Table of contents for Shape The Science of Exercise/Fitness in Shape

Got a ball? Then you’ve got an instant workout—and a recovery tool, too. Head to the yard, park, or beach to mix it up and engage in some powerful full-body conditioning. ENERGIZE YOUR YOGA “Using a ball with your flow can be a great energy boost,” says Tara Stiles, the New York City–based founder of Strala Yoga and author of Clean Mind, Clean Body. One yoga pose that a ball toss can perk up is the high lunge, lift, and slide. Start by holding a yoga or exercise ball close to your center as you come into a high lunge (rear leg straight). Inhale as you lift your hips up, and toss the ball overhead. Catch the ball as you exhale and sink down, and bring the ball back…

Middle of the road isn’t the goal most of us strive for. It feels bougie and safe. But if you don’t think your body is perfect—and really, who does?—the middle is a surprisingly healthy place to be. Experts call this resting spot “body neutrality.” If you think of body image as a continuum, body neutrality lies between two poles—hating how you look and feeling in love with your body 24/7. Read on to find out how body neutrality can change your life—and the best ways to shut off that critical voice we all sometimes hear when we look in the mirror. SO WHAT IS IT, ANYWAY? Body neutrality can mean different things. But to The Body Joyful author Anne Poirier, who popularized the term, body neutrality emphasizes our body’s…

Morning Fuel • Eat Happy • Metabolism News Where were you before you knew smoothies existed? These meals in a cup sometimes get a bad rap for their high sugar content and weak macros, but when blended right, a smoothie can work for any health goal you have. “Blending is one of the quickest, easiest ways to prep healthy foods, especially fresh fruits and veggies,” says Harley Pasternak, trainer, nutrition expert, and author of The Body Reset Diet. The pages that follow feature a variety of recipes for smoothies and other protein shakes, plus details on how these drinks can kick-start your metabolism and keep it fired up for hours. INGREDIENT AND PREP HOW-TO You generally need four things to create tasty, healthy smoothies: a liquid base, lean protein,…

Home Gym • Cardio 2.0 • Play Days You’ve probably noticed that gaining strength can help you feel better mentally and physically. But strengthening certain muscle groups (think: your glutes) can also improve your performance in the gym and make everyday tasks in your life easier. Functionally, muscles protect your bones, organs, and tissues—and even help you heal quickly. Muscles can be an important factor in maintaining your weight, too, says Kathryn Sansone, a certified fitness trainer in Missouri. “Muscle requires more energy and therefore burns more calories than fat. The more muscle mass you have, the faster your metabolism is.” More muscle means burning more calories at rest, plus being able to work harder during your workouts. Double win! All these perks have you wondering how to build…

The Exercise High • Sleep Yoga • Breath Work If you’re among the 50 percent of people in the U.S. who exercise regularly, you’re already familiar with the calming yet exhilarating effect of physical activity—the way you can begin a workout feeling tired and cranky, and 30 minutes later you’re grinning loopily and high-fiving random strangers. Now, a spate of recent research has confirmed what everyone from avid gardeners to ultra-runners knows: Moving your body alters your mind. Studies have shown that movement can reduce hostility, depression, anger, and anxiety—even in people who are mentally healthy. It can buoy happiness, self-esteem, energy, and life satisfaction. It may even cause minuscule genetic changes, which protect you from developing depression. “Exercise bolsters mood on a scale that’s similar to the effects…

In Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, a character is asked how he went bankrupt. “Two ways,” he replies. “Gradually, then suddenly.” Those painfully precise words also describe how many of us fall out of the habit of regular exercise. One minute you are a college athlete squeezing in two-a-days between classes or a Peloton fanatic doing a post-work sweat session five times a week, and the next minute you’re feeling too drained to get in more than a couple of workouts a month (and definitely not when The Bachelor is on). “There are many reasons that active people fall out of the exercise habit,” says Josh Bonhotal, former assistant strength and conditioning coach for the Chicago Bulls and current performance VP for the workout platform Future. “Our lives get…

What you eat after rolling out of bed has the power to banish cravings, turbocharge energy, and keep your weight in check. That small cup of yogurt can impact your overall health in huge ways: A study in the journal Circulation found that those who usually skip breakfast are 27 percent more likely to suffer from coronary heart disease compared with their regularly breakfasting peers. “Skipping breakfast makes you more likely to overindulge at your next meal or eat mid-morning snacks that are high in calories and sugar to ward off hunger until lunch,” says Amari Thomsen, R.D., owner of Eat Chic Chicago. And if the a.m. is your time to exercise, you especially need to eat breakfast beforehand. When you wake up, blood sugar levels and carb stores are…

Click here for the best dumbbells at every budget and fitness level. Already have a gym or fitness studio membership? Nice—but why limit yourself? Set up a properly stocked home gym, too: It can be an asset in reaching your fitness goals, mainly because of the flexibility that comes with it. “In the time it takes you to travel to the gym, you can be finished with your workout at home,” says Tom Holland, an exercise physiologist and author of The Micro-Workout Plan: Get the Body You Want Without the Gym in 15 Minutes or Less a Day. “Exercising at home also gives you the freedom to do it whenever you have spare time.” Don’t have time to devote a dedicated hour to training? No problem. Numerous studies have revealed the benefits…

If you’re lounging as you read this, the next sentence may scare you sit-less. “Sitting is the new smoking—it’s just as insidious,” says Marc Hamilton, Ph.D., director of the Texas Obesity Research Center, an affiliate of the University of Houston. Hamilton is making a point about how so many Americans are letting their leg muscles—and therefore their bodies—turn to mush. “You’ve seen the flatline on an EKG when all the doctors rush in? That’s what’s happening to your leg muscles when you’re sitting.” As he speaks, I flash back to a job I had at a digital agency. I showed up on my first day of work in the New York City office to find half the staff standing at their computers. Because they didn’t have chairs. The office…

For many people, sleep (and the process of getting to that point) is a delicate dance: no coffee pick-me-ups after 3 p.m., AC and fan on full blast, cooling eye mask, weighted blanket, and a white noise machine piping whale calls from the corner of the room. Sometimes, though, no matter how much you fine-tune your falling-asleep routine, your slumber still suffers. A 2021 study published in The Lancet Neurology reported that roughly two out of every three Americans were sleeping more poorly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Much of the reason for lackluster snooze? You guessed it: boatloads of stress. Another 2021 report, published in Canadian Psychology, noted that stress was one of the primary causes of inadequate, interrupted sleep. Granted, it can be difficult to rid…

What do a 10K run, a few reps on the squat rack, and a warrior I have in common? They all rely on good breathing. While we often take breathing for granted, it assumes new significance when you’re working out. No matter your preferred exercise—running, strength training, yoga, or all of the above—the way you breathe aids everything from endurance level to muscle engagement. Understanding the right breathing techniques will help you make the most of this close connection—and get results to match. BREATHING 101 Let’s start with the basics. “The key thing underpinning proper breathing is getting sufficient air into and out of the lungs,” says Mitch Lomax, Ph.D., a senior lecturer at England’s University of Portsmouth who studies breathing and exercise. “The breathing muscles are used to…

With a coffee shop on nearly every street (seriously, there are 35,000 in the U.S.), it’s clear people love their coffee. But does it love them back? Considering there’s a good chance you drink this beverage every day (64 percent of American adults do), it’s worth wondering: Is coffee healthy or not? We got some answers from dietitians, who share the buzz about coffee’s health benefits and downsides, plus coffee nutrition facts you need to know so you can sip wisely. COFFEE, DEFINED The beans used to brew coffee are roasted seeds from coffee cherries, the fruit that grows in coffee trees, according to the National Coffee Association. A typical coffee tree annually grows about 10 pounds of coffee cherries, which yields 2 pounds of beans that are ready…

We imagine our metabolism as a fire, flaming up when we exercise to torch calories. But that’s just a very small fraction of what it does, according to Herman Pontzer, Ph.D., an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University, the author of Burn: The Misunderstood Science of Metabolism, and the principal investigator for a game-changing new study on metabolism. “Metabolism is the work your cells do every minute of every day,” says Pontzer. “You’ve got 37 million of them, and each cell is like a little factory churning out everything needed to keep your body functioning.” Some calories do get burned during exercise, but most of what you eat is used to fuel the continuous work your cells do. The new research, published in Science by Pontzer and more than 80…