December 16, 2013

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online

Scientists writing in The Journal of Physiology say that exercise lessens many of the harmful physiological effects that take place after Christmas binge eating.

Previous studies have shown that even a few days of eating more calories than you burn can cause detrimental health impacts, making the holidays a tough time for the tummy. However, this new study counters this thought, showing that a daily bout of exercise generates vast physiological benefits even when consuming thousands of calories more than you burn.

This new research shows that the picture is more sophisticated than energy alone: exercise has positive effects even when we are actively storing energy and gaining weight, James Betts, one of the researchers from The University of Bath, said in a statement.

The team found that after just one week of overeating, people being monitored for the study showed poor blood sugar control and their fat cells were expressing genes that lead to unhealthy metabolic changes and disputed nutritional balance. However, these negative effects due to these short bursts of binge eating were markedly less for those who were exercising.

During the study, 26 healthy young men were asked to be generally inactive in their daily activities. Half of the men were asked to exercise daily on a treadmill for 45 minutes, and everyone involved in the study was asked to overeat. The non-exercising group increased their caloric intake by 50 percent, while the exercising group increased it by 75 percent.

Our research demonstrates that a short period of overconsumption and reduced physical activity leads to very profound negative changes in a variety of physiological systems but that a daily bout of exercise stops most of these negative changes from taking place, Jean-Philippe Walhin, a researcher on the study, said in a statement.

Dr Dylan Thompson, senior author on the paper, talked about how one of the features from the teams study was critical.

A critical feature of our experiment is that we matched the energy surplus between groups so the exercise group consumed even more energy and were still better off at the end of the week, Thompson said.

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Exercise Can Counter That Holiday Binge Eating