![]() "Sitting for an extended period of time causes your body to shut down at the metabolic level." When your muscles, especially certain leg muscles, are immobile, your circulation slows. "Your body is designed to move," Hamilton says. If they aren't careful, she says, active couch potatoes face the same health risks as their completely inactive counterparts. And that would make you an "active couch potato"-a term coined by Australian researcher Genevieve Healy, Ph.D., of the University of Queensland to describe exercisers who sit most of their day. Spuds on the Run Unless you have a job that keeps you moving, most of your nonrunning time is likely spent sitting. But experts say most people simply aren't running or walking or even just standing enough to counteract all the harm that can result from sitting eight or nine or 10 hours a day. Maybe they think they've worked out enough for one day. Research presented at the 2013 annual meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine from Illinois State University reports that people are about 30 percent less active overall on days when they exercise versus days they don't hit the road or the gym. ![]() In fact, regular exercisers may make less of an effort to move outside their designated workout time. "We were very surprised that even the highest level of exercise did not matter squat for reducing the time spent sitting," says study author Marc Hamilton, Ph.D., professor and director of the inactivity physiology department at Pennington Biomedical Research Center. That's more than nine hours a day of sitting, no matter how active they otherwise were. In a 2012 study published in the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, researchers reported that people spent an average of 64 hours a week sitting, 28 hours standing, and 11 hours milling about (nonexercise walking), whether or not they exercised the recommended 150 minutes a week. So is sitting too much." Unfortunately, outside of regularly scheduled exercise sessions, active people sit just as much as their couch-potato peers. Smoking is bad for you even if you get lots of exercise. ![]() "Now a consistent body of emerging research suggests it is entirely possible to meet current physical activity guidelines while still being incredibly sedentary, and that sitting increases your risk of death and disease, even if you are getting plenty of physical activity. student and certified exercise physiologist at the Healthy Active Living and Obesity Research Group at Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario. "Up until very recently, if you exercised for 60 minutes or more a day, you were considered physically active, case closed," says Travis Saunders, a Ph.D. A growing body of research shows that people who spend many hours of the day glued to a seat die at an earlier age than those who sit less-even if those sitters exercise. You needn't worry about the harms of sedentary living because you're active, right? Well, not so fast. ![]() All the time we spend parked behind a steering wheel, slumped over a keyboard, or kicked back in front of the tube is linked to increased risks of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and even depression-to the point where experts have labeled this modern-day health epidemic the "sitting disease." But wait, you're a runner. You've no doubt heard the news by now: A car-commuting, desk-bound, TV-watching lifestyle can be harmful to your health. ![]()
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