DT Study Says Soccer Is Better Than Jogging

 
AP Photo WCTIA115
By MARIA CHENG=
AP Medical Writer=
   LONDON (AP) _ There's a new slogan for weight-watchers: Burn it
like Beckham. A friendly game of soccer, a new study has found,
works off more fat and builds up more muscle than jogging.
   Danish scientists, who conducted their research on 37 men, also
found the soccer players felt less tired after exercising than the
joggers because they were having more fun.
   ``This is good news for men who prefer to play football with
their mates,'' said Dr. Gary O'Donovan, a sports medicine expert at
the University of Exeter who was not connected to the study.
   To measure how hard the men were working out, the researchers
strapped heart monitors to their chests and compared blood samples
and muscle tissue from before and after matches and jogging
sessions.
   The researchers selected men with similar health profiles aged
31 to 33 and split them into groups of soccer players, joggers, and
couch potatoes _ who not surprisingly ended the three month-long
study in the worst shape.
   Each period of exercise lasted about one hour and took place
three times a week. After 12 weeks, researchers found that the body
fat percentage in the soccer players dropped by 3.7 percent,
compared to about 2 percent for the joggers.
   The soccer players also increased their muscle mass by almost 2
kilograms (4.5 pounds), whereas the joggers didn't have any
significant change. Those who did no exercise registered little
change in body fat and muscle mass.
   ``Even though the football (soccer) players were untrained,
there were periods in the game that were so intense that their
cardiovascular was maximally taxed, just like professional football
(soccer) players,'' said Dr. Peter Krustrup, head of Copenhagen
University's department of exercise and sport sciences, who led the
study.
   The soccer players and the joggers had the same average heart
rate, but the soccer players got a better workout because of
intense bursts of activity.
   Krustrup and his colleagues found there were periods during
soccer matches when the players' hearts were pumping at 90 percent
their full capacity. But the joggers' hearts were never pushed as
hard.
   ``The argument as to whether or not vigorous activity is better
than moderate activity is over,'' O'Donovan said.
   He warned, however, that sedentary people shouldn't jump-start
their bodies with a dose of intense exercise but rather ease into
their fitness regime with some moderate activity.
   Unlike the soccer players, the joggers consistently thought
their runs were exhausting.
   ``The soccer players were having more fun, so they were more
focused on scoring goals and helping the team, rather than the
feeling of strain and muscle pain,'' Krustrup said.
   Health officials were unsure how much impact the study results
might have on the wider population.
   Nick Cavill, a research associate at the British Heart
Foundation at Oxford University, said it's hard enough convincing
people to exercise moderately, let alone engage in a high-intensity
sport like soccer.
   ``There might be enormous benefits to telling people to play
football twice a week,'' he said. ``But if they're not going to do
it, then that message may be useless.''