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Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

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Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#41

Post by mlhpdx »

umvi wrote: post #8

Dr. Bernstein has long argued this and documents it extensively in his book "Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution"[1]. The main reason being that muscles act like natural glucose sinks that drain sugar directly out of the bloodstream, bypassing the liver, so more muscles = more glucose control. I highly recommend the introductory chapter to "Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution" by the way, even for non-diabetics. It's bas…

Have you studied control systems? Adding a second storage mechanism with different dynamics changes control, and may complicate it. Those muscles may increase hypoglycemic events as well as soften spikes.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#42

Post by stanmancan »

bigDinosaur wrote: post #38
stanmancan wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10km/h is very fast for a beginner and likely unsustainable for more than a couple of minutes, I would expect most people to be starting around 5-6km/h if they’re a healthy weight. I think the best piece of advice is START SLOW. way slower than you think. And run for way shorter than you think. Even if your lungs and muscles are fine, if you haven’t ran for a while then your tendons certainly aren’t. You won’t know u…

You expect people to start running at 5-6km/h which is about a fast walking pace? That seems unduly slow?

If you haven’t ran before and are carrying some extra weight then yeah it’s probably a good place to start for your first couple of short runs. Even running slowly puts additional stress on your achilles so it’s a bit of a wake up call to your body. Running slowly for 10 minutes a few times when you’re just getting started isn’t going to hurt anyone and if everything checks out then you can start to up the pace.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#43

Post by bicx »

weird-eye-issue wrote: post #37
gentooflux wrote: post #25

The exercise you like doing and will do beats no exercise at all for blood sugar control

Yeah but sometimes you have to do things you don't particularly like. For example there are lots of people who do nothing but cycling and never do any sort of strength training which is certainly healthier than doing absolutely nothing but they are really missing out by not doing strength training.

You don’t have to exercise at all though. The far greater majority are people who don’t like exercise at all, and won’t do anything. To have a person do at least some exercise of any form is a big win for their health anytime it happens. That’s what we don’t want to discourage.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#44

Post by mlhpdx »

codybontecou wrote: post #11
ventana wrote: post #10

Luckily, we live in the reality where every human who is interested in how their own body, and not the one of some random mouse, deals with blood sugar, can order a relatively inexpensive (for the benefits it provides) device — a continuous glucose monitor — and gather all the data they need to see what helps controlling the sugar level, and what does not. Using a CGM was a truly life changing experience for me, and…

Which CGM did you get? Don't they require a prescription?

No prescription is required, but as the other comments say, you’re unlikely to learn anything significant.

Blood sugar in non-diabetics is boring, rarely moving in any significant way.

One impact could be dispelling misconceptions if you have them. Another could be discovering pre-diabetes.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#45

Post by gtg239a »

mattlondon wrote: post #29
SoftTalker wrote: post #12

Weightlifing is the only exercise that I've ever managed to make a habit. I do powerlifting 3x/week. I've tried running, swimming, cycling, etc. and hated all of it.

Running is quite meditative when you get in to it (at least for me when outside - indoor running on treadmills is soul destroying though I agree). You don't have to go fast or far, but after 10-15-20 mins I find my mind gets into a fairly calm state, even if my legs and lungs are burning. We - as a species - are engineered and built to run. I think there is a lot to be said for it. If anyone is reading this and consi…

Agreed. One way I found back into running was to acknowledge that I could walk for 5k, then try to slowly jog sections of it: walk for 5 mins jog for 15secs and repeat. Then next time raise both durations or reduce the walk or whatever. Now I can run a 5k no problem and all I did was frog boil myself.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#46

Post by Karupan »

bigDinosaur wrote: post #38
stanmancan wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10km/h is very fast for a beginner and likely unsustainable for more than a couple of minutes, I would expect most people to be starting around 5-6km/h if they’re a healthy weight. I think the best piece of advice is START SLOW. way slower than you think. And run for way shorter than you think. Even if your lungs and muscles are fine, if you haven’t ran for a while then your tendons certainly aren’t. You won’t know u…

You expect people to start running at 5-6km/h which is about a fast walking pace? That seems unduly slow?

I’m horribly out of shape and that’s pretty much what I can manage. The question isn’t how fast _should_ I go, but how fast _can_ I go so that I can come back and do it the next day.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#47

Post by weird-eye-issue »

bicx wrote: post #43
weird-eye-issue wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but sometimes you have to do things you don't particularly like. For example there are lots of people who do nothing but cycling and never do any sort of strength training which is certainly healthier than doing absolutely nothing but they are really missing out by not doing strength training.

You don’t have to exercise at all though. The far greater majority are people who don’t like exercise at all, and won’t do anything. To have a person do at least some exercise of any form is a big win for their health anytime it happens. That’s what we don’t want to discourage.

Nobody is actively discouraging that so you are just making up a strawman argument. That said cross training is very important for things like injury prevention. So if you just do something like running and nothing else at some point you are far more likely than not to get injured to the point that you have to completely stop or switch to something lower impact like cycling. And while cycling is great it doesn't have lots of the benefits of something like strength training so things like your bone health could still rapidly deteriorate as you age. So that means something relatively preventable like a fall leading to a broken hip that you never recover from can still happen to you. But yeah just do what you like and make sure you don't do anything you don't like in the moment

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#48

Post by sublinear »

mlhpdx wrote: post #41
umvi wrote: post #8

Dr. Bernstein has long argued this and documents it extensively in his book "Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution"[1]. The main reason being that muscles act like natural glucose sinks that drain sugar directly out of the bloodstream, bypassing the liver, so more muscles = more glucose control. I highly recommend the introductory chapter to "Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution" by the way, even for non-diabetics. It's bas…

Have you studied control systems? Adding a second storage mechanism with different dynamics changes control, and may complicate it. Those muscles may increase hypoglycemic events as well as soften spikes.

As much as we like to think in abstractions, the tail does not wag the dog.

You may intend to lift weights to gain muscle, but the body is doing a lot more than just gaining muscle. It's interesting to see what else happens. That is the point of this discussion.

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#49

Post by sublinear »

weird-eye-issue wrote: post #37
gentooflux wrote: post #25

The exercise you like doing and will do beats no exercise at all for blood sugar control

Yeah but sometimes you have to do things you don't particularly like. For example there are lots of people who do nothing but cycling and never do any sort of strength training which is certainly healthier than doing absolutely nothing but they are really missing out by not doing strength training.

I find it fascinating that people who exercise would want to skip the weights. Strength training makes everything else so much easier, even "doing nothing" (sleep, metabolism, etc.)!

Re: Weightlifting beats running for blood sugar control, researchers find (2025)

#50

Post by karamanolev »

bob1029 wrote: post #24

I used to do weightlifting, but it's hard to keep up daily discipline with potential injury risk. Rest days are mandatory and this is the #1 killer of compliance over time (for me). Rowing is my go-to now. It is low impact so I can do it every day without any exceptions. I've been able to hold onto this discipline for 2 years now. The advantage of rowing is that there isn't really a limit to how much it can suck. You…

You cannot burn 9000 calories per hour. Cycling at 166W for 1 hour burns approx. 600 calories. That's sustainable for a most amateurs. The absolute best riders in the world can optimistically do 450W for 1 hour and then be completely drained. That's 2000 calories and mere mortals are nowhere near that. So a realistic cap if you have great cardio and you're pushing it is 1000 calories.
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