Summary âThis Workout Makes Your Heart 20 Years Youngerâ - Dr Rhonda Patrick (Youtube) www.youtube.com
2,638 words - YouTube video - View YouTube video
n/a Peter Tia told me that VO 2 max is the single most important metric when looking at someone's longevity. How much truth do you think is in that?
Dr Rhonda Patrick I I think absolutely he's right. I think VO 2 max is 1 of the single and and the and the thing I love about it is that it's something that you can measure. It's a biomarker. I think it's 1 of the most important things. Absolutely.
Dr Rhonda Patrick And there's, you know, there's there's some evidence that, like, doing doing this vigorous exercise is important, but it has to be like a longer interval type of exercise. So, you know, at least 1 minute, that would be sort of the minimum, but, like, better if you can get to 4 minutes. So there's something called the Norwegian 4 by 4 protocol. And that's 4 minutes at the highest intensity that you can maintain for that entire 4 minutes, followed by 3 minute recovery of, like, light, light exercise. I mean, you want your heart rate to come down so that you could do it again 4 times.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Right? So the Norwegian miserable.
n/a It's absolutely miserable.
Dr Rhonda Patrick The Norwegian 4 by 4, and, you know, there's there was a study, and I like I like this is 1 of the studies that inspired me, and this is this was a study out of, UT Southwest in Dallas. And, the study took 50 year olds that were healthy, but they were not physically active. So they didn't have, like, type 2 diabetes and all that, but they weren't active.
n/a They're also detrained?
Dr Rhonda Patrick Exactly. They're detrained. And they put them on a pretty intensive training protocol for 2 years. K? 2 years.
Dr Rhonda Patrick It was a 2 year intervention, and it was a progressive protocol. So, obviously, when you have an untrained person, you don't just write out the bat, Norwegian 4 by 4 day 1. No. That's not gonna happen. So it took them 6 months to kinda work up their their their training, right, their endurance.
Dr Rhonda Patrick And by the time they got to their 6 month mark, they were doing about, you know, 4 hours a week of what's called maximal intensity exercise. So this is vigorous. This is this is
n/a 4 hours a week of maximal intensity?
Dr Rhonda Patrick Yeah. Wow. So they were doing so they were basically doing it was like it's it's high as you can maintain, you know, in vigorous intensity workout for 30 minutes, basically. So they're doing these 30 minute workouts where you're doing, like, 70 5, 80% max heart rate for 30 minutes.
n/a Okay.
Dr Rhonda Patrick So and I
n/a mean doing that 8 times a week.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Yeah. I mean so no. They're also doing they're doing other things as well. So they're doing it's not when I say 4 hours a week, they're exercising 4 hours a week. Oh, yeah.
Dr Rhonda Patrick What do
n/a you mean they were 4 hours of this Norwegian 4 by 4?
Dr Rhonda Patrick No. No. No. No. No.
Dr Rhonda Patrick No. No. No. No. They were doing exercise 4 hours a
n/a week. Okay.
Dr Rhonda Patrick But they were doing, a majority of that was maximal intensity exercise. So a lot of that was they were doing, like, 30 minute sessions of this. Alright. And I think they're probably doing, like, 1 and a half to 2 hours of that. Yep.
Dr Rhonda Patrick And then they were also doing some strength training,
n/a and
Dr Rhonda Patrick then they were doing the Norwegian 4 by 4. So there was kind of a a nice sort of balanced, and then the control group was doing this sort of, I say strength training, but it was more, I guess, body weight, you know, kinda stuff. The control group was doing that. So it was a type of sort of bodyweight training, but it wasn't high intensity. Like, it wasn't like the the CrossFit kinda stuff that you could do.
Dr Rhonda Patrick It was it was more like lower stretching kinda stuff, maybe yoga ish kinda thing. And, so so after 2 years, these people, like, the the cardiac structure so as we age, our heart gets smaller and it gets stiffer. And this happens. It's like part of aging, That results in a lot of things. So cardiovascular disease risk goes up, but, also, like, your exercise performance and capacity goes down.
Dr Rhonda Patrick So so after that 2 years of, you know, doing this pretty vigorous intensity exercise protocol, their, the people, the 50 year olds, they reversed their cardiac structure aging by 20 years. So their hearts were looking like 30 year old hearts versus 50 year old hearts. And this is after 2 years of doing this. And to me, it was so motivating to go, wow, these 50 year olds can do this. Like, these were untrained people who don't usually work out.
Dr Rhonda Patrick And by the end of this 2 years, I mean, they were, like, getting at it. And so I've, you know, kinda stepped up my my game a bit. Also, like, I've got a coach coming, and I'm working with, 2 2 days a week and to do I'm doing a lot of, it's like a resistance training, but, like, kind of interval as well. So I'm getting the high heart rate and and that interval training.
n/a Funny to see Peter Teer and yourself kind of converge on this new it's not it's not as if it's new, but it was definitely something that I wasn't hearing about 4 years ago. I wasn't hearing people talk about this. Everything was zone 2. It was, you know, like go slow to go fast or whatever the tagline is. And, 1 of the problems with zone 2 is that you need quite a high duration, like by design because 45 minutes or an hour multiple times per week, which is actually difficult.
n/a So lots of benefits of improving VO 2 max. What are take us through the Norwegian 4 by 4 again, and then what else is in there? If there was a protocol or a number of protocols you were gonna design, here's a program that you can take away today into your gym and do that will help to improve your VO 2 max. What would you tell people?
Dr Rhonda Patrick I would say the Norwegian 4 by 4 is by far the best, and you're gonna get the if for the people that are really, determined and committed, that would be it. That would be the 4 minutes of the exercise intensity as hard as you can go and maintain it for that entire 4 minutes. So, obviously
n/a to that. What what do you mean? As hard as you can go and maintain it. What does that mean?
Dr Rhonda Patrick It means you don't wanna go, like, all out, like like, 95% of your your max heart rate, because then you can only last for, like, a minute. You know? And so so then you're gonna go down. You're gonna you're gonna slow down. Right?
Dr Rhonda Patrick So what it means is, like, you wanna go you know, it it might for some people, it might be, like, 75% max heart rate. Right? So for some people, it might be 80%. But you wanna go as hard as you can for the 4 minutes, without, like, really slowing down. So you kind of have to pace yourself a little bit.
n/a Mhmm.
Dr Rhonda Patrick But you don't wanna go too slow. Right? Like, you you definitely can't be talking. Like, you should not be able to talk for sure when you're doing it. So it's hard enough that you just absolutely can talk, but it's not all out.
Dr Rhonda Patrick So
n/a 4 minutes.
Dr Rhonda Patrick 4 minutes and then 3 minutes of totally light. Like, you're going all the way. This is like, you know, you're you're, like, back to, like, zone 1 if you wanna call it something.
n/a If your heart can come come down so quickly. Down.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Yeah. And you're doing that for 3 minutes because you wanna give your you wanna recover so that you can do it again. And it and you repeat it, it's a 4 it's a 4 time protocol. So you do it once, and then you repeat it 3 times, or you just call it the 4 by 4. I think that's probably 1 of the the best protocols to improve VO 2 max.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Now, doctor Martin Gavala, I've had him on my podcast. He's a real expert expert on these high intensity interval training protocols. He does a lot of research on it at McMaster University, in Ontario, Canada. And he also says you there, you know, there there's evidence that a 1 minute protocol so, like, just even doing, like, an interval, like, 1 minute interval and then doing that, like, you know, a few times also can improve VO 2 max. So that's a little easier and, also, it's easier.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Like, I like I I do 1 minute intervals. I'm trying to now incorporate the 4 by 4 into my routine, which is coaches help with that. So, but it is
n/a I imagine it's a motivation thing, which is probably 1 of the biggest hurdles to get over that just if you've got any program in front of you that isn't the Norwegian 4 by 4 for the day, you go, maybe it's back in biceps. Maybe I'll just go for a little jog. It's like manana manana manana.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Yeah. It is. It but, again, like I said, you do have to do you try to make it consistent. So
n/a frequency per
Dr Rhonda Patrick week? Well, the Norwegian 4 by 4 would be, like, 1 time a week.
n/a Oh, okay. And that's that's the That's
Dr Rhonda Patrick the that's the hard day.
n/a That's less that's less miserable. It is. Okay. Yeah. Is there any benefit to going twice per week?
Dr Rhonda Patrick Probably, yeah.
n/a But It'd been so much better
Dr Rhonda Patrick if you'd said. But these 50 year old yeah. These 50 year olds did it 1 time a week for 2 years, and they reversed their cardiac structure aging by 20 years. Of course, they were they were also doing other vigorous intensity exercise. It wasn't the torturous Norwegian 4 by 4.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Yep. You know, like
n/a So if Norwegian 4 by 4 is gold standard at the moment for improving VO 2 max, what would be some examples of other vigorous exercise workouts? What else is in that bucket?
Dr Rhonda Patrick Well, people can do what they enjoy doing. So you can go for a run. Like, I often go for a run, and, you know, I'm doing 75, 80% my max heart rate. Usually, it's like a 20 minute run that I do that. You know?
Dr Rhonda Patrick So, like, is is intense as you can maintain for 20 minutes. Like, that's what you wanna do. You wanna kinda get that, you get a feeling for that. So if you like runs, because there's a lot of benefits to running. You're out in nature.
Dr Rhonda Patrick Well, I guess some people do it on treadmill. I'm not so big on treadmills. Like, I I'll do them, like, when I go to a gym or something, traveling, but I like running out in nature. I think there's it's just there's lots of benefits to doing that. Some people like to get on their bike and cycle.
Dr Rhonda Patrick So, like, you can just get on your bike and do a 20 to 30 minute, 70 5, 80% max heart rate cycle. Right?
n/a So what we're aiming for here is 75 to 80% max heart rate for around about 20 minute exposure?
Dr Rhonda Patrick You can, or you can do you could do, like, a high intensity interval training. So, so high intensity interval training would be you're gonna you're gonna go more than 80 5 80%. Right? You might go you're gonna do, like, more of, like, a submaximal, perhaps, perhaps even a maximal interval. So you can go up to 90, 95 percent max heart rate.
Dr Rhonda Patrick So that would be I mean, obviously, you can only maintain that for, like, so long. Right? Some people might be 30 second pushes.
n/a Like a tabata style thing pass.
Dr Rhonda Patrick I do a lot of tabatas as well. Oftentimes, I like to do something every day, most days of the week. And it's funny. I kind of adopted this this routine when I was I was kind of trying to do a little bit like Joe Rogan sober October, but it was, like, everyday October. I was trying to work out every day, and I noticed I was like, I could do this.
Dr Rhonda Patrick I'm doing it for, like, 1 month. And I don't I wasn't going as hard as, like, the those guys doing the Sober October where they were, like, competition. It was like they were just
n/a Air biking the solar.
Dr Rhonda Patrick If you do something every do something every day. So sometimes I'll do, like, a 10 minute Tabata where I get on there and I just go hard for 10 minutes. It's 20 you know, it's most of the time, I'll do a 45 second on, 15 second off, so it's a 3 to 1 ratio. I really like that 1, but sometimes I'll do 20 second on, 10, 10 second off. So it's like, I do both.
Dr Rhonda Patrick But, like, even just 10 minutes, again, I time it around, like like, I got I'm gonna go do work. I'm gonna I wanna feel motivated. I wanna feel better. I wanna be more focused and on my game, and I just get on there for the bike for 10 minutes and do it.
n/a We'll get back to talking to Rhonda in 1 minute. But first, I need to tell you about ketone I q. 60% of Tour de France riders use ketone I q to help them with their energy and mental clarity. And that's why I use it as my pre workout. I don't wanna have caffeine upon waking, but I still wanna have energy to make sure that I have a good session, which is why I use this.
n/a Gives me really clean energy. There's no jitters. There's no crash afterward, and it massively helps with mental clarity. Ketones are the brain and body's preferred fuel source, but getting into a state of kurtosis is hard. You often have to fast for a long time or restrict carb intake or exercise your glycogen stores away, but that can take days.
n/a Ketone IQ delivers ketones to your bloodstream within minutes. It has no sugar, no caffeine, and 100 of 5 star reviews. Best of all, they've got a 60 day money back guarantee. So you can buy it and try it for 59 days. And if you do not like it, they'll give you your money back.
n/a Right now, you can get a 30% discount off your first subscription order by going to the link in the description below or heading to hvmn.com/ modernwisdom. That's hvmn.com/modernwisdom. Thank you very much for tuning in. If you enjoyed that clip with Rhonda, you will love the full length 3 hour long podcast, which you can watch right here. Go on.
n/a Tap it.