Undebatable
Few aspects of health and performance are beyond debate, but there are some that are close
There are very few agreements in the health and performance world, especially on the internet. Perhaps this is a result of marketing strategies, perhaps corporate interest or perhaps it is just that the body is a complex system. That said, there are a few areas of the space with as close to universal agreement as we can get.
Sleep
Considered the ultimate performance enhancer, not to mention essential for health, sleep certainly fits the bill here. Nobody thinks we should be skipping sleep.
There’s extensive research on sleep, and sleep deprivation when it comes to performance. There’s a little bit of nuance here, in that study type and measurement tools can impact things, but it looks like cognitive performance and endurance performance are more impacted by poor sleep. Similarly, a single night of poor sleep may not be so significant, but again - nobody’s arguing to sleep less (but don’t fall victim to the nocebo effect after a single bad night’s sleep either).
When it comes to health, sleep may have some of the strongest evidence in its favour of any intervention. The impacts of poor sleep on mental health, metabolic health and even things like pain are significant. I won’t labour the point, but sleep is important.
Sleep is one of those simple yet not always easy, things but before trying the latest gadget or fad, make sure you address the big rocks first.
Phone Use
Most folks would probably agree, that they use their phone too much or at least would like to use it less. Interestingly, the literature tends to support this too. Specifically, in and around training and exercise. That’s right, scrolling during your breaks between sets is hurting your gainz bro.
The very likely situation is that social media (what else are we doing on our phone around exercise) is inducing a level of mental fatigue, which impairs subsequent endurance performance, rating of perceived exertion and strength (if not using low repetitions - though perhaps this would hold for low reps, I just haven’t seen this in the literature).
Interestingly, there is some research showing impaired decision making in skill sports when social media is used before training sessions. This could reflect the impact of fatigue itself or the impact of fatigue on learning (there’s a subtle difference) but regardless, it’s probably not ideal.
There are certainly potential health issues associated with phones, that said they have the potential for improving health significantly (some of the best predictors of health and longevity are education level and socioeconomic status - and like it or not, phones can help with these). To this end, I’d recommend mindful and intentional use, so listen to your music in a workout, but also use ‘do not disturb’ mode. I’d also caution against use later at night given the research linking late night smart phone use to sleep impairment and mental health issues. So, be mindful of when you’re using your phone and how much, especially with respect to social media.
Creatine
The momentum for creatine continues to pick up with enormous year on year growth in sales (increasing 120% 2022 and 114% in 2023). Long term readers would remember my article on the use of creatine, and whilst it was mostly focussed on health, performance benefits are at creatine’s origin. Specifically speed and power related benefits. But there’s a non-insignificant number of folks advocating that it could help endurance athletes too, specifically with faster finishes to events, or indeed glycogen resynthesis during recovery.
Walking
Walking is one of the healthiest things you can do, with increasing step counts showing a dose response reduction in all cause mortality, at least up to around 12,000 steps, depending on the research you are looking at.
There’s little argument to be walking less, or being less generally physically active. Beyond the health benefits it’s been shown to improve performance with respect to creativity too. As I touched on the article linked below, some of the benefits of walking are probably related to the removal of sedentary behaviour which will very much impair health and performance.
For more on walking, why it may be healthy and why it may not be exercise see my article here.
Social Support/Connection
The role of social support and connection is under-discussed in a world where it isn’t for sale. That said, the role of community and building a community is increasing becoming apparent in the behaviour of brands, creators and the likes. As is the role of social interaction intersecting with exercise (hello run clubs).
Most people would agree experientially, and research would support this, that exercising (or even training, ie more goal oriented and performance focussed) is easier, and more enjoyable with someone else or in a group. An interesting study using medical students showed “participation in regular group fitness classes led to a statistically significant decrease in perceived stress and an increase in physical, mental, and emotional QOL compared with exercising regularly on one's own or not engaging in regular exercise.” (*QOL = quality of life)
Similarly, many would agree their output is higher when in a group, especially if the group is better than them. This is so common, it even has a name (the Kohler Effect). This effect seems to hold true in virtual situation (hello Zwift). *I wonder how long until we see this manipulated (hopefully for a net positive - though I do think the individual would feel taken advantage of).
When it comes to health specifically, there looks to be greater efficacy of behaviour change efforts (such as weight loss) when done in a groups (I can see gym staff and personal trainers incurring mild concussions from the vigour with which they are nodding). Not to mention social support driving health itself, in what’s like a mixture of logistics (people to help you when unwell) as well as things like feeling connected and its role in mental health.
When it comes to implementing interventions and even evaluating them, I use multiple lenses (covered here) beyond pure efficacy. Some of these including calculus around costs (financial as well as opportunity costs) as I believe these add weight (or at least remove barriers) to whether something should be adopted. Similarly, in this article, going beyond a ‘burden of proof’'/”weight of the evidence” type of situation and more towards a “lack of argument” one should too lend weight to the argument in favour of these. I say all this to say, I think almost everyone, in almost every situation would benefit form the above behaviours (or cutting them down in the case of phone /social media use). So go forth and be healthy and perform.
References
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