(AGENPARL) – Rome, 23 May 2024
(AGENPARL) – Thu 23 May 2024 In the Udine area, around sixty healthy volunteers of 40 years of average age were involved
GOING TO WORK BY BICYCLE, EVEN FOR SHORT DISTANCES,
IMPROVES HEALTH AND REDUCES CO2 EMISSIONS INTO THE ATMOSPHERE
The results of a study by the Exercise Physiology Laboratory
of the Department of Medicine of the University of Udine
Udine, 23 May 2024 – Going to work every day by bicycle, even for relatively long distances
short – about 8 kilometers round trip from home, more or less half an hour a day, is associated with a
improvement of “cardiovascular fitness”. But also of the function of small blood vessels and
of the endothelium, i.e. the thin layer of cells that lines the internal surface of the vessels, whose alterations
they are a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases, glucose intolerance, development of diabetes. AND
this is demonstrated by a study by the Exercise Physiology Laboratory of the Department of Medicine
of the University of Udine thanks to a project co-financed, with a doctorate on green topics, by the Union
European. The research is directed by the head of the Laboratory, Bruno Grassi, professor of physiology.
The study, conducted in the metropolitan area of Udine in collaboration with the Fiab aBicitUdine association,
it involved around sixty healthy volunteers with an average age of 40. They were placed in a first phase
comparing a group of subjects who usually went to work by bicycle and one who went
usually working in the car. In a second phase the people who used the car were convinced to
use the bicycle for six months.
The results will be presented at the end of May at the main world congress of Sports Medicine
organized by the American College of Sports Medicine (Acsm) to be held in Boston. The use of the bicycle is
result in satisfying the minimum weekly physical activity requirements set by the Acsm.
The study During the bicycle trip, with a portable metabolimeter, it was also measured
the emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) with the air exhaled by the person pedaling. The
Human metabolism in fact consumes oxygen and produces CO2. The results showed that the emission of
CO2 was 15 times lower than that associated with traveling in a small petrol car
displacement along the same path.
«The use of the bicycle as a means of transport, even on relatively short journeys – summarizes the
Professor Grassi – promotes an active lifestyle and represents protection against
development of chronic pathologies, especially cardiovascular and metabolic ones. At the same time it has effects
positive for the environment, reducing vehicular congestion and CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. I study
