If a the results of a decades-long study hold up to scrutiny, we could all be feeling a lot more pressure to get pumped up. Researchers discovered that men with large muscles were up to 40% less like to die from cancer than those who did no weight training. And the benefits of weight training remained significant even when other risk factors such as a high body mass index were present.
A team of experts, led by scientists from Sweden’s Karolinska Institute, tracked the lifestyles of 8,677 men aged between 20 and 82 for more than two decades.
Each volunteer had regular medical check ups that included tests of their muscular strength.
Between 1980 and 2003, researchers monitored how many developed cancer and subsequently died from it.
The results showed men who regularly worked out with weights and had the highest muscle strength were between 30 and 40 per cent less likely to lose their life to a deadly tumor.
According to the report, it’s not necessary to get pumped up like a body-builder. But an increase in muscle mass gained through doing some resistance training a couple times a weeks seems to be a pivotal health factor.
