By Marcia Zimmerman, M.Ed., C.N.

LAST YEAR when the National Academies' Institute of Medicine recommended an hour of exercise a day, many people felt that goal was unreasonable. But you can easily meet these guidelines - by accumulating physical activity over the course of the day. Just pay attention to your daily physical activities, even if the holidays keep you too busy to make it to the gym.

EXERCISE SMARTER
As we age, our stamina, strength, balance and flexibility start to decline. This happens so gradually that we don't realize it right away. The one thing we do gain as we age is the wisdom to know ourselves better. Instead of beating yourself up because you can't do what you could in your teens or 20's, work smarter. Look at exercise in a different way, thinking about how you're moving in order to meet your fitness goals.

EXERCISE WHILE YOU WORK
Ordinary tasks can make a significant contribution to your daily exercise total. Start by watching the clock when you're vacuuming or washing floors. Vigorous housework counts in terms of fitness

While at the office, you can increase your strength even sitting at your desk. The way you sit is extremely important: Make sure your back is well supported and your shoulders are relaxed, then keep your lower abdominals ["seat-belt" muscles] engaged. Check your breathing from time to time, drawing air deeply into your lungs without flaring your ribs, then exhaling slowly through your mouth.

Keep a small ball under your desk, and place it between your ankles or knees from time to time, alternately squeezing and releasing it. The small muscles you engage while doing these exercises will build strength and balance.

You can also improve your flexibility at the office. From a comfortable sitting position, lift your legs out straight with your feet flexed , toes pointed up. Do 8 or 10 leg lifts, bending from your knees. You can engage a different set of muscles by pointing your toes during these leg lifts. Repeat with your heels together and toes pointed outward, Charlie Chaplin-style. Then repeat the leg lifts with your toes touching and heels wide apart so you're knock-kneed. You'll feel the pull on the muscles on both the inside and outside of your legs, as well as the front of your thighs and calves. These exercises will also improve the appearance of and circulation in you legs.

Remember to get up from your desk frequently to walk around the office. Take the stairs whenever possible. British researchers found that previously sedentary young women improved their lipid and respiratory profiles, and even lowered their blood pressure and lactic acid levels after just seven weeks of stair climbing at work.

HOBBIES COUNT, TOO
Leisure activities add up. Finnish doctors found that men who engaged in moderate to vigorous leisure-time activities were less likely to develop metabolic syndrome, a condition that can led to diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Develop a hobby that you enjoy and can stick with, be it gardening, golf, or walking. Skating, skiing, and snow shoeing will shape you up in cold weather.

Women who engage in yard work can improve their bone-mineral density as much as those who work out with weights. In fact, University of Florida investigators found that heavy yard work was better than jogging, swimming, calisthenics, bicycling, aerobics, walking, and dancing for building dense bones. Splitting and chopping wood or shoveling snow are even more energy-intensive chores for those who are fit.

WALK TO TURN BACK THE CLOCK
Walking is one form of aerobic exercise that benefits the cardiovascular and respiratory systems, along with swimming, jogging, cycling, skiing, and climbing stairs. Many people have discovered the importance of walking during their lunch hour. But there's a big difference between power walking to stay young. The latter allows you to clear your mind from work or personal concerns and to concentrate instead on moving your body correctly.

Follow these simple steps along the path of anti-aging walking:

• Stretch first.
• Keep your spine straight and your core engaged.
• Breathe deeply in rhythm with your steps.
• Concentrate on tightening the muscles in your thighs, back of legs, and buttocks as you move forward. Walking over hills gives you the best opportunity to practice this technique.
• Keep your knees flexible and soft to avoid locking your joints.
• Make sure your feet are tracking straight ahead of your hips. We all tend to "to out" as we get older.
• Relax your shoulders, keeping your collarbone wide. Avoid pumping your arms and hunching your shoulders.
• Concentrate on what you're doing: You can window-shop another time.

STRENGTHEN YOUR CORE
Working smart also means moving your body from a position strength - your core, or torso, particularly the lower abdominal area. Conditioning exercises (stretching, t'ai chi, qi gong, yoga and Pilates) help strengthen your core - and have become the latest craze in fitness. Pilates is enjoying tremendous popularity because it includes anaerobic, or resistance training, with the use of a machine called the "reformer".

Calisthenics, Pilates, weight training, and working out with an exercise band are all forms of resistance exercise, which helps increase your strength. Resistance training is also important for building and maintaining bone mass, improving body composition, and preventing or reducing the inflexibility and pain of ostarthritis. Perhaps the greatest psychological benefit is improved self-esteem.

WORKOUTS LOWER HEALTH RISKS
Diabetes and heart disease are the two most common ailments that plaque older individuals. Regular exercise alters the body's insulin response, improving insulin's ability to handle glucose - a considerable benefit for those with insulin resistance and diabetes.

Just how vigorous should your workouts be? Frequency may be more important than intensity. A recent study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that those who exercised more often, but not necessarily at high intensity, showed the greatest cardiovascular benefits.

HOW MANY CALORIES ARE YOU BURNING?
You can figure how many calories you are burning with exercise by using a simple equation:

Calories = (weight in pounds / 2.2) x (mins. of exercise / 60) x (MET activity value from table below) . . . any questions?

Alright, I was never very good at math either. Let's see if we can work this out. The first factor (weight / 2.2) converts your weight in pounds to weight in kilograms. The second factor expresses the minutes spent exercising as hours, eg. 30 mins divided by 60 yields 0.5, or one-half an hour. If you keep track of your time in terms of hours, skip the conversion and just enter the hours. Example: if you exercise for 2 hours just use 2 for the second factor. If you exercise for 120 mins then divide by 60 to get 2. The third factor comes from MET Activity table. Just look up the MET value for your exercise activity.

Here's an example. I have just come back from a 45 minute, brisk walk. I weigh about 125 pounds. First I calculate my weight in kilograms (my weight in pounds divided by 2.2); that's 56.8 kg. Now, the hours exercised - enter either .75 for the three quarters of an hour I walked or divide 45 by 60. In either case the second factor is 0.75. Now look at the table below to get the MET for brisk walking. The MET is 4. Now I multiply the three factors together, 56.8 x .75 x 4 to get my calories. The answer: 170 calories. If I walk 3 times a week that's 570 calories per week. So, in addition to all the other benefits of exercise mentioned above, I can lose a little weight at the same time I am improving my overall health. §