Health-Wise, Professional Gamers Are Practically Dead

[BuzWeaver]

In news that is probably not too shocking, professional gamers are not exactly the most physically fit individuals. While top gamers are as mentally agile as athletes, they are physically comparable to a 60-year-old chain-smoker, according to a study from England's University of Essex.

Study author Dr. Dominic Micklewright pointed to one gamer who appeared to be slim and healthy but actually "had the lung function and aerobic fitness of a heavy smoker in his sixties," the Daily Telegraph reports. Micklewright blamed the 10-hour daily gaming sessions performed by most professional gamers and urged them to get active or risk heart disease down the line.

Mentally, however, gamers are in top shape. ''Their reaction time, motor skill, competitiveness and emotions were pretty close," Micklewright told the Telegraph. "Elite athletes have unusually high levels of positive feelings and low levels of negative feelings such as depression and fatigue."

Micklewright collected his data at April's Gadget Show Live in Birmingham, England.

Source

[stormlord]

Worse lung function than a chain smoking 60 year old? Pretty bad!!!!

There're a lot of obese and sedentary people (office jobs) in the UK and the US.

I recommend 30 minutes per day of moderate physical actiivity and 30 minutes of intense exercise 3 times a week. It's hard at first and the sweat is not easy to cope with, but it's good for you in the long run. It helps your arteries to expand and stay that way and for your heart to build a vast network of capillaries (this is an example of safety in redundancy and finding the shortest path between two points). Ofcourse, overdoing it's not good either. The human heart has a finite number of times that it can beat in a lifetime. If you overuse it, you'll shorten your lifespan. Underuse can lead to a heart that's not efficient. Find the balance.

Ofcourse, there're other risk factors for heart disease. Exercise is not a silver bullet. Obesity is the number one factor and obese people tend to avoid physical activity. You need a healthy diet (lots of plant-based foods) and a good balanced lifestyle. Too much stress can easily ruin everything. And some people have a genetic disadvantage. Even air pollution can increase your risks of a heart attack. There're other risk factors. You have to know these things and work with your doctor to attack it where it counts.

Even modern jobs based on phyiscal activity aren't what they were 100 years ago. My grandpa worked probably twice as hard to cut trees down and transport them. He remembers using hand saws. That was brutal work! Nowadays, they don't even have to use chainsaws. They can use these big machines that cut the tree down single handedly, in addition to cutting all of its limbs. All of this reduces the physical activity of the worker and applies pressure on them to get their exercise away from work.

At the end of the day, we have to realize the human body has evolved to move. To move a lot! We have only lived in this modern lifestyle for a hundred years at most. Our body has not evolved to a lifestyle with less physical activity. This means our bodies are being pushed to their evolutionary limits. In fact, physical activity is not the only example where our evolutionary traits are being challenged. The rate of change in the past century is extraordinary. At some point, we will have to assume at least partial control of the evolutionary processes. What this means is using medicines, surgery and even genetic engineering to combat our evolutionary shortcomings. Natural evolution would easily require more time than we have.

One example of this need to combat nature is the prevalence of obesity in the modern world. In the past, we ate a lot of food and packed on the pounds to survive periods of famine. But now that we have a stable supply of food due to technology and greater knowledge, people overeat themselves to death. We're forced to turn to surgery and many other techniques to combat it. Genetic engineering is right around the corner.

And, if your heart goes out, you can always get an artificial one, but it's not as good as the original. The hope is to grow body parts from peoples own stem cells or dna, but this goal is years away.

The goal here is to keep the original whenever possible [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Thrymm]

The source uses one person as its basis of evidence. Did this person suffer from asthma? Did he/she smoke? Drink/Drug? Suffer from xbox live rage?

http://www.gearlog.com/2010/06/repor...ave_bodies.php

Also "professional" gamers and I chuckle at that, however they can make very good money like the "competitive eaters", aren't playing MMOs. I don't doubt people who sit behind a keypad and screen all day whether its EQ, WoW, CoD, fucking farmville etc aren't doing themselves a world of good if that is all they do.

The article is so ridiculous, "top gamers".. the 2 other articles it links doesn't mention the scope of the "test", or any other information. Shit, my grandmother sat in a chair for 40 years smoking with Mash and All In the Family on the TV, and sure died of cancer.... but blame that on TV? Or name her top sitcom watcher?

edit:
could be worse, they could be working for Foxconn: (alittle dated)
http://www.dailytech.com/Foxconn+Mak...ticle18526.htm

People live and die to ages which can defy their lifestyles. Someone who never drinks/smokes, works out like a champ, eats right could die tomorrow. Someone who smokes/drinks/eats like shit, doesnt work out, might live to be 90+.

Go Pro Gamers!