Bike Your Way to Lower Dementia Risk

A new study suggests that hopping on a bike could do more than keep you fit. It may also help protect your brain. According to CNN, researchers following nearly half a million adults in the UK Biobank study found that people who cycled had a 19% lower risk of developing dementia and a 22% lower risk of Alzheimer's compared to those who traveled by car, bus or train. The study also showed cyclists had larger hippocampal volumes, the part of the brain tied to memory and learning. Dr. Joe Vergesi of Stony Brook University said this is the first study to show that cycling is linked not only to lower risk of dementia but also to a larger hippocampus. Experts caution the study was observational and relied on self reported habits. But the findings fit decades of research showing exercise benefits the brain. Foreign so what's the real message here? Spend less time sitting on your butt and more time moving. Bike riding is a perfect example. New research shows that bike riding can reduce your chances of developing Alzheimer's. For that reason alone, hop on your bike today. Let's go a little deeper here and look at this. Know I want to, I want to not be a hypocrite because I am one of the first ones to tell you to warn you against a lot of news that's put out that isn't scientifically grounded, that is merely correlational because it is true that you know, certain, you know, certain people take medicines and then the next day they die? Well, it's not because of the medicine, it's just a correlation because every single day some people die somewhere. So you can't say just because it's correlated, there's causation. I can jump up and down and do a rain dance and it rains later today. It's correlated, but there's no causal connection. So this was an observational study. Here's what we don't really know. Is it, are the numbers skewed because somebody who's already in bad health and more likely to have Alzheimer's or develop Alzheimer's, they've already self selected away from pedaling their bikes. That can skew the results. The report was these were self reported. So a lot of times people like to say they ride their bike. It makes them feel good, it makes them feel like, oh, I'm virtuous, I don't want to admit I don't ride bikes. So this was self reported. Most of the participants were white. So I don't know that it really gave a good sample size. But having said all of that there, to me there's just countless, countless studies and research that comes out virtually daily that shows human movement is a good thing. When you looked at the anecdotal stories. And again, I'm going back to anecdote. When you look at the stories of people 100 years old and still vibrant, it's typically never that they go to the gym every day and lift weights every day. It's typically never that they go to jazzercise class. No offense to jazzercise. It's that they figure out a way of incorporating movement into their daily life. And that's why I love bicycles. Now, I have had. I don't know if it's just me because I consider myself fortunate in all the big picture aspects of life, but I've had at least four bicycles stolen. The last one I had had used maybe five times. That was a nice bike. It was stolen. But most recently, as those of you who are regular viewers know, I bought a quadricycle. So I now use a quadra. Yeah, there's four wheels on it and it looks like a golf cart. Looks like, like a clown car. But I take that everywhere when I'm in my own community. So when I'm going to the swimming pool, pickleball courts, or just out for an evening instead of a walk, since it's so hot here in Florida, I routinely use my bicycle on a daily basis. Now, does this guarantee I'm going to live to be 100? No. But for me, it's essential to one of my main mantras in life. It's something I program my brain to hear every single day and my own audio reminders, my own text reminders. And here it is. TJ Move more instead of sitting, stand instead of standing, walk instead of walking, run instead of sitting on a car seat or a golf cart, seat, pedal. That's what it. To me, that's what's more significant. And the problem in our modern capitalistic system is other than the Schwinn Manufacturing bike company and a few other bike companies, which are pretty small companies, no one has an incentive to bombard you with billions of dollars of advertising to ride your bike. Unfortunately, the people the money are the pharmaceutical companies that, not that they're bad people, they're lovely people, but they basically need to wait for you and me to be so lazy, to not exercise, to gorge ourselves with so much fatty, unnutritious food. With the sad diet, the standard American diet of lots of processed carbohydrates, fat, sugar, salt. They wait for us to become obese and overweight. And diabetic. And then they bombard us with reminders to buy their pharmaceuticals. And you may need their pharmaceuticals at that point. But what I need you to think about is how can you program your brain to do the healthy thing on a daily basis? Because you're going to get reminders every day to eat more chips, to drink more colas, to drink more sugary drinks. You get those reminders in the form of 10,000 marketing ads you receive every single day. And you're not going to get 10,000 reminders to ride your bike. So I'm hoping to change that equation a little right now with a reminder. Let's look at some more facts here. Walking shows some mixed results according to this survey. Some benefit, but not as much as the cycling. What is interesting here is the cycling is tied to the larger hippocampus, which is key for memory and learning. Now, I'm speculating here. Let me state very clearly, I'm not a medical doctor, I'm not a biologist, I am speculating here, but I'm thinking most people when they're riding a bike are not staring at gps. I understand you could have your phone mounted and you're looking at it, but that's still one area where I don't see people staring at their GPs. I'm certainly not using it when I'm on my quadricycle. Therefore, you actually have to think about does this street go here? Does this where I need to turn to get to this restaurant or this store, this grocery store. So you're having to actively think in a way that if you're just in a car these days, it's so easy to just automatically put in GPS and not have to. I don't know if that's why or not, but again, what they found was Alzheimer's risk was 22% lower among cyclists. But what we don't know is that such a self selected group of people who are already healthier in so many regards that even if they didn't bike, they would be better off. Here's the thing. If you take safety precautions and wear a helmet and you don't get run over, because that is a health risk. Biking very few, there's very few downsides to biking more. You're getting your blood going, fresh air, a little sunlight, you're getting your heart right up, you're getting, depending on how hard you're pedaling, you're getting aerobic benefit. All of those things have been proven to, to make you healthier and to decrease the odds of getting chronic disease. So for that reason alone, I think you need to give biking another chance. If you tell yourself, well, you know, I biked as a kid. That's a kid thing. No, it's not. I'm 62 years old. I bike every single day now. And I gotta tell you, I'm loving it. Absolutely loving it. Now, lest you think I'm a hypocrite, I want you to hear it from me first. I will confess, with my quadricycle, there is an electric assist, because the quadricycle is much heavier than a bicycle. And so I do use the electric assist, but I'm pedaling the whole time. So if you ever see me out on a quadricycle, wave and say, if I'm not pedaling, say, hey, why aren't you pedaling? They do think I need more exercise. You need more exercise, and we need reminders to exercise. So figure out some way if your bike is in the garage or you need air in the tire, write yourself a reminder right now to try to bike later today. And I'm recording this on a Sunday morning. This is the perfect day to go bike riding, I hope, for you. But don't wait for the perfect day. Just start riding your bike. I think if you take proper safety precautions, you will not regret it.