Arnold Schwarzenegger‘s Newsletter, the Arnold Pump Club, has been created for the sole purpose of educating people ever the right choices when it comes to fitness and health. Throughout the history of fitness, the misconceptions about longevity are deep-rooted in doing only cardio. However, research suggests something different which Schwarzenegger has now made his village aware of.

The bodybuilding icon imparted his knowledge about how along with cardio, if another aspect of gym training, lifting weights, is added, the risk of mortality risk can be pushed back to a greater degree. Let us look at how the data compels people to take these two exercises seriously and what is Schwarzenegger’s answer to the question of “How to fight off death?”

Arnie recommends resistance training and aerobic exercises

Schwarzenegger’ wrote, “Research suggests that the best way to prolong your life is to include both resistance training and aerobic exercise.” He explained that people who lift weights were seen to have lessened their mortality rate by 22 percent, whereas, those who did their cardio regularly had reduced it to 34 percent. The former bodybuilder champ also talked about how combining these two would yield better results. He stated, “But the winner was doing weights and cardio. The combined effort led to nearly a 50 percent reduction in mortality risk.”

He also suggested how people who did strength training at least twice a week would have a lesser risk of death, “regardless of cause,” when compared to people who do not do weights at all. Schwarzenegger then wrote his own recommendation. He said, “The current recommendation is to get 150 to 300 min of moderate-intensity exercise or 75 to 150 minutes of vigorous-intensity exercise per week.” He also added that some movements were better than no movement, but people should try to exceed their intensity level every once in a while.

Arnold Schwarzenegger had previously mentioned how one can increase their life span in another way that does not involve the gym at all.

Laughing out loud can add eight more years to your life: Arnie

Schwarzenegger once stated that people who usually laugh more can extend their life span up to eight long years than those who don’t laugh much. “A phenomenon known as the “humor cliff” suggests that we begin to laugh less in our 20s, and compared to childhood, we laugh a fraction of the time,” he explained.

He explained that people who laugh more would have about a 48% decrease in death risk regardless of cause. Schwarzenegger said, “Frequent laughter was associated with a 48 percent decrease in death from all causes, a 73 percent lower risk of death from heart disease, and an 83 percent lower risk of infection.” 

Out of these two ways of increasing one’s longevity, which one would you prefer? Would you like to follow both the recommendations? Let us know in the comments below.