There May Be More Than One "Best" Workout For Your Arteries
You might have a favorite way to exercise.
Maybe you settle into a steady run, lift weights a few times a week, or feel your best after a hard interval session.
But when it comes to your blood vessels, finding one perfect workout may not be the point.
In a recent analysis of 51 trials1, researchers compared several types of exercise to see how they affected different measures of vascular health. The results suggest that different workouts may have different strengths when it comes to your arteries.
About the study
The analysis included 51 randomized controlled trials with 2,638 adults ages 18 to 65 who had overweight or obesity. Each exercise program lasted at least four weeks, and researchers measured blood vessel health before and after the intervention.
The researchers compared five types of training:
- Steady-state cardio: Continuous exercise such as jogging, cycling, or brisk walking
- Strength training: Exercises designed to build or maintain muscle
- Interval training: Short bursts of harder exercise followed by periods of recovery
- Combined training: Programs that included both cardio and strength training
- Hybrid training: Programs that mixed several types of exercise
Most exercise research compares working out with not exercising at all. This analysis went a step further by comparing different types of exercise with each other to see whether some might be better suited to specific aspects of vascular health.
Each workout had a different strength
The analysis looked at three measures of blood vessel health.
Hybrid training had the biggest improvement in blood vessel responsiveness. This was measured through flow-mediated dilation (FMD), which shows how well blood vessels widen when blood flow increases.
Interval training had the biggest reduction in arterial stiffness. Researchers measured this using pulse wave velocity (PWV). Lower stiffness means arteries can expand and recoil more easily with each heartbeat.
Steady cardio and combined training had the biggest reductions in artery-wall thickness. This was measured using carotid intima-media thickness (CIMT), which looks at the thickness of the walls of an artery in the neck. It can provide a picture of longer-term structural changes in the arteries.
So while every exercise type improved vascular health compared with no exercise, the strongest results varied depending on what researchers measured.
Why variety may matter for your arteries
Different workouts put different demands on your cardiovascular system.
Intervals repeatedly push your heart and blood vessels to respond to changes in intensity. Longer cardio sessions keep blood flowing at an elevated rate for more time, while strength training creates a different physical stimulus.
That may help explain why different workouts showed different strengths in the analysis.
Blood vessel health isn't one single measure, so there may not be one workout that is best at everything. Fitness levels earlier in life have also been linked to healthier arteries decades later.
The researchers also cautioned that these findings are exploratory.
Confidence in the evidence was low, and some comparisons were based on limited or inconsistent data. So this isn't a definitive ranking of workouts.
What this could look like in real life
You don't need to completely redesign your routine based on one analysis. But if you already enjoy different types of training, there's a good reason to keep them in the mix.
Intervals may be particularly useful for arterial stiffness, while steady cardio and combined cardio-plus-strength training may offer an advantage for artery-wall structure.
Hybrid training showed the largest improvement in blood vessel responsiveness.
There are also plenty of reasons to strength train beyond vascular health, including maintaining muscle and supporting metabolic health.
Regular cardio can also help improve VO2 max, a measure of how efficiently your body uses oxygen, and certain workouts may lower blood pressure throughout the day.
You don't need a perfect weekly formula. A mix of cardio, strength, and some higher-intensity work can give your body different training stimuli while supporting several aspects of health.
The takeaway
Different types of exercise may support different aspects of vascular health.
While the evidence is still early, mixing cardio, strength, and higher-intensity work may be a more useful approach than searching for one perfect workout.