12 minutes more exercise a day can save £6 billion in the UK.

The recommended amount of exercise in the UK is 150 minutes a week, which breaks down to 5 days of 30 minutes of exercise each. I reality though the average person exercise a measly 4 days a month. Data from the Health Survey for England (HSE) indicates that 70% of all brits don’t meet the recommendations.

Those that do sports have better mental health and physical health, lower cholesterol
and blood pressure levels, are less likely to report having cardiovascular disease or
Type 2 diabetes and are more likely to be a healthy weight.

The stats also indicates that exercise is a class issue. The average household income of those that do moderate sports is more than £6,500 a year higher than inactive households. These people are also more likely to be employed. Lowering the barrier for exercise could help reduce these inequalities.

This is also where I start to preaching making Nano Workouts a part of the daily life. These missing 12 minutes a day could easily be covered if a few Nano Workouts were made part of the daily routines. Just including a Nano Workout while brushing your teeth twice a day would cover 33% of the missing 12 minutes.

Link to full report by Nuffield Health

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Obama and Hamid Karzai on a walking chat outside the white house on Jan.11 2013

Walking meetings – walk 30miles a week while still at the office.

People spend an average of 9.3 hours every day on their butt. It’s actually possible to trace 6% of all heart disease and 7% of all type 2 diabetes to inactivity. Now if you work in an office and attend lots of meetings, Nilofer Merchant have a simple solution for you.

In this thee minute TED talk Nilofer Merchant explains about the benefits of doing walking meetings.

The idea is simple; If you have a one-on-one meeting your should make it into a walking meeting. Drop that boring conference room and get out there and move your ass.

For Nilofer this was a real lifechanger and she now does walking meetings for about 20-30 miles a week.
Check out the video below

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LeAnn Rimes spotted doing some shopping bag dumbbells.

According to the daily mail country star LeAnn Rimes was seen leaving a whole foods food market while repeatedly lifiting her shopping bags over her head. We call this nano workout shopping bag dumbbells. It also just happens to be one of my favorite exercises to do when out shopping. So there it is. Want to work out like the celebs try some Nano Workouts.

You can now pre-order the Nano Workout book from amazon

Casey Neistat is an internet film makes who makes quirky movies in his own entertaining style. On his recent client list are Nike, for whom he created the Make it count video, and Mercedes Benz for whom he’s currently making a four part series for the launch of their new CLA model, the CLA project.

In this video Casey tackles the problem of how to get exercise into his office hours. The 4min short is really a lot of fun and you should check it out.

Pre-order the Nano Workouts book from amazon now!

An almost-ready version of the Nano Workouts book cover.

During this winter I was busting my ass to finish all illustrations and texts for the Nano Workouts book and I super excited to see that it’s now possible to pre-order it from amazon. Even though still haven’t seen the final version in it’s physical form I’m really proud of the content and judging by the drafts I have received from Ulysses Press I’m confident the book will look great.

Depending on how the book does will also determine the future of this blog so if you enjoy the blog please show your support and turn a few hard earned bucks into a physical edition of the best workout book of the century (I might not be 100% objective in that opinion). Also, if you would be so kind and share this with your network I would be even more grateful <3

Pre-order the Nano Workouts book from amazon here

Darrul Agawin’s 3-piece workspace furniture set which transform into exercise furniture.

Vancouver based based designer Darryl Agawin have designed a set of furniture which should invite the user to exercise. No sweat! is a three piece workspace furniture set which transforms into exercise equipment.

The set is based on some very common exercise tools; a step-up board, balance board, skipping rope and kettle bell.

I applaud the idea but I can’t help to feel that more could be done. Most of it are tools you pick off the furniture and then use for exercise separately and there’s not really too much benefit from having them by themselves. I would like to see a chair which folds for sit ups or a pull up bar desk.

Darryl claims that the set is designed for everyone but I think that everyone in this case have to really enjoy 80’s design and especially the Memphis reaction from 1981-85.

Still it’s a novel idea and it would be great to see more of this kind of thinking.

No, Sweat! – teaser 2 from Darryl Agawin on Vimeo.

Nel is exercising his quads at his desk at work.

Keeping fit while at work can be a challenge. You are stuck behind a desk and there’s a ton of work which needs to get done. But do not despair, there are plenty of good exercises well suited for your office space and this is just one of them. Leg extensions are great because they are easy to do and you don’t even have to take your focus away from the computer screen and still work your quads. The leg extension is an isometric exercise (static). This means that your joints or muscle length doesn’t change during the exercise.

How
Sit up straight and tense your abs. Lift one of your legs straight out to hip level and keep the foot pointing slightly upwards. Tense your quad (thigh) and maintain the tension for a desired period of time before relaxing and lowering your leg. Repeat for the desired number of repetitions and then switch to the other side. You can start with about 10 seconds for each rep, but feel free to do as short/long as you feel like.

Alternative
An alternative version is to perform the leg extension as a dynamic/isotonic exercise. When your leg is extended, slowly move it up and down while keeping the muscle tensed. Repeat for the desired number of repetitions and then switch to the other side.

Check out more office workouts here.

Nel is stretching his shoulders while driving.

The shoulder roll is a simple stretch exercise with a lot of benefits. Shoulder rolls will help you release tension in your shoulders, increasing general mobility and improving your posture. You can do them almost everywhere and they one of few exercise suited to do in a car. They are especially good on a long drive, since you tend to tense up after hours behind the wheel.

HOW:
Keep your head up without tilting it forward and relax your shoulders. Take a deep breath through your nose. Do the shoulder rolls as you slowly exhale through your mouth.
Start with your left shoulder. Pull your shoulder back and then lift it up towards your ear and then push it forward in a rolling motion. Roll your shoulder forward a few times and then switch direction. Then do the same with your right shoulder. Take your time and do them slowly. You can either roll one shoulder at the time, or both shoulders at the same time. Finish by shrugging your shoulders a couple of times.

What we already knew is now proven through scientific research; Nano Workouts makes you smarter.

British Journal of Sports Medicine have done some data analysing of study evidence and the result suggests that short bursts of moderate intense exercise boosts higher brain function, such as memory, concentration, planning, and decision-making in three age groups.

In short; exercise makes you smarter.

24 studies with three age groups have been investigated to find the effect of short burst exercising. 19 of these were relevant and they involved 586 participants.

The data concluded that all age groups showed a small to moderate increase in higher brain function after a short burst of exercise.

This also suggests that exercise can be used as a treatment for conditions characterised by impaired higher brain functions, such as ADHD and autism.

They speculate that short bursts of exercise may boost the cerebral blood flow to the pre-frontal areas of the brain, responsible for higher functions.

Now do some push-ups and exercise your brain at the same time.

You can find the full study here

Climbing a mountain is both healthy and fun.

Exercise with moderation and live longer and healthier.

Research from the The Aerobics Center Longitudinal Study performed by the Cooper Institute in Texas shows that one of the reasons we are experiencing an obesity epidemic is simply that we move less than we used to.

Some of the not-so-positive stats provided by the study (based on US only):
- ¼ trips are one mile or less, but ¾ of those trips are done by car.
- Children ages 5-15 bike 40% less than they did in the 70’s.
- In the US only 6% of all trips are by walking or biking. In Sweden it’s 49%.

The study provides a list of small lifestyle changes you can do to get more activity into your everyday. If you are a regular reader of Nano Workouts you know that this is pretty much what this blog is dedicated to, and who am I to argue with science.

Run, but not too fast or too long
Another study from ACLS also tracked 5000 men and women who were runners. The study showed that people who ran less than 20 miles a week, at a pace of six to seven miles an hour, had a 19% lower risk of dying from any cause when compared to non-runners. But, runners to ran more miles at a faster pace did not have any additional survival benefits. Not very surprising the study also showed that walkers suffered less risk of injury than runners. Moderation is key.

Link to reserch presentation (PDF)