Just a Little Movement Has Powerful Effects
A new study published in JAMA Oncology showed that just a few minutes of “vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity” (VILPA, in the jargon) was associated with a 17 to 18 percent decrease in cancer risk, based on a prospective cohort study of over 22,000 non-exercising adults from UK Biobank, a massive-scale long-term research resource.
VILPA has been considered a way to introduce more exercise to the least physically active people. It includes sporadic activities like ascending stairs or power walking, that take only a couple of minutes. VILPA is promising because it’s attainable, and does not come with the financial or time-related costs of a gym membership or personal trainer. (The majority of people over the age of 40 do not engage in vigorous exercise or sports.)
A 2022 study published in Nature found that around four minutes of VILPA led to a 26 to 30 percent reduction in all-cause mortality. And these most recent findings indicate that VILPA “may be a promising intervention for cancer prevention among individuals unable or unmotivated to exercise in leisure time,” the authors write.
One way to fit in some VILPA-like movement is an exercise snack—sneaking bouts of activity into our commute, grocery shopping, or lunch break—as GQ wellness columnist Joe Holder introduced in 2019. You can sneak this type of movement into your day with much more ease than hitting the gym for an hour-long session. It only takes a few minutes, but it may pay dividends later on.
Alternatively, if you want to feel more regimented about your daily activities, you can call “trying to carry all the grocery bags in one trip” a component of your VILPA protocol.
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Ashwin Rodrigues is a freelance writer. He often covers health, fitness, and things you might've heard on a podcast. He previously worked at Morning Brew as a business features reporter. Even more previous than that, he was a staff writer on the culture team at VICE. His byline can also... Read moreXRelated Stories for GQWorking OutHealth