is never any good.
As an example, cycling alone does nothing for bone density and has people who do no weight bearing exercise open themselves up to osteoporosis as they age. An efficient heart is little consolation for a broken hip.
The 50+ forum is full of guys who rode 6000 miles/year and had heart attacks - too much stress ,not enough sleep, thought they could eat anything they wanted and cholesterol/plaque clogged their pipes. An efficient heart can't force blood through clogged arteries.
Eat right, get plenty of rest, add some weight bearing exercise... classic advice given for decades. To that I would add ruthlessly removing anything which causes stress. It is not possible to have a perfectly peaceful life all the time but major stressful situations should be rooted out to the extent that it is possible.
A life where physical, spiritual and intellectual are balanced is best.
-Tim-
Good advice re stress. I think the stress from a bad marriage is enough to take decades off a person's life.
Disagree re dietary fat and risk of strokes and heart attacks:
RESULTS: During 5-23 y of follow-up of 347,747 subjects, 11,006 developed CHD or stroke. Intake of saturated fat was not associated with an increased risk of CHD, stroke, or CVD. The pooled relative risk estimates that compared extreme quantiles of saturated fat intake were 1.07 (95% CI: 0.96, 1.19; P = 0.22) for CHD, 0.81 (95% CI: 0.62, 1.05; P = 0.11) for stroke, and 1.00 (95% CI: 0.89, 1.11; P = 0.95) for CVD. Consideration of age, sex, and study quality did not change the results.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20071648