The best time of day to exercise to ‘slash your risk of early death by 61%’ – and 9 other longevity hacks

IT’S no secret that exercise is key to staying healthy.

As well as boosting your mood and dampening stress, being physically active can improve your odds of developing certain long-term conditions.

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Squeezing in a workout at the end of the day was found to slash the risk of early death and heart disease[/caption]

It’s even been suggested that exercising regularly can extend your life.

But does the time of day you choose to break a sweat make a difference?

A team of researchers from the University of Sydney followed people 30,000 people who were overweight over the course of eight years.

They found that squeezing in a workout at the end of the day packed a punch against cardiovascular disease and lowered the risk of early death by 61 per cent.

The study published in <a aria-label="Diabetes Care (opens in a new tab)” href=”https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/doi/10.2337/dc23-2448/154403/Timing-of-Moderate-to-Vigorous-Physical-Activity” target=”_blank” rel=”nofollow noreferrer noopener”>Diabetes Care analysed the data of 29,836 adults aged over 40 from the UK Biobank study to see how the timing of physical activity impacted health outcomes.

Researchers focused on people classed as obese – with a body mass index of 30 or over – as they’re “at a much greater risk of major cardiovascular conditions such as heart attacks and stroke, and premature death”, Dr Angelo Sabag, lecturer in Exercise Physiology at the University of Sydney, said.

“Exercise is by no means the only solution to the obesity crisis, but this research does suggest that people who can plan their activity into certain times of the day may best offset some of these health risks,” he added.

Some 2,995 participants were also diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.

Participants were divided into four groups based on what time of the day they tended to get moving:

• No “aerobic bouts” – less than one bout of moderate-to-vigorous activity lasting over three minutes per day on average
• Morning exercisers (between 6am and noon)
• Afternoon exercisers (noon to 6pm)
• Evening exercisers (6pm to midnight)

They exercise was monitored 24 hours a day by wrist-worn devices.

Using NHS and National Records of Scotland data, researchers were able to follow the health trajectories of participants for almost eight years.

Over this period they recorded 1,425 deaths, 3,980 cardiovascular events and 2,162 microvascular dysfunction events – this is a type of heart disease that affects the smallest blood vessels that branch off from the coronary arteries, large blood vessels that supply the heart with blood.

Participants with pre-existing cardiovascular disease and cancer were excluded from the analysis.

Researchers found that, compared to those who didn’t exercise, people who carved out time in the evening to move had a:

• 61 per cent lower risk of death by any cause
• 36 per cent lower risk of cardiovascular disease
• 24 per cent lower risk of microvascular disease

Morning and afternoon exercise was also found to be beneficial, though results weren’t as robust as for evening exercises.

Morning movers still had a 33 per cent lower risk of dying and 17 per cent lower risk of cardiovascular disease.

The odds against early death improved to 40 per cent for the afternoon group, who also had a 16 per lower chance of getting heart disease.

Interestingly, how often people exercised seemed to matter more for health than the total amount of time spent moving.

Researchers noticed the same trend in participants who had type 2 diabetes, as evening exercisers showed the lowest rates of death and disease.

Does it matter what kind of exercise I do?

Joint first author Dr Matthew Ahmadi stressed that the study did not just track structured forms of exercise.

Rather researchers focused on tracking bouts of moderate to vigorous physical activity that lasted three minutes or more.

“We didn’t discriminate on the kind of activity we tracked, it could be anything from power walking to climbing the stairs, but could also include structured exercise such as running, occupational labour or even vigorously cleaning the house,” Dr Ahmadi said.

Researchers stressed that their findings need to be confirmed with more rigorous clinical trials.

But the results suggest people with obesity and diabetes may want to consider shifting some of their activity later in the day.

Previous studies have indicated that just 22 minutes of exercise a day is enough to slash your risk of early death and undo the health damage of a desk job or lounging on the sofa.

Other research shows that walking can be enough to improve your life expectancy – a minimum of 4,000 steps a day was deemed to be enough, though upping that to 10,000 slashed the chances of early death by 39 per cent.