“There is some good news here for older women in the population, in that they respond much like younger women do to training,” said study leader and exercise physiologist George Brooks, UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology. “The results are very encouraging for exercise without weight loss as an effective means for increasing vigor and controlling risk factors for chronic diseases in older women.”

Although the endurance training involved cycling on an exercise bike for an hour, five days a week, at 65 percent of maximum lung capacity, the researchers noted that even less strenuous aerobic exercise would likely produce some benefit.

This is definitely good news for women in this age group who generally experience decreased estrogen, lean body mass, and aerobic capacity. “Despite changes in hormones and changes in body composition, postmenopausal women can make significant changes in their cardiovascular fitness without going on extreme diets,” said Zinta Zarins, a newly minted UC Berkeley Ph.D. who conducted the experiments and is now a post-doctoral fellow at UC San Francisco.

By the end of the study, the participants’ blood pressure during exercise had dropped by 8 millimeters of mercury, while their heart rates were 19 beats per minute less when performing at the same intensity as early in the study. In addition, the women decreased their carbohydrate burning during exercise and increased their fat burning by about 10 percent. The women maintained their body weight as a way to balance energy input and expenditures.

These are very exciting results for postmenopausal women. Much more on this fascinating study can be found at sciencedaily.com.

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