What sport makes you live the longest? (2023)

Do sporty people live longer?

Overall, athletes live longer and have a reduced incidence of both CVD and cancer mortality compared to the general population, refuting the 'J' shape hypothesis. However, different health risks may be apparent according to sports classification, and between sexes, warranting further investigation.

Lifetime sports are those you can play for your whole life. Finding a sport that you enjoy is one of the keys to exercise adherence—otherwise known as sticking with it once you start. 1 You can't win or reap all the physical and mental health benefits of sport if you don't continue to play it.

Compared to a life without a competitive sports career, a higher socioeconomic status and the avoidance of general risks during the sports career lead to a longer life span. In contrast, with increasing training load, sport-specific risk factors reduce the life span.

Other studies show that compared to the general population, elite athletes have lower rates of heart disease, stroke, and smoking-related cancers. Even the most extreme endurance athletes—Tour de France cyclists, for example—have a 40 percent lower mortality rate than nonathletes.

Regular, moderate activities, such as brisk walking, have been associated with increasing life expectancy by several years. For example, 150 minutes of exercise or more each week increased life expectancy by about 7 years over those who didn't do regular moderate exercise.

Interestingly, there is a clear difference between team and individual sports when it comes to how much sleep professional athletes require. Research shows that individual sport athletes sleep on average 6.5 hours a night while team sports came in at 7 hours.

They include bicycling, cross‐country skiing, figure skating, swimming, jogging, golf, backpacking, badminton and just plain exercising.

Sport reduces stress and depression

At the same time, physical activity stimulates production of endorphins. These are natural mood lifters that can help keep stress and depression at bay. Endorphins may also leave you feeling more relaxed and optimistic after a hard workout on the field.

Swimming is a sport you can enjoy throughout your lifetime, but you have to start somewhere. Babies and young children can be enrolled into our Survival Swim program, while children and adolescents of all ages are encouraged to fine-tune their swimming skills in our Stroke Development classes.

The sport with the lowest life expectancy: Boxing

According to experts (see below), the accumulation of head blows over time has an adverse effect on the body and can reduce life expectancy.

Do athletes have bigger hearts?

Athletes who pursue intense endurance exercise for five hours or more per week may develop exercise-induced cardiac remodeling—often referred to as athlete's heart—a physiologic response where the heart becomes larger and more efficient than average as a natural response to intensive exercise.

If you're an athlete in training, you may need more. "Just as athletes need more calories than most people when they're in training, they need more sleep, too," Geier says. You're pushing your body in practice, so you need more time to recover. Athletes in training should sleep about an hour extra.

Long-distance running, cycling, cross-country skiing, triathlon and long course swimming are typical endurance sports.

Regular physical activity helps prevent and treat noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) such as heart disease, stroke, diabetes and breast and colon cancer. It also helps prevent hypertension, overweight and obesity and can improve mental health, quality of life and well-being.

Longevity is defined as "long life" or "a great duration of life." The term comes from the Latin word longaevitās. In this word, you can see how the words longus (long) and aevum (age) combine into a concept that means an individual who lives a long time.

Statistically, Glasgow Rangers are the most successful sports team in the world with a total of 55 league titles.

1- Boxing They brought together a panel of experts to rank the top 10 most demanding sports based on endurance, power, strength, flexibility, agility, durability, hand-eye coordination, agility, nerve and analytic aptitude.

According to several studies about “science of muscles and movement” experts label boxing as the most demanding sport for an athlete. Boxing requires strength, power, endurance, and the ability to withstand huge hits over a period of time.

Speaking of boxing, though, a panel of eight experts convened by ESPN in 2004 went in a different direction to “Forbes.” The sports scientists, athletes and journalists voted boxing tops for its blend of endurance, strength, power, speed, ability, flexibility and other elements of athletic skill.

Which kind of sport is the best option for health?

Sports have an immense impact on a person's daily life and health. They do not just give you an interesting routine but also a healthy body. Getting indulged in physical activities like sports improves your heart function, reduces the risks of diabetes, controls blood sugar, and lowers tension and stress levels.

Longer life spans tend to run in families, which suggests that shared genetics, lifestyle, or both play an important role in determining longevity.

Maintaining five healthy habits — eating a healthy diet, exercising regularly, keeping a healthy body weight, not drinking too much alcohol, and not smoking — during adulthood may add more than a decade to life expectancy, according to a new study led by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Indeed, World Bank estimates have shown a steady increase to an average life expectancy of 71 years in 2019 — an improvement of six years on the figure two decades earlier.