If you love food but hate exercise, you’re in luck.
Eating just a few servings of fruits and vegetables a day is equivalent to taking thousands of steps for your physical fitness.
More than 2,000 participants had to run on a treadmill while their oxygen levels were measured by Harvard researchers.
People who stuck to a Mediterranean diet, consisting of lots of fruits, vegetables and whole grains, had the same fitness level as people who took about 4,000 steps a day in the researchers’ previous studies.
Fruits and vegetables are high in fiber, which acts as a natural fat burner that can boost your metabolism. They are also high in antioxidants that prevent inflammation and other health problems.
Higher scores in the food questionnaires indicated a better quality diet with an emphasis on vegetables, fruits, whole grains, nuts, legumes, fish and healthy fats and less red meat and alcohol
Lead author of the study Dr. Michael Mi, of Harvard’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said: ‘This study provides some of the strongest and most rigorous data to date to support the link that better diets can lead to better fitness.
‘The improvement in fitness that we observed in participants with a better diet was comparable to the effect of taking 4,000 extra steps every day.’
Healthy foods are known to reduce the risk of heart disease and cancer – two of America’s leading causes of death.
There are differences in fitness among people who do the same amount of exercise – suggesting even more factors are involved.
The study of 2,380 middle-aged American men and women identified diet as a key factor.
Participants completed a food frequency questionnaire to rate consumption of 126 items over the past year, ranging from never or less than once a month to six or more servings per day.
The information was used to assess diet quality using the Alternative Healthy Eating Index (AHEI; 0 to 110) and Mediterranean-Style Diet Score (MDS; 0 to 25), both of which are related to the health of the heart.
Higher scores indicated a better quality diet emphasizing vegetables, fruits, whole grains, nuts, legumes, fish, and healthy fats and limiting red meat and alcohol.
Dr Mi said: ‘In middle-aged adults, healthy diets were strongly and favorably associated with fitness, even after accounting for habitual activity levels.
“The relationship was similar in women and men, and more pronounced in those under age 54 compared to older adults.”
Further analysis identified 24 metabolites — substances produced during digestion and released into the blood during exercise — associated with poor or beneficial diet and fitness.
Dr Mi said: “Our metabolite data suggests that healthy eating is associated with better metabolic health, which could be one possible way it leads to better fitness and ability to exercise.”
The US team took into account age, gender, total daily energy intake, BMI (body mass index), smoking status, cholesterol level, blood pressure, diabetes and routine physical activity.
The mean AHEI and MDS were 66.7 and 12.4, respectively. Compared to the mean score, an increase of 13 points on the AHEI and 4.7 on the MDS was associated with a 5.2 percent and 4.5 percent increase in “peak VO2” – the maximum amount of oxygen your body can take in during exercise, respectively. can use.
Dr. Mi added: ‘This was an observational study and we cannot conclude that eating well leads to better fitness, or rule out the possibility of an inverse relationship, ie that fit individuals choose to eat healthily.
“There are already many compelling health reasons for consuming a high-quality diet, and we’ll give one more with the association with fitness. A Mediterranean diet with fresh, unprocessed foods and minimal processed foods, red meat, and alcohol is a great place to start.”
The research has been published in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology.