Can You Outrun a Bad Diet?

While studying for my current university nutrition course, I came across an interesting lecture titled “Can you outrun a bad diet?”

At first, I would have said no way! Healthy eating increases your energy levels, strengthens your body, and helps you maintain a healthy body composition.

After watching Glen Gaesser’s presentation on this topic, I am blown away over the data. Glaesser has a PhD and is a professor at Arizona State University. Gaesser’s research focuses on the effects of exercise and diet on cardiovascular fitness and health.

First, it’s essential to clarify what we are outrunning from. Metabolic syndromes: type 2 diabetes, certain cancers, cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, and poor lipid profiles.

What is considered a bad diet? The typical Western dietary pattern of processed meats, fried foods, high fat dairy, prepackaged foods, sugar sweetened drinks and foods, and refined grains. Studies have shown an associated increased risk of chronic diseases and all cause mortality when regularly eating an unhealthy diet. However, Dr. Gaesser brings up an interesting point, that most studies do not investigate the participant’s physical fitness level.

There are few studies that examine the connection between diet and exercise. The results are surprising! I have listed two below:

A rather large (over 1000 participants ages 55-74) randomized control trial (the BEST type of study) from 2010 discovered that the lowest prevalence of metabolic syndromes were from individuals with the highest VO2max (Kouki et al., 2012). VO2max is the standard measure of someone’s cardiovascular health. It measures how much oxygen your body uses while exercising. The more oxygen you inhale, the more energy your body can use. Higher VO2max indicates better physical fitness. You increase your VO2max through cardiovascular physical activities, like running, cycling, and HIIT training.

In the study, of course those who ate healthy and worked out had the best health, but those participants who ate the typical Western diet and consistently did high intensity exercise seemed to migrate the ill effects of the bad diet (Kouki et al., 2012). An interesting note was those who ate a healthy diet but didn’t exercise had a much higher incidence of having metabolic syndrome than those who exercised regularly but ate a poor diet (Kouki et al., 2012).

(Kouki et al., 2012)

A cohort study of over 13,000 participants discovered the same thing. This next study wanted to determine the relationship between dietary patterns with mortality from all-cause and cardiovascular disease with the positive effects of physical fitness (Héroux et al., 2010). They discovered that with those who had high cardiovascular fitness levels, their diet was relatively unimportant regarding the mortality risk from metabolic syndromes. Physical fitness was the main factor offsetting that risk, not a healthy diet (Héroux et al., 2010).

(Héroux et al., 2010)

This is so amazing! This means that physical activity and exercise are so POWERFUL for you and your health. Move your body in all the ways you love to!

150 to 300 minutes of cardiovascular exercise weekly: long nature hikes, group cycling classes, running, swimming, HIIT training like during PLS’s Pilates+Cardio classes.

Add your strengthening activities 2-3x weekly to keep your body strong and balanced, pick your fave: traditional Pilates, weight training at the gym, barre at your local studio, etc.

Just to note: the two studies listed above are showing how exercise is most important for metabolic markers for health. If you are hoping to also increase your energy (think vitamins and minerals to initiate your body’s metabolic processes), maintain important lean muscle mass (getting enough protein), and have a preferred body composition (by eating a certain amount of calories for energy in, energy out), then definitely a healthy diet of fruits and vegetables, lean protein sources, whole grains are an important part of the plan.

Resources

Kouki, R., Schwab, U., Lakka, T. A., Hassinen, M., Savonen, K., Komulainen, P., Krachler, B., & Rauramaa, R. (2012). Diet, fitness and metabolic syndrome – The DR’s EXTRA Study. Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Diseases, 22(7), 553–560. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.numecd.2010.10.008

Héroux, M., Janssen, I., Lam, M., Lee, D., Hebert, J. R., Sui, X., & Blair, S. N. (2010). Dietary patterns and the risk of mortality: Impact of cardiorespiratory fitness. International Journal of Epidemiology, 39(1), 197–209. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyp191

Dr Glenn Glaesser: https://search.asu.edu/profile/1263739