What Does Riding a Bike Do for Your Body?
As far as low-impact aerobic exercises go, biking is among the best of the best. It holds a wealth of benefits for riders in almost all skill levels, which adds to its already high popularity.
If exercise is the last thing on your mind, you can use your bike for transport. Even then, you’d still get the exercise you need.
When choosing a bike, people don’t just think about a better riding experience; they also think about their health. Today, we’ll cover specifically the physical health benefits of cycling, so you’d be even more inclined to try it out.
Cycling Physical Benefits
Aside from learning more about bikes and meeting fellow enthusiasts, you also get tons of physical benefits from pedaling around in the city. Below are just some of them that you need to make a note of.
1. Develop Leg Strength
Cycling boosts lower-body performance in several ways. It strengthens your leg muscles while also allowing you to observe its limitations.
So, your hamstrings, glutes, quads, and calves only get the workout that’s appropriate for their level of development. As you progress, the level of workout for these parts also follows.
A cycling-weightlifting tandem can further develop those lower body muscles. Go for a few rounds of biking as cardio, then couple that with several sets of squats, lunges, and leg presses as strength training. Those leg muscles will become monstrous before you know it.
2. Improve Weight Management
Routine cycling at high intensities can shed those extra pounds like they’re nothing. It lowers the levels of fat in your body, promoting healthy weight management.
Not to mention, it also builds muscle and boosts metabolism. So, you don’t have to worry about a few cheat meals here and there.
3. Perfect for Beginners
Most physical activities that have considerable physical health benefits aren’t easy to get used to. However, cycling isn’t one of them.
Riding a bike is simple and offers various alternatives even for those who are not comfortable riding bikes in motion. A stationary bike should solve that problem easily.
A standard bicycle also lets you take it slow when you need to. Then, as you get fitter or slowly recover from whatever was holding you back, you can amp up the intensity.
4. Provides a Good Mental Health Boost
The various aspects of health are so closely intertwined that improvements in one directly leads to improvements in another. When you feel better about yourself physically, you also help ease those mental challenges holding you back.
You’ll no longer feel as lonely, anxious, depressed, or stressed as you used to. That’s all thanks to your newfound hobby and the friends that come with it.
Whenever the feeling of lethargy starts creeping up, just get on that bike for a few minutes to get your body and mind going. That’ll stimulate the release of endorphins, which boost your mood and lower stress levels.
5. Provides a Good Ab Workout
Perhaps one of the best physical health benefits of cycling is its ability to work your back and abdominals. It maintains your body’s posture by keeping you in an upright position while you ride. The more you get used to this, the more you develop core strength.
When your back and abdominals get the daily workout they need, your spine becomes stronger, your stability improves, and your overall comfort while cycling becomes next-level.
6. Helps Battle Cancer
Cycling is often incorporated in a cancer patient’s recovery plan because of its ability to improve cardiovascular health. If cancer runs in the family, you can decrease your risk of getting it by staying fit and healthy through cycling.
Many who have fought breast cancer say that the adverse effects of their disease are not as damaging due to their stronger bodies and minds, courtesy of an excellent cycling program. A program can also address the effects of aggressive cancer treatments, so they won’t be as impactful.
7. Gives a Positive Start To the Day
What better way to start your day than getting your heart rate going? Cycling helps boost circulation and gives a sense of accomplishment as you begin your morning. Thus, you’ll be more inclined to make wise decisions as the day goes by.
Even low-intensity morning rides can shed excess fat, boost endurance, and take your energy and metabolism levels to new heights for the rest of the day.
Ride Your Bike Today!
It’s high time to take your steed out of the shed and reintroduce it to your life. If you’ve been cycling all this time, at least now you know how you’re helping your body.
Keep at it because consistency is key to optimal health improvements. Remember, the things mentioned above are just the tip of the iceberg of cycling as a lifestyle can take you in the long run.