We all know that experts say the recommended amount of exercise is 1 hour but what if you do, let’s say jumping jacks, for an hour then wouldn’t the recommended amount of exercise time needs to differ from only an hour. Like any good gym teacher would say, every exercise takes a different amount of energy. If you eat a taco and jog for a kilometer then you might still be full, but if you run as fast as possible for a kilometer you might be hungry because it took a lot of energy to sprint. In this article I will tell you about which sports take the most energy and which take less as well as explain if the 1 hour rule is actually correct.

Which sports take the most energy?

Sports that take more energy tend to be ones that include using your entire body and  require blood pumping all around your body. Sports like swimming in which you use your legs, arms and your core to go through the water. Other sports, like football, mostly use your feet and your legs while on very rare occasions actually use much arm work unless you are running which takes some arm work. If you do a sport, like swimming, it takes a lot of energy while if you do ping pong or table soccer, you mostly stand around and do a lot of arm work. Therefore the more body parts used in the sport the more energy it will take.

Which sports should I do if I want to get the most exercise?

As I have already established, different sports that use more of the body take more energy and don’t need as much workout time as if you are playing a game like volleyball which only uses your arms. If you want to maximize the amount of time you want to  exercise, most health scientists would say 1 hour a day keeps the doctor away, but this rule does not include games like hopscotch but more of games like tag or soccer. If you want to get the most exercise out of something, you would probably aim towards sports such as handball swimming or water volleyball as these sports  mix swimming and throwing or in handball’s case running and throwing. These sports would have a recommendation of 45 minutes while soccer is about 1 hour and 30 minutes.

So is the 1 hour rule really correct?

Not exactly. Generally the 1 hour rule is only a rough estimation, but if you want an exact amount of time that you should spend outside, I would say as long as possible or simply devote half of the time you usually spend staring at a screen for going outside for fun.  However,  if you do these things for the exercise,  1 hour and 30 minutes should be enough to stay healthy and remember don’t  devote all time outside as it is still important to take a rest too.

Ways to stay healthy.

At our school we are part of the sports academy and have many after school activities such as soccer, basketball and more. There are even more sports that are after school which are in clubs. It is very important to get exercise and these clubs are a great way to do this and make friends from other grades. You can also follow certain food habits such as only eating candy on Saturdays or eating more veggies. These are great ways for kids to get healthy in fun ways. 

Thanks to the SIS PHE teachers for helping with this information.