EXERCISE FOR YOUR HEART

Exercise is good for your heart. It helps protect you against heart attack. Regular exercise conditions heart muscle so that the body can perform more without placing excess demand on the heart. Exercise permits heavier work as it improves the efficiency of heart muscle. It's also said that, to provide your heart muscles with oxygen, the main arteries to your heart dilate with increased activity. Also enlarged are smaller blood vessels, promoting 'collateral circulation'.

We know that dilated arteries are less likely to block. And even if they do, collateral circulation keeps your heart functioning normally, averting what might have been a heart attack. Exercise also lowers the level of cholesterol and tricglycerides in blood, reducing your risk of developing coronary artery disease.

Statistical studies confirm that regular, strenuous exercise lowers the risk of heart attack. For example, farmers have a much lower coronary artery disease rate than farm owners. A long-term study in the US has conclusively shown that the more active you are, the less likely you are to suffer a heart attack and even if you do, the risk of the heart attack being fatal is really small.

When you pump your legs during exercise", the muscles squeeze your leg veins. This helps ward off thrombophlebitis and reduces the chance of a blood clot cutting off circulation through an artery.