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The participants only worked out 18 minutes a week on average—and still got measurable results.
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Americans over 65 are routinely told that staying mobile means hours of weekly exercise, and most never get there.
A randomized trial from Penn State College of Medicine suggests the useful dose can be far smaller. Researchers tested whether a four-minute home routine, done every day, could move the needle for sedentary older adults who already had trouble walking.
The paper, published in PLOS ONE, followed 97 adults with an average age of 74 through a 12-week program the team calls FAST-2. Participants did four bodyweight exercises in sequence, each for 30 seconds, with 30 seconds of rest between them. The whole workout runs four minutes.
The four moves are push-ups (allowed against a wall or countertop), chair stands, two-arm seated rows with a resistance band, and stair stepping on a short step. The adults enrolled averaged only 18 minutes of exercise a week when they started.
