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"Stop ruminating on your past fitness feats and start looking forward instead: Maintaining a cardio fitness routine—or improving on your baseline fitness level—may help lower your risk of stroke and an early death, new research published in the American Heart Association’s journal Stroke found . In the study , researchers from Norway analyzed data from a group of 1,400 men ages 40 to 59. They broke them into four categories—remained fit, became unfit, remained unfit, and became fit—and followed them for 35 years (or until they died). They assessed the participants’ physical fitness with a bicycle ECG test at baseline and again at seven years. This test was used to measure their cardiorespiratory fitness—or, in this case, a measure of endurance based on how long they could keep riding. The upper half of the group, meaning those who scored above the median of 8.5 METs, was defined as “fit” and the lower half as “unfit.” That 8.5 METs median obtained at both visits suggests a relatively fit population, study author Erik Prestgaard, M.D., Ph.D.(c)., of Oslo University Hospital told Bicycling . That’s similar to the exertion level of riding moderately at about 13mph. The researchers found that those who started with low fitness and then became fit had a 60 percent lower risk of stroke and a 34 percent lower risk of dying during the study period than participants who remained unfit. Additionally, those who started with high fitness and became unfit were almost 2.5 times as likely to have a stroke and 74 percent more likely to die during follow up than the group who remained fit the entire time. “Not only did the data show that those becoming fit had lower stroke risk than those remaining fit, but also that those becoming unfit had a much higher stroke risk than those remaining fit,” Prestgaard said. “This should serve as motivation to continue to stay fit into middle age, not bask in former glories.” The researchers believe that exercise, or maintaining your fitness levels, can help strengthen your immune system, as well as reduce inflammation. That can cut down on the risk of blood clots, which can lead to ischemic stroke. Plus, improving fitness can also help to lessen traditional stroke risk factors , like high blood pressure, heart disease and obesity. These findings are especially important for younger people, both because it hammers home the importance of lifelong fitness and because it comes on the heels of of other research showing that stroke isn’t just a concern for older individuals. In fact, a 2017 study published in JAMA Neurology found that the number of men aged 35 to 44 hospitalized for a stroke has increased almost 42 percent from 2003–2004 to 2011–2012."
<https://www.bicycling.com/news/a25834408/cardio-fitness-lowers-stroke-risk/>