| How to Use Exercise to Improve Your Cholesterol Profile
If your “bad” LDL cholesterol or triglyceride levels are high, or your “good” HDL cholesterol level is low, step on up! And keep stepping. Do it enough and you might reduce your total cholesterol by 10 to 20 percent in just three to four months. And that’s good for your heart. “Every time you reduce your cholesterol level by 1 percent, you reduce your risk of heart disease by 2 percent,” says Neal Barnard, M.D., president of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Here’s what works:
The best kind of exercise:
There is none; the best choice is whatever you will keep doing. Walking, though, is the most popular and, for many people, may be more easily sustainable than more vigorous types of exercise. In a study at the Cooper Institute in Dallas, women who walked three miles five days a week for 24 weeks significantly increased their HDL. HDL is a little lipid package that transports the heart-damaging LDL out of the body. Walking may also help lower LDL and triglyceride levels. (Triglycerides are fats that circulate in the blood and are a powerful indicator of heart disease risk.) One study from the University of Maryland found that even without changes in diet or body fat, 24 weeks of consistent aerobic exercise significantly lowered LDL and triglyceride levels in previously sedentary 50- to 75-year-old people. If you do lose weight from exercising, you may lower LDL and triglyceride levels even more. You can, of course, jog or choose to do some other, more intense, form of exercise. But studies show that increasing exercise intensity might not be necessary for improving cholesterol. What seems to do the trick is moderate activity that you do frequently and can sustain for a long duration—at least 40 minutes.
The burn rate:
To achieve cholesterol benefits, exercise for at least three to four hours a week and burn up at least 1,500 calories in the process.
The routine:
According to Ralph L. La Forge, M.Sc., managing director of Duke University’s lipid disorder physician education program, the best approach is to start out slowly and build your endurance. Here’s a sample program:
Start with walking 20 minutes per day, four days a week. Over the next six to eight weeks, increase to an hour a day, six to seven days a week. If you’re walking, chose a route that takes you over hilly (variable) terrain. If you intersperse walking with jogging, flat ground is fine. An alternative? Walk 50 to 60 minutes three days a week, take an aerobics class three days a week, and perhaps enjoy two to three sets of singles tennis on the seventh day.
When you’re battling high cholesterol and working to prevent heart disease, get started with regular moderate physical activity. Why not take a walk right now? | 
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