WingNews logo WingNews
top | item 45871246

(no title)

trjordan | 3 months ago

Between this and http://myticker.com (posted recently), I want to share a theory of mine:

1) the internet is mostly made up of spaces where the median opinion is vanishingly rare among actual humans.

2) the median internet opinion is that of a person who is deep into the topic they're writing about.

The net result is that for most topics, you will feel moderate to severe anxiety about being "behind" about what you shuld be doing.

I'm 40, and I'm active. I ran a half marathon last weekend. I spent 5 hours climbing with my kids this weekend. My reaction to these articles, emotionally, was "I'm probably going to die of heart disease," because my cholesterol is a bit high and my BMI is 30. When I was biking 90 miles a week, my VO2 max was "sub-standard."

Let's assume this information is true. That's OK. It's all dialed up to 11, and you don't have to do anything about it right now.

discuss

order

wotmatetherow|3 months ago

Obesity is an independent risk factor, even if otherwise active/healthy. It's worth getting under control for lifespan and healthspan.

rootusrootus|3 months ago

Across the population as a whole, BMI 30 is basically negligible increase in all-cause mortality. For someone otherwise reasonably active I wouldn't stress about the number. Ideal is somewhere around 27.

trjordan|3 months ago

Sure. I lost 20lbs in the last 12 months. I agree it’s worth working on, but not that it’s worth stressing about.

jaggederest|3 months ago

Don't feel bad about your VO2 max, the baseline and ceiling are largely genetic. Most people can only bump VO2 max by about 10-15% even with absurd training regimens. Same goes with many of the markers people track - you can control them to an extent, but some people just have high blood pressure or poor lipid profiles and thus need intervention.

port11|3 months ago

Thanks for saying that. Even when I ran every day — with the occasional VO2max sprint day —, my Apple Watch never placed me anywhere but Below Average for VO2max. It was disheartening. Some of these metrics actually put you off training.

trjordan|3 months ago

Appreciate it. The Apple-Watch-measured version came up to 44 since I’ve started running. I’ve been pleased.

None of my markers are high enough to trigger a doctor to care.