By Phillip Tomlinson
NYC Personal Trainer & Martial Arts Instructor

“How sweet it is… Pins and needles, needles and pins. It’s a happy man that grins.”

If only America’s most famous bus driver, the Honeymooners Ralph Kramden, knew that researchers, as early as 1953, discovered that people like him were on borrowed time, he may not have been cooing “how sweet it is.”

And, well, he may have been a worried rather than a grinning man.  Yes, Ralph’s considerable girth inspired some sick jokes but, in this case, that’s not what researchers were worried about.

Far from it.

Rather, what he did was the issue. And, like Big Ralph, what you do could be a big issue — no pun intended. So big, infact, that it may be lethal.  Yup — a life and death issue.

Let’s put it this way:  Sit for too long like Ralphie Boy, and you are more likely to die sooner than the person who spends a lot of time on his or her feet.  Of course, you’re thinking, that’s obvious.  But, hold your horses. Really. In this case, things aren’t that simple. This, according to scientists who found that the reason for this difference in life expectancy was the action of a gene that is not at all influenced by how much you exercise but, rather, by how much you sit or stand.

And here’s the scary part: It applies to you even if you’re ripped to the bone.  The British study first done in 1953 concluded that bus drivers were almost twice as likely to die of heart disease than conductors who were always on their feet.

The culprit? A gene that can cause heart disease. And it doesn’t matter if the Ralph Kramdens of this world exercise vigorously every day after sitting behind the wheel for eight hours. But it also doesn’t matter if you are skinnier than a rail, sit for eight hours and
then work out to the limit of your endurance.

The mere act of sitting for long hours causesthe gene to have an adverse effect.  Yes, lipoprotein lipase (LPL) will be at its highest — effectively breaking down fat for use as energy, when we are standing — but will take a nose dive when we are sitting.  Exercise, by all means, but know that you can never do enough to overcome the effects of long-term sitting.

The cure? Start giving up that chair through regular breaks, staying on your feet longer than you sit.